'Whose Milk Was It, Really? ... It Was a Gift, a Savior, a Healer, and a Connector': Reflections on a Collaborative Autoethnography of Breastmilk Donation after Stillbirth

I am a great birther. Even my first birth, which lasted 37 hours and was nothing close to easy, was, from my perspective, a great one . . . My stillbirth experience, on the other hand, wasn't so great. It was raw, bleeding, crying, begging for forgiveness; (literally) gut-wrenching, life-changing, and transformative . . . A few days after giving birth to my dead baby, my milk had fully come in . . . That morning, I pumped 100 ml of real, infant milk. I spent that session overwhelmed with competing emotions. There was a bit of a thrill to see my breasts producing so much so quickly, immediately followed by deep sadness and regret that they were producing all of that for someone who would never drink it. I was struck by a blinding flash of grief from the realization that my body believed my son was still alive, while my heart was struggling to comprehend that he wasn't. I sat for a few moments, staring at that bottle filled with my milk . . . his milk . . .