I've battled a fairly severe panic disorder for as long as I can remember. Pregnancy shoved my panic into overdrive.
Once Juni was born, my panic morphed. I didn't suffer from the never-ending attacks as much. But at night, rocking my new baby, my body aching from less sleep than anyone thought was humanly possible, my panic tortured me in a totally different way.
I began having visions of my baby, dead in my arms. I'm in the hospital, refusing to let him go. I know he's dead, but he's still warm. I can't let go. I can't stop crying. I can't stop talking to him. I can't stop stroking his skin. I can't let the nurses rip him from my protective arms.
Juni is three-and-a-half, and I still have the same vision, with me clutching his toddler-sized, limp body in my arms. It's the worst kind of panic attack. It's the kind no pharmaceutical company can develop a pill to cure. It's the kind of panic attack only a mother must suffer.
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