Dear Baby Bear- week 23

Dear Baby Bear,

I love waking up to your movements, it's very reassuring! You're still hitting the placenta most of the time, but I can occasionally feel your little taps. I also feel like you're already trying to go up into my ribs! It should be too early for that!
You're 23 weeks today, and that means you have a very small chance of surviving outside of my womb with intensive medical help. The age of viability is 24 weeks, but some hospitals will try to save a baby at 23 weeks. Of course you would have several disabilities (mental and physical) but you'd be here, and hopefully alive. But I don't want you to come out just yet- you keep cooking till at least June 25.
I don't have an appointment for another week and a half, so you're gonna have to wait to hear about your size or how you're doing or anything like that. I'm going to try and see if they'll give me an ultrasound- just for reassurance that you're doing okay. I'll also hopefully be discussing more in depth about your condition and the results of your anatomy scan. I never got a call about coming in and talking with my OB, so no news is good news, right?
Baby Bear, there are now nine different friends who have publicly announced their pregnancies on Facebook- they're all due within a month of you. This worries me. Before, when I was expecting your sister, there were only four other women due around her due date- so five of us in total. Well, you know what? 1 in every 4 pregnancies ends in a miscarriage or stillbirth. Last time, I was the statistic. I was the mother who's pregnancy ended in a fatality, the 1 in 160 who's birth ended in a stillbirth. And now there are ten of us waiting for little babies? That's really pushing it! Statistically, at least one person is going to lose their baby. And it scares me, because I don't want to be that one again. And I don't want anyone else to feel the pain of child loss- it really, REALLY, sucks! I'm scared, Baby Bear. I just want everyone to be happy and healthy.

23 Weeks and wearing papa bear's shirts!