Poppy

We started trying for a second baby right after I got a job offer that would mean we would be moving from the US, where we were from, to Canada. My wife got pregnant on the first try, just like with our older child—and always surprising for a couple inseminating at home with frozen sperm. As my wife started the process of joining pregnancy apps again, she read one of those size things, which said “your baby is the size of a poppy seed.” We laughed, and started calling her Poppy,/8!,3 we always picked a “fetus name” for our babies before they were old enough that we knew the sex and could start calling them their real names.

My wife miscarried at seven weeks pregnant. That zygote never got much bigger than a poppy seed. She never had another name.

Emily, Ottowa, Ontario, Canada