I get asked by well-meaning (let’s be serious, prying) strangers and family members regularly if we’re having another, or if our daughter is going to be an only child.
But here’s the thing: She isn’t an only child.
Two months before she was conceived, I suffered a miscarriage. It was early, and painful, and heartbreaking. It felt as though a dream was dying. We had plans for that baby.
We talk about that baby regularly. While it was too early to know, I think it was a boy. He would have been named Connor. We tell our daughter about her big brother. We celebrate his due date and light a candle every October for Pregnancy & Infant Loss Awareness.
So when people ask if she’s an only child, the answer is “No.” She has a sibling that came and went before her, which paved the way to her life and that we remember every day. And that changes things; her life is different because she is the only living child. Her life experiences come with the shadow of the ones that her brother didn’t get; there is a sadness that I sometimes feel when I realize that her beautiful life wouldn’t exist if he hadn’t lost his.
My child is the only living child. She is our last, and in many ways, our first as well, but she is not our only.
