15 years ago today, my baby girl died in my arms at 5 1/2 months old after suffering excruciating pain from a rare metabolic syndrome. The gruesome details of the long ordeal I will not go into. After doing everything we could we signed a DNR and took her off life support... 1/

We had a meeting with the hospital pastor, the palliative care director, and specialists of various types who all tried to help us save Nicole. The consensus was that if she survived, she would have no quality of life but that it was unlikely she would pull through w/o. 2/

Life support. We were told we might be able to keep her alive longer with a tracheotomy (she already had a feeding tube). It was clear to us by this point that our little baby girl was dying. We chose not to go with a tracheotomy and decided that Nicole's 3/

Suffering needed to end. I don't have the words to describe to you just how soul crushing this entire 3 month event was. Watching your baby suffer unspeakable pain and not being able to do anything is the most helpless emotional pain a parent can experience 4/

I prayed and wept uncontrollably and prayed and wept uncontrollably on a loop. I also saw, while staying at the Children's hospital Pittsburgh, many suffering babies and young children. I realized that at any given moment on any given day, there are babies and children dying 5/

In hospitals around the world. The cold hard facts are not easy to look at or accept but babies die! They die from a huge number of different medical conditions that sometimes are not detected in the womb. People need to understand that not every pregnancy has a happy ending 6/

Not to mention that the mother herself can have serious life threatening complications during pregnancy that she has zero control over. #ProLife people need to face reality and get rid of their fallacy that #ProChoice people just want to kill perfectly healthy Anne Geddes 7/

Calendar babies. Yes, there are cases where women are just inconvenienced but I argue that they are much fewer than the women with REAL MEDICAL COMPLICATIONS AND BABIES WITH REAL MEDICAL COMPLICATIONS.

It is egregiously cruel to discount reality vs idealistic fantasy 8/

Regarding abortion rights in this country. Nobody LIKES abortion. Nobody WANTS abortion. People trying to interfere with pregnant women and their doctor need to accept the horrible reality that BABIES DIE! They need to accept the fact that WOMEN DIE! 9/

I'd give anything to see, smell, hold, and kiss my baby girl again but I thank God that she isn't suffering anymore and tbqh, if I could go back in time, I would show her mercy and have an abortion (as heartwrenching as it would be) so that I could stop her suffering from 10/

Happening any further than that. Do they think I'm guilty of infanticide? She died as an infant, we kept her comfortable with morphine and oxygen after we took her off life support... am I a murderer in their eyes? I don't feel like one... if anything 11/

I showed her mercy. I showed her love. It broke my heart and it broke my soul but I know where she is. She's not gone, she's just somewhere else and I'll get to see her again someday. I have REAL faith. My faith was the ONLY thing that got me through and 12/

It's stronger than ever! God is with me and I know it, I feel it, I believe it. I'm not afraid of going to hell and I don't need to shove my faith down anyone else's throat. It's private and it's personal... one on one and it's nobody else's business... that's how faith 13/

SHOULD be. I am #ProChoice and I believe in the teachings of Jesus. I am not an evangelical or a Catholic, I am a former protestant who has disowned organized religion for they clearly know not what they do.
They have forgotten about mercy. They have forgotten about charity.14/

They have forgotten about love.

I have seen with my own eyes and felt with my own heart this harsh truth:

There are worse things than death.

Rest in peace my sweet little Nicole.... Mommy loves you so much

Fin

Addendum:
The response has been truly remarkable. Thank you for your kind words of support.

I want you to know that Nicole was my middle child. I have a 21 year old daughter and 13 year old son. They are the light of my life. Here's an incognito of them taking a walk together