I gave birth to the first of my quadruplets at twenty-three weeks, but the doctors stopped the delivery before the other three could be born.

By noon the following day, time had lost all meaning.

In high-risk obstetrics, time is not measured in hours or days; it is measured in gestational milestones. Every twenty-four hours a baby remains inside the womb at twenty-three weeks increases their survival rate by roughly two to three percent. If I could reach twenty-four weeks, their chances of living without severe long-term disabilities would jump dramatically.

If I could reach twenty-four weeks. That was six days away. It felt like trying to swim across an ocean.

“Your white blood cell count is creeping up,” Dr. Foster said during her morning rounds on Day Two. She was examining the blood panel drawn at 5:00 AM. “It’s at fourteen thousand.”

“What does that mean?” I asked. I hadn't slept a single minute. The magnesium sulfate caused severe nauseous hot flashes, and every time I tried to close my eyes, the phantom feeling of Faith’s birth rushed back—the cold air, the sudden drop in weight inside my belly, the sight of her tiny, bruised body wrapped in plastic.

“When the membranes rupture and one baby is born, the cervix remains open,” Dr. Foster explained, sitting on the stool beside my bed. “The umbilical cord from Faith’s placenta was cut and tied high near the cervical os, but it acts as a pathway for bacteria from the outside world to enter the uterus. We are pumping you full of broad-spectrum antibiotics, but if an infection—chorioamnionitis—takes hold, we won't have a choice. We will have to deliver the remaining three immediately to save your life.”

“No,” I said, my voice fiercely stubborn. “No. Oliver is only one pound, four ounces right now according to the last scan. He won't survive.”

“Hannah, an infection in the uterus can cause maternal sepsis within hours,” Dr. Foster warned, her voice stern but deeply empathetic. “If your temperature spikes above 100.4, or if your heart rate goes over one hundred and twenty, we go to the operating room. I need you to understand that.”

At 3:00 PM, Andrew returned from the NICU with a printout of a digital photograph.

It was a picture of Faith. She was nestled inside a nest of blue warmers. A clear tape held a ventilator tube in her tiny mouth, and an IV line was tapped into a vein in her foot no thicker than a human hair. Her eyes were fused shut—a characteristic of babies born before twenty-six weeks—but her little hand was curled tightly around a cotton swab the nurses had placed in her incubator.

I held the photo against my chest and wept until my ribcage ached.

“She’s a fighter,” Andrew said, sitting beside me and kissing my shoulder. “Dr. Reed said her blood gases improved slightly this afternoon. She’s tolerating the ventilator.”

“She looks so cold,” I whispered, staring at the photo. “I want to touch her, Andrew. My skin aches to touch her.”

“I know, sweetheart. I know.”

Suddenly, a sharp, stabbing sensation ripped across my lower pelvis. It wasn't a dull ache; it was a tight, searing spasm that gripped my lower back and radiated down into my thighs.

On the monitor screen, the flat baseline line representing uterine activity suddenly swelled into a steep, rounded mountain peak.

BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.

The contraction monitor chimed.

I gasped, clutching Andrew’s arm. “Andrew... it’s happening again.”

Within seconds, the door burst open. Nurse Brenda rushed in, eyes glued to the contraction printout paper spitting out of the telemetry machine.

“She’s contracting every three minutes,” Brenda yelled down the hallway. “Get Dr. Foster! Increase the magnesium drip to the maximum rate!”

“No!” I screamed, terror seizing my throat. “No! It’s too early! It’s only day two! They’re not ready!”

Oliver, as if sensing the sudden pressure inside his world, began kicking violently against my cervical wall. On the monitor, his heart rate spiked from one hundred and forty to one hundred and ninety beats per minute. He was in distress.

Dr. Foster ran into the room, snapping on latex gloves. “Hannah, keep breathing! Deep breaths! Don't push!”

“I’m not pushing!” I sobbed, sweat pouring down my neck as another contraction gripped my abdomen like an iron vice. “They’re trying to come out!”

“Check the cervix,” Dr. Foster commanded.