Ali L Hall

The Mornings After Ali L Hall

In my mind, pregnancy would be a time of reading The New Yorker aloud to my baby in utero, Bach streaming gently in through a pair of Bose headphones laid tenderly over my belly, as a doting husband shopped at Dean & DeLuca's to satisfy my every craving. Instead, I endured pregnancy with psychotherapy, Reiki, and hikes with my dog Buddy. My pregnancy came on the heels of a short marriage and a quick divorce while I was living in Salt Lake City, Utah. The father of the baby wanted nothing to do with it, proclaiming that he was done with the "World Series of Pain," his name for our relationship. The Mornings After is an account of my nine-month journey during which I prepared emotionally for motherhood, faced the mistakes of my past, and lived a life in stark contrast to that of my conservative, religious neighbors. My family and friends were thousands of miles away, but their love and support never wavered. This is how it felt to bring someone new into the world, and how it changed my life.