‘I knocked on the door. ‘I remember everything you did to me.’ We drove from California to Texas, just so I could look him in the eye and say it.’: Sexual assault survivor fosters 26 children, ‘I want to bring them hope’

“I remember my grandfather always calling my name, looking for me. While most kids were dreaming of graduating high school, I was piecing together horrific memories. I remembered the smell of the burnt orange carpet when I’d hide under the bed. I remembered the knick-knacks on the dresser I focused on to escape what was happening. Many people ask me, ‘Why in the world do you continue to do foster care when your own biological kids have left the nest?’ The answer is simple: I’m meant to love people through their pain.”

‘Is she breathing right now?’ She was limp, almost lifeless. I watched in fear as they loaded my tiny 1-month old baby girl into the ambulance.’: Baby is born with rare chromosomal deletion, ‘We basically won the lottery with her.’

“Hattie had been born with a significant deletion of her first chromosome. We had no idea what this all meant. Hattie was one in a billion. We received a plethora of mail. ‘Dear parent or guardian of a child with special needs.’ Special needs? Hattie doesn’t have special needs, does she? As far as we knew, Hattie seemed completely normal to us! We have learned to avoid the CAN’Ts and focus on all the CANs.”

‘So she’ll always be sick?’ I leave the office with an answer but no cure. ‘I’m not dying. I’m just 16 and past my prime.’: Chronic illness warrior battles lupus and fibromyalgia

“’Maybe if I drank bleach,’ I think. I feel so dirty, tired and stiff. ‘Maybe if I turned inside-out and scrubbed my veins out with soap.’ Surely the disease would be eradicated. I’m supposed to find out today. I tap my foot. ‘Remember to breathe, you have to breathe, just breathe.’ Dr. Box settles into his rolling chair. ‘So she’ll always be sick?’ ‘Yes, but we caught it early.’ Yesterday, I dropped my hairbrush. I couldn’t finish. My hair is still knotted in the back. Last week, I passed out briefly, stepping out of the shower. And this was an improvement.”

‘My husband divorced me after my baby was born. At 28, I had to move back in with my parents as a single, special needs mom.’: Mom to daughter with Cerebral Palsy finds new perspective on ‘true happiness’

“Emily was only 2 pounds. She was so small my husband’s wedding band fit around her tiny wrist. She was crying, but I could not hear her. It didn’t seem real. Quickly, I was told by nurses, ‘You cannot touch her.’ I felt helpless. With each day, it became more and more evident my marriage was not going to survive this horrific ordeal.”

‘My first experience with birth would be giving birth to death.’: Woman births stillborn due to knot in the umbilical cord

“My first experience with birth would be giving birth to death. ‘What are you here for?’ ‘A c-section,’ I responded. ‘How exciting! Do you know the sex?’ ‘No, we don’t,’ I said, thinking she should just give me the damn wristband and let me go. ‘Oh, that’s so fun. Congratulations!’ Our doctor said, ‘It’s a GIRL.’ I remember that first look and the love that overcame me.”

‘Pray for the kind of man that will lay next to your 13-year-old, on the bathroom floor, because she can’t keep a drop of water down.’: Woman encourages others ‘Do. Not. Settle.’ when it comes to finding the perfect soulmate

“Young ladies, when you’re starting to pray for a spouse to spend your life with… pray for a man that will carry her down the stairs, to the car and spend all night in the hospital by her side. Because, if he can wake up at 4:30 a.m. on Saturday to hunt… he can wake up at 6:30 on Sunday to lead his family to salvation.”

‘This one is a ‘something tequila.’ Tequila? Say no more. I grabbed toothpicks and down the hatch it went.’: Woman recalls hilarious story traveling to family wedding

“I suddenly looked like I had been through 3 wars. My ears got hot, my face was changing colors, and my esophagus started burning. I coughed. ‘He he he he he,’ my Grandma chuckled. I gave her ‘the’ look. The poor guy behind the cheese cart looked at me like l had a few screws loose and asked if I was okay. ‘I’m good. *cough* What’s the other ones?’ I was sweating. My sternum was on fire, but Mamaw didn’t raise no fool.”

‘I found you barely breathing. Lifeless, sleeved roll up, hunched over, gasping for air. I shook you and shook you. I was numb.’: Woman’s bittersweet realization loving heroin addict ex-boyfriend, ‘saving you will always be my best decision’

“I was so focused on not letting heroin kill you, I almost let it kill me. You pushed through to one year sober. But you decided to share that milestone with someone else. Forget about me and our life together. After everything we went through, you cut off communication with me through a text. You told me you were seeing someone else through a single text. That was all I deserved to you. ‘We can’t do this anymore.’ That was the most I could get out of you.”

‘Why bother?’ She asks herself. ‘Why put myself through it all again this month.’ She walks past this test in Target, and gives it a doubtful glance.’: Woman urges those battling infertility ‘you are not broken’ in viral pregnancy test post

“To any woman picking this box up to stare at it in longing, in mourning, in hesitation. To wonder. To wish. To throw it in her shopping cart again this month. Throwing it in with hope. With fear. With premature excitement. With anticipation. With a sense of dread that it may just be another down the drain waste basket Walmart drop of $12.98.”

‘A nosy man focused too much on race. I lost my patience. ‘I have so many kids because I sleep around a lot.’ He whipped his gaze over to my husband in shock.’: Couple with biological kids adopt 2 more, ‘My soul knew these souls’

“‘If you have more children, you could spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair.’ I can still hear those words echoing in my ears. There was no panic. Just calm. They didn’t even come with a photo. We didn’t need a photo to be drawn to the baby boy and his toddler sister looking for their family. They ran right to us and gave us big hugs. They are my babies, they always have been and they always will be.”

‘Hudson’s brain told him to swallow a lot of pills. We are thanking God our boy is here with us still.’: Family advocates for open discussion around mental health after son’s suicidal thoughts, ‘Do not be afraid of this.’

“Our child is not physically sick… he is mentally sick. We see no difference. He needed a hospital. He needs prayers and support. When he returns to school, please treat him like any other friend who just got out of the hospital. High fives full of welcome backs and ‘I’m glad you’re okay.’ Please don’t be afraid to talk.”

‘Up until that point, I’d lived a charmed life. Then tragedy struck. It was isolating. But they also didn’t throw a ‘pity party’ for me.’: Man credits resilience for getting him through ‘each of those dark days’

“My life was quickly thrown upside down. The love of my life was suddenly killed in a car accident. I handled it with anger and bitterness. The economy began to crumble. I quickly became the best possible cab driver I could be. Shifts were 12 hours long. I pulled my boots up and reinvented myself. Then everything changed again. The ginger ale sat on the kitchen counter, slowly turning into a bomb. At the exact second Shelly passed the sink, the bottle exploded. I was horrified. What a battle it has been.”

‘Be careful not to startle him with sudden sounds.’ ‘A loud sound could kill our boy?!’ We were terrified.’: Baby boy with extremely rare LQT Syndrome, Microcephaly, Deafness defies all odds

“While rocking Azariah to sleep for his nap, he went stiff in my arms. I turned the light on and things changed drastically. He started to convulse and foam at the mouth. I ran downstairs and called 911. Two minutes went by and he was turning blue. I lay him down and gave him 3 breaths. ‘How in the world did this happen to OUR son, why OUR son?’ No one else in the world was known to have the same genetic deletions.”

‘I get told I’m ‘too much.’ I can’t whisper. I laugh at my own jokes. I suck at keeping plans, and I spend more money than I save. But all of these things make me, ME.’: Woman urges ‘stop letting people extinguish what sets your soul on fire’

“You will be told you are too honest. Too real. You may be told your dreams are silly or stupid. You may be taunted, laughed at, or mocked for stepping out of what is ‘expected of you.’ Sorry not sorry, but you can’t confine me to a box, and girl, you shouldn’t either! You have a light that is too bright to be hidden. Stop letting people extinguish what sets your soul on fire.”

‘The cop opened the trunk. Jack quickly put his hands up. ‘Don’t shoot!’ There, in the trunk, lay my friends.’: Man reminisces on the old days with his true friends thanks to StoryWorth

“It was the 1950s. Sitting at Mae’s Grill with my buddies, a girl I’d recently broken up with called. ‘Shoot, you’ll end up going back steady with her.’ ‘Like hell I will!’ They didn’t believe me. When I picked up Joan to talk, my pals were in the trunk to hear it all. ‘Don’t make noise!’ I warned. Next thing I knew, the state trooper was at the side of my car. ‘I hope you don’t have any beer in the trunk!'”

‘We were babies when we said our vows. Or, at least, that’s what everyone said. Nobody told us things would feel broken beyond repair.’: Woman realizes ‘nothing precious is ever truly broken’

“What absolutely nobody told us was at some point, no matter how much we loved each other, there would come a time when things felt broken beyond repair. We had seen couples split. Even couples we admired. But we figured that kind of brokenness was for people who didn’t love one another as much as we did. Like I said, we were young.”