Content note: This episode includes discussion of infant death

In this episode, Dr. Baron sits down with Zissel Garber, a lawyer and mother of two living daughters, for an honest conversation about the five pregnancies that shaped her family and the grief and gratitude she carries with her every day.

Zissel opens up about her first pregnancy, a molar pregnancy that grew into cancer, and the six months of chemotherapy she underwent before she could try again. In her second pregnancy, she gave birth to her daughter Bracha (blessing) at 20 weeks, and Bracha died shortly after. Zissel shares what it meant to hold her, to give her a name full of meaning, and to speak about her without apology, even when it makes others uncomfortable.

After learning she had cervical incompetence, or, as Zissel prefers to call it, “cervical insufficiency,” she carried two more pregnancies filled with uncertainty, and her daughters each arrived early, bringing their own fears and hopes. With openness, she speaks about the grief that still visits her years later, on first days of school and at birthday parties, and why she sees this not as a journey with an ending, but as a path.