The percentage of sports better that end up losers.
As a long time sports better, I always said, meh I can beat the house edge, and now with Kalshi it’s not really gambling it’s trading.
Bullshit.
I’m officially retiring boys. If you choose to stay, I hope you become the 2.5%.
A few weeks ago, I shared the heartbreaking loss our family experienced. Since then, my wife has been carrying emotions that I now realize is very common for women to quietly carry after loss. She’s feeling guilt, shame, anger, confusion, and the endless cycle of questions that never seem to stop:
“What did I do wrong?”
“Was it something I could have prevented?”
“Why did this happen to us?”
“I don’t want to tell [that person].”
I’ve watched someone I love deeply search for answers in a situation where there often are none. And the hardest part is that so many women on here share these questions/ statements. They carry the weight of something that was never theirs to carry in the first place.
So I wanted to say this for anyone who needs to hear it:
You did not fail.
You did not cause this.
You are not broken.
And there is absolutely nothing shameful about what happened to you.
You are not “less of a woman” because your story didn’t go the way you imagined it would. Your worth is not measured by a pregnancy outcome, by your body’s ability to do something perfectly, or by whether life unfolded fairly. Sometimes terrible things happen to good people, loving mothers, healthy families, and people who did everything right.
I think one of the cruelest parts of loss is how isolating it can feel. Social media makes it seem like everyone else gets their happy ending while you’re left wondering why your world stopped spinning. But the reality is there are far more women hurting quietly than most people realize. Many never talk about it. Many smile through it. Many blame themselves for years.
Please don’t.
Your body is not your enemy.
Your grief is valid.
Your tears are valid.
Your anger is valid.
And your healing does not have a timeline.
I’ve learned over the last few weeks that grief isn’t linear. Some days feel almost normal. Other days a random song, a baby outfit, an empty room, or a simple memory can completely break you. That’s okay. Healing doesn’t mean forgetting. It just means learning how to carry the love and the pain at the same time.
And for the husbands, partners, families, and friends reading this: be gentle with them. Even when they seem okay, they may still be replaying every detail in their mind wondering if they somehow failed. Remind them often that they didn’t. Remind them they are loved. Remind them they are enough.
Most importantly, if you’ve experienced this kind of loss, please know you are not alone. There are people standing beside you who understand the pain, even if they’ve never said it out loud. There is no shame in grieving. There is no weakness in hurting. And there is still hope, even on the days it feels impossible to see it.
To every woman carrying this pain quietly I mean this from the bottom of my heart: you are stronger than you know, more loved than you realize, and no tragedy will ever define your value.
I debated posting this, but I want to share what our process actually looked like. My heart breaks as I write this, but I need to put it somewhere.
We went in for an ultrasound on a Friday. We saw her heartbeat. She was healthy, moving around, strong heartbeat, no concerns from the doctor at all.
This was my second child, and I’ve seen a lot of ultrasounds between our first and this pregnancy. I was in the room. I was present. I was holding my wife’s hand. But I wasn’t staring at the screen the whole time. I found myself checking emails and even scrolling social media.
It was the last time I would ever see my daughter alive, and I was fucking distracted.
I don’t know if I’ll ever forgive myself for that.
Then Monday night, around 11 PM, as we laid in bed trying to sleep, my wife told me she was worried about the baby. I downplayed it.
I said, “What are you worried about? We just saw her Friday. She’s great.”
She told me she hadn’t felt much movement that day, and normally the baby was extremely active. I asked whether she thought it was an emergency or if it could wait until morning since we already had a scheduled appointment at a 3D ultrasound place.
We talked ourselves through it. During Friday’s ultrasound, the baby had been moving a ton, but my wife couldn’t really feel much of it. We reassured ourselves everything was okay and agreed to wait until morning.
The next morning we arrived at the office. They were incredibly kind and brought us back quickly. The technician started the ultrasound and kept looking. And looking. And looking.
I could tell she was flustered, but she kept saying out loud that the baby was just in an awkward position.
But I could see it in her mannerisms. Something was wrong.
My wife sensed it too.
We looked at each other, and that was the first moment we both knew we needed to go to the ER.
At that point, we still weren’t 100% sure we had lost our daughter, but we definitely weren’t driving slowly to the hospital.
We rushed in.
Within about 15 minutes of arriving, they did another ultrasound. In less than 30 seconds, they confirmed what had taken the 3D technician 30 minutes to realize.
There was no heartbeat.
My wife screamed and broke down crying.
I went into shock. I just held her. I didn’t say anything. I didn’t even cry yet. I just held her while my brain tried to process what was happening.
Then came the blood work, the monitors, the questions, the constant poking and prodding. About 30 minutes later, the doctors came in and started explaining our options.
The first decision was how we wanted to deliver our daughter:
The doctors explained that vaginal birth carried fewer risks if we wanted to have another child in the future.
But the negatives were brutal. She would have to be medically induced. The process could take multiple days. It would be long, painful, and emotionally exhausting.
And because this would have been her first vaginal birth, they also discussed the potential psychological trauma of that first experience being tied to stillbirth.
Then came the next set of questions:
Did we want to see the baby?
Did we want to just briefly view her and let them take her?
Did we want to hold her?
Did we want to keep her in the room with us during our hospital stay?
That conversation broke me.
We disagreed.
I didn’t want to hold her. I didn’t want it to feel real. Part of my brain was desperately trying to cope by emotionally distancing myself from it. I wanted to shut my mind off and treat it like this was somehow different than losing a fully formed child.
Ironically, I generally lean pro-life, but in that moment my brain was racing for survival.
My wife wanted to hold her. She wanted every possible second with her.
The doctors told us that parents who spend time with their baby often have healthier long-term emotional recovery. So I let my wife make the decision.
During the C-section, I sat by my wife’s head while a blue tarp blocked the rest of the procedure from view. I could hear the tools, the movement, the conversations behind the curtain.
I spent the whole time trying to distract her. I talked about vacations, future plans, random things, anything to keep her mind away from the reality that she was cut open while they removed our dead daughter from her body.
The entire experience horrified me.
I was terrified for my wife’s life.
And somehow, through all of it, she handled it like an absolute warrior.
After the procedure, we saw our daughter for the first time.
Her lifeless body wrapped in a blanket.
She was tiny, but fully formed. She had my wife’s nose and my skin tone.
She was beautiful.
I carried her from the operating room back to our hospital room.
The doctors explained they would bring in a cooling bassinet to help preserve her body while we spent time with her.
We took turns holding her and crying together while we waited for it to arrive.
It took about 30 minutes.
That period was surreal. Part of me felt relief because my wife had made it through surgery safely, but at the exact same time, I was holding my dead daughter in my arms.
I still don’t know how to explain that feeling. My emotions were everywhere.
My wife needed close monitoring for the next three days, so our daughter stayed in the room with us the entire time.
Meanwhile, the phone calls started flooding in.
Every time we told someone, it felt like reliving the entire nightmare again from the beginning. Sometimes my wife would finally calm down after crying for half an hour, and then another phone call would come in and we’d have to say the words all over again.
“This happened.”
“She’s gone.”
“There’s no heartbeat.”
Over and over.
And now comes the part nobody prepares you for. I genuinely hope none of you ever experience this.
Warning: this part is graphic.
On day one, I was okay holding the baby and handing her to my wife.
By day two, I could feel how soft her head had become. Discoloration had started. At times there was even bleeding.
My wife still wanted to hold her constantly.
Meanwhile, I had started feeling like we were handling a body instead of a sleeping baby. It felt wrong to me, but I wanted to support my wife and give her the time she needed.
By day three, it became painfully obvious that we needed to let her go.
Her body had become extremely soft. There was significant discoloration, white spots were appearing, and her skin had started peeling.
I can barely write that sentence without stopping.
At one point my wife asked to hold her again, and I told her softly that I thought this should probably be our last time.
She disagreed at first.
But when I handed our daughter to her, she immediately saw what I had been seeing.
And I think that was the moment death finally became fully real to her too.
That was the moment she agreed we needed to say goodbye.
We prayed together. We held her. We said everything we needed to say.
Then we told the nurses we were ready.
Even that process was harder than I expected.
For some reason, I thought once we made the decision, they would come right away. But they didn’t. We had already said our goodbyes, and she still remained in the room with us for another three hours or so.
And when they finally came to take her, it became yet another goodbye all over again.
That was probably my biggest breakdown.
Afterward, we started calling cremation services. Something else nobody tells you: not every crematory accepts infants. It took several calls before we finally found one that could help us.
Eventually they came, took her body, and told us we would receive her ashes in a few weeks.
We’re still waiting.
Since then, we’ve had an overwhelming amount of support. Flowers. Church outreach. Meals. Messages. People showing up for us in ways I’ll never forget.
This has been the hardest thing I’ve ever gone through in my life.
Right now we’re just taking it one day at a time.
And honestly, I just hope my daughter is somewhere beautiful.
Sometimes I imagine my grandma holding her, feeding her a bottle while she sleeps peacefully somewhere far better than here.
I’m not a doctor. I’m qualified to talk about my experience. Nothing more or less.
Edit:
I debated posting this, but I want to share what this process actually looked like. My heart breaks as I write this, but I need to put it somewhere.
We went in for an ultrasound on a Friday. We saw her heartbeat. She was healthy, moving around, strong heartbeat, no concerns from the doctor at all.
This was my second child, and I’ve seen a lot of ultrasounds between our first and this pregnancy. I was in the room. I was present. I was holding my wife’s hand. But I wasn’t staring at the screen the whole time. I found myself checking emails and even scrolling social media.
It was the last time I would ever see my daughter alive, and I was fucking distracted.
I don’t know if I’ll ever forgive myself for that.
Then Monday night, around 11 PM, as we laid in bed trying to sleep, my wife told me she was worried about the baby. I downplayed it.
I said, “What are you worried about? We just saw her Friday. She’s great.”
She told me she hadn’t felt much movement that day, and normally the baby was extremely active. I asked whether she thought it was an emergency or if it could wait until morning since we already had a scheduled appointment at a 3D ultrasound place.
We talked ourselves through it. During Friday’s ultrasound, the baby had been moving a ton, but my wife couldn’t really feel much of it. We reassured ourselves everything was okay and agreed to wait until morning.
The next morning we arrived at the office. They were incredibly kind and brought us back quickly. The technician started the ultrasound and kept looking. And looking. And looking.
I could tell she was flustered, but she kept saying out loud that the baby was just in an awkward position.
But I could see it in her mannerisms. Something was wrong.
My wife sensed it too.
We looked at each other, and that was the first moment we both knew we needed to go to the ER.
At that point, we still weren’t 100% sure we had lost our daughter, but we definitely weren’t driving slowly to the hospital.
We rushed in.
Within about 15 minutes of arriving, they did another ultrasound. In less than 30 seconds, they confirmed what had taken the 3D technician 30 minutes to realize.
There was no heartbeat.
My wife screamed and broke down crying.
I went into shock. I just held her. I didn’t say anything. I didn’t even cry yet. I just held her while my brain tried to process what was happening.
Then came the blood work, the monitors, the questions, the constant poking and prodding. About 30 minutes later, the doctors came in and started explaining our options.
The first decision was how we wanted to deliver our daughter:
The doctors explained that vaginal birth carried fewer risks if we wanted to have another child in the future.
But the negatives were brutal. She would have to be medically induced. The process could take multiple days. It would be long, painful, and emotionally exhausting.
And because this would have been her first vaginal birth, they also discussed the potential psychological trauma of that first experience being tied to stillbirth.
Then came the next set of questions:
Did we want to see the baby?
Did we want to just briefly view her and let them take her?
Did we want to hold her?
Did we want to keep her in the room with us during our hospital stay?
That conversation broke me.
We disagreed.
I didn’t want to hold her. I didn’t want it to feel real. Part of my brain was desperately trying to cope by emotionally distancing myself from it. I wanted to shut my mind off and treat it like this was somehow different than losing a fully formed child. I never got peace.
My wife wanted to hold her. She wanted every possible second with her.
The doctors told us that parents who spend time with their baby often have healthier long-term emotional recovery. So I let my wife make the decision.
During the C-section, I sat by my wife’s head while a blue tarp blocked the rest of the procedure from view. I could hear the tools, the movement, the conversations behind the curtain.
I spent the whole time trying to distract her. I talked about vacations, future plans, random things, anything to keep her mind away from the reality that she was cut open while they removed our dead daughter from her body.
The entire experience horrified me.
I was terrified for my wife’s life.
And somehow, through all of it, she handled it like an absolute warrior.
After the procedure, we saw our daughter for the first time.
Her lifeless body wrapped in a blanket.
She was tiny, but fully formed. She had my wife’s nose and my skin tone.
She was beautiful.
I carried her from the operating room back to our hospital room.
The doctors explained they would bring in a cooling bassinet to help preserve her body while we spent time with her.
We took turns holding her and crying together while we waited for it to arrive.
It took about 30 minutes.
That period was surreal. Part of me felt relief because my wife had made it through surgery safely, but at the exact same time, I was holding my dead daughter in my arms.
I still don’t know how to explain that feeling. My emotions were everywhere.
My wife needed close monitoring for the next three days, so our daughter stayed in the room with us the entire time.
Meanwhile, the phone calls started flooding in.
Every time we told someone, it felt like reliving the entire nightmare again from the beginning. Sometimes my wife would finally calm down after crying for half an hour, and then another phone call would come in and we’d have to say the words all over again.
“This happened.”
“She’s gone.”
“There’s no heartbeat.”
Over and over.
And now comes the part nobody prepares you for. I genuinely hope none of you ever experience this.
Warning: this part is graphic.
On day one, I was okay holding the baby and handing her to my wife.
By day two, I could feel how soft her head had become. Discoloration had started. At times there was even bleeding.
My wife still wanted to hold her constantly.
Meanwhile, I had started feeling like we were handling a body instead of a sleeping baby. It felt wrong to me, but I wanted to support my wife and give her the time she needed.
By day three, it became painfully obvious that we needed to let her go.
Her body had become extremely soft. There was significant discoloration, white spots were appearing, and her skin had started peeling.
I can barely write that sentence without stopping.
At one point my wife asked to hold her again, and I told her softly that I thought this should probably be our last time.
She disagreed at first.
But when I handed our daughter to her, she immediately saw what I had been seeing.
And I think that was the moment death finally became fully real to her too.
That was the moment she agreed we needed to say goodbye.
We prayed together. We held her. We said everything we needed to say.
Then we told the nurses we were ready.
Even that process was harder than I expected.
For some reason, I thought once we made the decision, they would come right away. But they didn’t. We had already said our goodbyes, and she still remained in the room with us for another three hours or so.
And when they finally came to take her, it became yet another goodbye all over again.
That was probably my biggest breakdown.
Afterward, we started calling cremation services. Something else nobody tells you: not every crematory accepts infants. It took several calls before we finally found one that could help us.
Eventually they came, took her body, and told us we would receive her ashes in a few weeks.
We’re still waiting.
Since then, we’ve had an overwhelming amount of support. Flowers. Church outreach. Meals. Messages. People showing up for us in ways I’ll never forget.
This has been the hardest thing I’ve ever gone through in my life.
Right now we’re just taking it one day at a time.
And honestly, I just hope my daughter is somewhere beautiful.
Sometimes I imagine my grandma holding her, feeding her a bottle while she sleeps peacefully somewhere far better than here.