When I was eight months pregnant, my friends organized a baby shower to help me survive the hardest year of my life. By the end of that afternoon, my mother would be in handcuffs, my baby would be fighting for his life in the NICU, and I would learn—once and for all—that love and blood are not the same thing.
I hadn’t wanted a baby shower. I told my friends that more than once. What I wanted was peace—just a quiet afternoon, a few cupcakes, and something to distract me from the constant fear tightening in my chest. My pregnancy had been complicated from the start. One medical issue followed another, and the bills kept … Read more