Actually, I'm not fine… blog

Chapter 2: The Weeks I Still Count

Time doesn’t move the same way after loss. I look at the calendar and each week is a reminder of what could have been. I find myself doing the math, silently marking the days in my mind, the milestones, the growth that should have been. If everything had gone as I imagined, my baby would have been the size of an apple this week. Next week, maybe an avocado. My mind has memorized the fruit sizes and the measurements like a cruel ritual, one I cannot stop performing. It’s an endless chaos inside my mind.

Even in ordinary moments, I feel it. Walking past a baby aisle, I pause, almost holding my breath, because I know that space would have felt different if my child were here. Even small things, like hearing a lullaby like sounds when my husband sings in the room right next to me or a giggle from a child in the distance, tug at a place in me I didn’t know could be so raw. I imagine how my baby might respond to these sounds, the tiny movements I’ll never feel, the gentle nudges I will never see. Each imagined milestone lands like a weight, reminding me of what I lost and what I will never hold.

People tell me that these early weeks didn’t matter, that my grief is too much for something that wasn’t fully developed. But they don’t understand that my heart started counting the moment I knew life was growing inside me. My love didn’t need confirmation from doctors, ultrasounds, or heartbeat monitors. It existed, absolute and undeniable, from the first whisper of hope. And the absence of that life now is measured not just in weeks, but in the gaping holes those weeks would have filled in our story.

I try to distract myself. I scroll through social media, busy myself with work, clean the house, cook meals. But every week I pass another milestone, and my mind finds a way to count it. I picture the size my baby should be, the growth of their tiny body, the development of muscles, fingers, eyes, the very essence of a life I never got to meet. The more I imagine, the more real they feel, and the deeper the ache becomes.

It’s not just the physical growth I think about. It’s the potential, the personality that might have been, the life that could have unfolded. I imagine holding their hand for the first time, watching them take their first steps, seeing their curiosity bloom as they discover the world. I think about the bedtime stories, the giggles, the little quirks that make a child unmistakably themselves. Each vision is beautiful and unbearable all at once.

Even with all this pain, there is a strange tenderness in these weeks I count. They are proof that my love was real and deep. Proof that even when life was brief, my heart expanded to accommodate it. Every imagined kick, every phantom hiccup, every week that passes without them here reminds me of the love that did existed, even for just a moment in time.

Yet again, i toggle with the remaining feeling of tenderness, but also frustration. I feel robbed of time that should have been filled with anticipation, joy, and growth. I wanted to see the world through my baby’s eyes, to experience every tiny first alongside them. I wanted to watch the way my husband’s eyes might light up at their smiles, the gentle ways he would soothe and comfort. I wanted the story of our family to include this child, a living testament to the love we fought so hard to preserve. Now I carry only these weeks in my mind, each one a reminder of the future I will never get to live, even for a split seconds the dread that leaves me bleeding from an invisible open wound.

The counting that holds space in my head is relentless. It sneaks in at quiet moments when I am least prepared. A fleeting thought, a random object, a sound. A television commercial can throw me off balance, reminding me of a timeline that will never exist. I feel both grief and longing simultaneously, the two intertwined.

And still, somehow, I move forward. Some days, just putting one foot in front of the other feels like a victory. Some days, I am able to laugh or smile, even for a moment. But underneath, the weeks continue to accumulate in my mind, and the love I feel remains intact. These weeks are both a burden and a connection: a way to keep my baby alive in memory and in heart.

I don’t know when the counting will stop. Perhaps it won’t. Perhaps the weeks will always be etched into me, a calendar of love and loss that I will carry forever. And maybe that is okay. Maybe it is enough to hold onto these weeks in my mind, to honor them as part of our story, to recognize that grief, as heavy and relentless as it is, can coexist with love.

For now, I continue counting. I continue imagining. I continue feeling every week, every moment, every possibility that never came to be. And in doing so, I carry my baby with me, alive in memory, alive in heart, alive in the love that never fades. Continuing the toggling feelings of gratefulness and mourning.