Cry for Help

No one ever told me about the dark side to pregnancy. The experience was always glossed over with deadly complications left undiscussed. I had always seen the happy soon-to-be mom preparing the nursery and smiling for the day to meet her child. Well, that’s not even close to how this played out. Somewhere between rare blood antigen complications and hospital germs, we both almost died. I begin photographing moments 6 weeks in. The tension of distress caused on my family was evident from the start. My 3 year old son took it the worst as I spiraled in to depression. After spending 7 months in a state of pregnancy chaos, I needed a therapeutic way to share my story and try to find a deeper meaning in it all. The photos were captured on an iPhone as it was the only camera I could hold during my 2 month hospital stay. Post-pregnancy, I learned a lot from my baby’s time in the NICU. I merged photos together to tell a broader story within a single image. Hopefully these images can tell the story that is hard to talk about. I hope this series will evolve to more than just a photo series, more than a book, and more than my Cry for Help. By bringing attention to my experience and all of the events that unfolded, it will raise awareness to complications that can happen. The message will get out and funding and additional research hopefully will be directed toward further hemoglobin research.