My Husband Said the Funeral Van Would Take Me to a Clinic—Then a Loose White Cord Gave Me a Chance to Get Out

Then my daughter was born.

There was a short interval while the team assessed her.

To me it felt longer than any silence had a right to feel.

“Is she breathing?”

They told me what they were doing.

Then I heard her cry.

It was a small, sharp sound, and I started crying before I knew I had made a sound of my own.

She weighed just under five pounds.