Part of My Reality

On September 26, 2017, I went to the emergency room at 19 weeks pregnant following a car accident.

At 11:45 that night, I was checked. My heartbeat was strong, and so was my son’s. Kollin was still there. His little heart was still beating.

At 12:45 AM on September 27, I was transferred to the OB unit so they could establish baseline stats and check us again.

This time, they couldn’t find his heartbeat.

There are moments in life when reality seems to split into a before and an after. One minute, there was reassurance. There was still hope. There was a heartbeat.

And then there wasn’t.

Kollin was my son. He was wanted. He was loved. He had a place waiting for him in our family and a future we had already begun imagining.

I never got the lifetime with him that I expected to have, but his life still became part of mine.

Years later, I wrote about losing him in This Can’t Be Reality because this is where so much of my story begins. Long before some of the losses people know me for, there was this one.

There was Kollin.

Some people measure a life by how long someone was here. A mother doesn’t.

I remember the heartbeat. I remember the hope. I remember the moment everything changed.

And I remember him.

Part of my reality.

Part of my story.

My son, Kollin.

Always loved. Always remembered.

September 27, 2017 ❤️‍🩹