This was the moment. Every screaming match with her ex-husband, every night spent sobbing in his arms, every minute spent in front of the mirror hating her own broken body, and every second spent clutching her belly as she rode waves of cramps so painful that they made her dizzy; all of it had lead her here.

“You’re so strong.”
“You’re so brave!”
“You'll get through this.”
“You’re gonna be okay!”
“I admire you so much.”
“I’m able to get through this because of you.”

She’d heard and read those words daily for twenty years, letting them soak into her skin like they were the only kind of sunlight that it recognized. Sage was able to get out of bed in the morning because of those words. She held her head high because of those words, knowing that they weren’t just about her. Doing that -- holding her head high as an act of defiance against the crippling fear and sadness that she felt -- made her able to inspire other people to do the same; other people struggling just as she was and knew exactly what she was going through, even as they lead completely different lives.

But sometimes, she hated those words, because she hated having to be strong. She didn’t want to be brave -- she wanted to be normal. She wanted to have a body that worked like it was supposed to, that could carry biological, healthy children like it was supposed to. She wanted to have her miracle baby, and she wanted to hold onto the hope that someday, somehow, it could happen for her against all the odds. And this was the moment that she was giving all of that up. She would never have her miracle baby. She would never get to feel that hope again, and she had no choice but to be brave.

“you’re making a good choice, babe. in case you doubted it.”

Those were the words that she held onto instead. As she counted aloud and let the anesthesia take her under, she thought about the comfort that her best friend had given her when she’d needed it the most. He didn’t tell her that she was strong, or that he admired her, or that she would be okay. He told her that she was doing the right thing, and to give herself the courtesy of allowing herself to think it, too.

When Sage woke up, she no longer had her uterus, cervix, fallopian tubes, or ovaries. She grieved through an ocean of tears for a while, and didn’t feel an ounce of strength left in her changed body… But she knew that once she was healed, she wouldn’t have to be in pain anymore. And she knew that she deserved that. She’d made the right choice, and she let herself believe it.