We Are Not Just Teachers - We Are Mothers First
This guest post is a collaborative piece written by Jackie Mancinelli & Liz O’Donnell of Aaliyah in Action and PUSH for Empowered Pregnancy When I first read Liz’s story online, I could not stop staring at the accompanying photograph. In it, she cradled her daughter, Aaliyah. Instead of Liz looking overjoyed at meeting her daughter, she looked heartbroken. I recognized myself in that photograph because I have a very similar one from when I first met my son, Richard. In 2016, I had an emergency C-section to deliver my son at just 33 weeks along. He was in distress, and the doctors decided that it was best to deliver him and allow the NICU team to work with him. Once he was born, I expected to hear a cry, but instead I heard silence. And then murmurs between the doctor and midwife. I could hear snippets of their conversation: “lots of blood…” “not a placental abruption…” “placenta looks intact…” I could see a flurry of movement to my left as the NICU team took Richard. I screamed