I do not recognize this child.

I pace the floor, reminded of the days I did this with a newborn.  This time around she isn’t folded up against my chest, everything right with the world.  Instead she is kicking and screaming, and I am holding her tiny hands to keep her from clawing her face and pulling out clumps of hair.  […]

I pace the floor, reminded of the days I did this with a newborn.  This time around she isn’t folded up against my chest, everything right with the world.  Instead she is kicking and screaming, and I am holding her tiny hands to keep her from clawing her face and pulling out clumps of hair.  Sometimes I let her scratch me, hoping it gives her some sense of satisfaction, one thing she is able to control.

I don’t know why she is screaming; I wonder if she does.  Her shrill shriek breaks my heart into a million pieces, the same way this cancer shattered our lives.

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