A Mother's Love: A Journey Through Grief and Healing
Speaking on the theme Against All Odds at Speaker Slam® in Toronto on Apr 25, 2023, Sandeep Aujla took the stage with a five minute story and placed third.
Transcript
it's November 11 2020. a day I will never forget it was the day when I was supposed to hear the first little beautiful heartbeat and get that for the first ultrasound instead I'm lying on a hospital bed alone ridding in pain and with each spasm of pain I am convinced I'm losing this child I wish for my whole life the nurse wouldn't tell me anything just wait for the doctor would you like something for the pain she didn't understand this was a pain that medicine could never reach when the doctor finally came to see me I searched his eyes for a sign of what he
might say and when he hesitated to look me in the eye I knew I knew he was going to confirm my worst fears foreign if anyone says you can't miss someone you've never met they're wrong my grief was overwhelming and at far outshadowed the physical pain that I had endured for several hours before I was so angry at God for taking away the one thing I wanted more than anything else why why would he take away the gift that he gives me and then just it's a question most of us ask when we're standing in our own tragic moments why I felt a profound emptiness
as I walked out of that emergency room as if I was walking away from the last memory of my baby as if I was leaving behind every tangible reminder of the life that I carried inside of me for three months that was the threshold Crossing into the after Story of my very brief time as a mom foreign it was a dark time for me a season of tears and trying to swim my way back and then one day it hurt a little less and then the next week a little less it's not that the dark wasn't there anymore it's just that the sun had somehow
found its way in it always does you know I found myself standing on this bridge between the dark and the light standing in this moment of choice where I could pick the light or the dark but I knew if in that moment I chose the dark I wouldn't be able to move past this pain and misfortune so I chose the light what does that even mean it means that I decided that I was going to change what I was choosing to focus on I decided that I was going to stop focusing on the loss and start focusing on the gifts hidden somewhere in this experience
I was going to cherish the very brief time that I was a mom I allowed myself to be so grateful for the fact that I got pregnant at all which given my chronic illness the doctors had said was Against All Odds for me proving that sometimes we beat the odds which made me wonder maybe I had more days ahead of me of beating the odds I decided in that moment that grief would not be the final say in my life I would instead of choosing to write a story of loss I decided to write a story of Hope and maybe my story is coming to
you in a moment where your dream is not working out I can't take your pain away I can't even reduce it and I wouldn't want to I just want you to know that when it's time you will find your way back to a choice and you may not choose the circumstances what life gives you or takes away from you but you choose what you'll do from that moment on the story you write and I just want you to know that you can let Hope have the final say I was a mother for a moment and I will forever be grateful for the fact that I
got to experience at precious time I will also forever believe that I have what it takes to beat the odds and so do you
Transcript generated from the recording and lightly cleaned. Some names and wording may differ from the spoken speech.