The Meaning of a Life (comment)

I'd be in a world of fury and anger if I believed we'd lost Natan because I was supposed to learn or do something differently from it, because I needed it, or God thought I could handle it. The only reasons I look for from it are physical--as someone whose preterm labor still cannot be explained, the only thing I still want to know about why is what happened medically. For our sake, it no longer matters, but I wish that at the very least Natan's death could have yielded knowledge to prevent it from happening to others--and maybe it did. Maybe Samuel is here and this new babe will be here because we and the doctors became vigilant. But that's not a reason or a blessing. It's just a new dam built to preserve the new world after a flood destroyed the old.

And I still wish there were something more concrete--some new "aha!" about unexplained preterm birth that could have come from it, and that doctors could take forward from it. I suppose our story and experiences did add to the cumulative experience and knowledge of the young doctors/residents/med students who worked with the older ones at our teaching hospital, and that's something. That's a reason I always, always say yes when asked if a med student can observe. But again, that's not a reason to explain the past, just a reason to keep moving forward.