October 11, 2020 was supposed to be a joyous day. "That was our due date," Bethany Torrez said. "We miss him every day."
After her first son Brenner was born, Torrez tried to have another child for two and a half years.
"You really get disheartened. It's like, I'm going to take a test, but I know it's going to be negative," Torrez said. She decided to record her tests on her cell phone.
Instead of capturing disappointment, the first video showed Torrez in her bathroom, crying tears of joy. "Oh, my goodness, it finally happened! We finally did it!"
Torrez's motherly intuition told her not to be overly excited.
"It was at 17 weeks. I thought I was going to find out the gender," Torrez recalled. "Something was wrong, they say that it was just an 'error in coding.'"
Torrez delivered her son, Mateo, at 21 weeks. He was stillborn.
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"When the moment came, I just remember yelling and crying and telling my husband 'I'm not ready. It's too soon. I'm not ready,'" Torrez said. "Instead of signing a birth certificate, you're signing a death certificate."
October 15 is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day. Torrez isn't alone in her grief. One in four women lose a baby during pregnancy, delivery or infancy. One in 160 pregnancies ends in stillbirth, like Torrez.
"He had 10 fingers, 10 toes, he was very much our son," Torrez said. "There's nothing you can say to make it better, but you can say our child's name."
Torrez said she is sharing her story to let other 'loss parents' know they aren't alone, and to let those who have not experience that loss know it's OK to talk about it.
"What my 4-year-old says 'he didn't get to stay,'" Torrez said explaining how her oldest son thinks of his younger brother. "There is life after loss."
For resources on pregnancy and infant loss, click here.
