It comes as no surprise to hear that a pregnant women is a more particular emotional mess than your average menstruating and/or PMSing and/or any other day of the month woman. Hormones coupled with heartburn create an environment inside a pregnant woman’s body that is somewhat like the battle of Gettysburg in a spicy salsa hell.

I have been emotional lately. Crying at random commercials. Smiling and offering to adopt cute babies I see in public. Slamming the door in my husband’s face – to name a few examples. I was having a particularly hard time this week keeping myself in check. Overwhelming sadness seemed my constant companion, and I couldn’t really pinpoint why.

Yesterday I remembered that this week would have been our first pregnancy’s final week. The baby we had, and lost to miscarriage, was due September 23rd and would have made his or her appearance during this gorgeous week of early fall weather. When I realized this, I knew suddenly what the painful sadness was that I had been feeling all week – the pain of loss and the void of a child we will not know in this life.

So today, I find myself telling our daughter all about the super hero brother she won’t get to meet. How he probably is already better than her at just about everything. He was probably smarter, faster, taller and had X-ray vision like Superman. But she needn’t worry because if she tries hard enough, one of us might like her better than her genius brother.