Michelle LeJuhn

This will make you sterile
The doctor said as I signed my name
I watched myself sign my name
like I was looking through a window to my future
To a future I wasn’t prepared for
I could already see the empty spaces
the birthdays that would never come
the tiny hand I would never hold
the version of me I would spend the rest of my life missing
The ink dried long before my heart was ready
On a paper that confirmed a closing door
A door that closed long before it should have
As I signed my name
a part of me died inside
There is a kind of horror in survival
when survival means subtraction
When you are alive
but something sacred has been removed
and the world keeps moving
like nothing happened
No one tells you that grief can exist without a funeral
That there are losses with no obituary
no casseroles at the door
no flowers
only follow up appointments
People congratulate you on healing
They tell you that you look better
They don’t see
that some wounds never learned to bleed on the outside
The body remembers even when it can no longer create
It remembers dreams it was once preparing to hold
And every year
when the world celebrates motherhood
or tiny shoes
or first birthdays
I quietly celebrate survival
I keep thinking about the word sterile
how clean it sounds
how it hides what it really means
Final. Empty.