He’s 22, manages a fast food restaurant, loves the color orange, listens to alternative rock music and plays Magic the Gathering in his spare time. He is the most special person in my life. He is also a first/birth parent.

When we got pregnant, Danny was scared to death. He wasn’t ready to be a dad. He was afraid of me while I was pregnant; he hardly touched me or talked to me. My pregnancy was almost as hard on him as it was on me.

When Punkin was born; Danny slept through my entire labor, he was that detached. I ended up having an emergency c-section and held my hand through the whole thing, scared for my life. The doctor took Punkin to work on him because he wasn’t breathing well. Danny did take a chance to hold him, his first attachment to Punkin.

Punkin was transferred to a regional medical center and we weren’t able to see him for about a week because of work obligations. The first time I held Punkin, Danny knelt by my side and cried. In our first pictures together with Punkin he as tears streaming down his face. He was becoming attached whether he liked it or not. Punkin was really our baby at that point. The realities of losing to adoption were starting to sink into his head. Our life was never going to be the same.

Punkin spent five long weeks in the NICU and was eventually transferred to the Mayo Clinic. Those five weeks were hard on Danny. I was an emotional wreck, trying to hold onto my motherhood and losing it at the same time. We were trying to make medical decisions for a child we loved dearly and were being disrespected by the medical staff at the first hospital. To them we were “just” birth/first parents. I was making things harder on Danny because I wasn’t taking his feelings into consideration. I thought he didn’t care because he had been so far removed during my pregnancy.

Our loss of Punkin has been profound for Danny. As Punkin gets older he sees what he is missing out on and realized he can never get that back. He sees the pain and loss I have gone through and feels guilty because he feels he caused that pain because he wasn’t ready to parent.

Our visits are bittersweet for Danny because he sees a little boy that he is comfortable around now, a little boy he will eventually want to buy Transformers for and teach how to play Magic. He is a birth/first father who loves his son dearly and will miss him always.