'Everyone told me having "only one" was "easier". No one knew the truth.'

This story discusses pregnancy loss.

The irony of losing three pregnancies while working as a sleep consultant for babies is not lost on me. It feels like a cruel blow from the universe, leaving me to wonder "why?" It's a slap in the face that I sometimes feel daily, and other times not for days, but often enough that it cannot be forgotten or dismissed as something I should be "over," as society and some so-called friends suggest.

Their insensitive words and assumptions about how long I should grieve cut deeply each time, reminding me of what I don't have. Comments in the playground about how my life is "easier" because I "only" have one child further compound my grief.

Standing on the oval waiting to pick up my solo child while other families pile their three or more kids into their vehicles feels like a reminder that I am perceived as less of a mother because I have fewer living children.

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I respond with little emotion, simply saying, "Yes, I have one," deliberately avoiding the word "just" to convey that my son is not less than theirs. What I truly want to do is scream and explain why I have one child, sharing the pain of losing three bodies and three souls that never made it to this world. Each loss was agonising and unique, shrouded in secrecy due to societal taboos that deem such experiences as failures.

I have wanted to be a mother for as long as I can remember, envisioning a wedding, a marriage with my best friend, and creating the nuclear family I grew up in, which seemed perfect. After a few false starts, within 12 months of marriage, we were pregnant. On a Sunday, when I was about 12 weeks along, we shared the news with friends who were elated for us.

Watch: The time I felt like a terrible mother. Post continues after video.

Finally, it felt like our turn. The next day, I received the worst phone call of my life. I was told my baby was 80 per cent likely to have a genetic condition. That statement nearly brought me to my knees in a coffee shop. Somehow, I managed to pay for my coffee, gather my belongings, and call my husband in tears.

The next day, we underwent more tests. The wait for the results was the longest of my life, surpassing even the days my father faced surgery for bowel cancer and the agonising wait for my mother's Parkinson's diagnosis. Both diagnoses occurred within the same month, leading to years of health battles when I was just 26 years old.

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Their illnesses and deaths happened before I could even ask my parents about my childhood or imagine how they could positively influence my unborn children's lives as grandparents. On that fateful day of waiting, I pleaded with God or the universe to spare our son from a difficult life. At 5pm, the call came. My baby had the genetic condition and a termination was scheduled for the next day.

The injustice of my first pregnancy at 36 unfolding this way, without time for informed decision-making or counselling, was overwhelming. The lack of compassion from the professionals left me feeling suicidal, compounded by the hormones still coursing through my body and the intense grief that engulfed me.

The lasting effects of this trauma are only now coming to light, recently suggested as PTSD, 8 and a half years later. Yet, it feels as if that phone call and the traumatic events that followed happened just yesterday. Falling pregnant again 10 months later was the greatest thing that ever happened to me, but it was also marred by the grief of losing my mother to a cruel illness when I was 13 weeks pregnant with my living son. With both my husband's parents also having passed, my son would grow up without grandparents. We decided to give him a sibling, determined not to repeat my mother's experience as an only child, which she had despised.

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However, the losses of my final two babies, both girls, are a blur of dates and details that no longer matter. The bottom line is they didn't make it, and I must now live with the reality my mother feared for me — that my son would be an only child. Yet, the saving grace in all this agony is that the child who did survive is a truly old soul, as a psychic once told me, "It's like he has been here before." Perhaps his soul resembles our first son in some way, but this time we were blessed with a healthy, robust body that stayed.

Working with other families is a constant reminder of what I don't have and what I have lost. It has been filled with jealousy, heartbreak, and intolerance, but it also provides an opportunity to work through my trauma, an ongoing journey of acceptance of having one child and not the family I had always envisioned. I always thought I would have up to four living children, with my parents by my side for support. However, I am filled with gratitude for my son and husband. We have raised him independently, without emotional or logistical help from anyone, and he is a true gift.

Feature Image: Supplied.