A sense of doom

"Life goes easy on me
Most of the time."

-- The Blower's Daughter, Damien Rice



The most bizarre sequence of events happened today.

Joe and I had a meeting with each other and our lawyers on Monday. We reached an agreement where I could see Jacob more often to breastfeed him, and since my milk has gone way down, I should have been thrilled to have the chance to get it back, right? Except that one of the ways I have to see Jacob is to go to Joe's house, GO INTO HIS HOUSE, and feed the baby.

I woke up thinking about this today. That I will have to take Zoe with me. And what a fucking stress this is, that nothing about this agreement is easy. I get to provide a valuable service to one kid, but then, who knows what I'm about to do to the other one.

And I just didn't want to do it. I angled for and got what I wanted, and now, I didn't want to do it.

I didn't have Jacob this morning, so Zoe and I got out of the house in a timely manner. BUT I COULDN'T HELP FEELING LIKE MY RIGHT ARM WAS MISSING. Did I get the bottles? Oh, I don't have to. Did I change his diaper? Oh, he's not here.

I don't know how I made it to Zoe's school. I was in a daze.

At work, I wrote a rambling manifesto to my lawyer and sent it off. It went on about Joe something this and Joe something that, that I was willing to eat mac'n'cheese for the rest of my life and spend my money instead on paying to feed this guy's family if he would make sure I could have my son with me forever.

It was like... all my ends were loose. All of them.

I got my very first post-preggers period Monday, in the middle of the meeting with Joe -- I'm not fucking kidding, I get the go-ahead to reproduce in the middle of litigating my son with that man -- and for anyone who has bad periods, imagine your worst flow times five. There was none of that normal pain, but there's just a lot of ... yeah, that stuff.

So, I'm hitting the send button on this diatribe to my lawyer today, when I suddenly realize every woman's worst fear. Yeah. My crotch is bathed in blood. I'm sitting at work, and I'm in trouble.

I headed for my car. Did not pass go. Did not collect $200.

And .... I'm OUT OF GAS.

Not totally out of gas, I made it to a gas station, but I had to take my messy self out of the car and stand there waiting for my gas tank to fill, and let me tell you, gas doesn't flow any faster when you've got blood pooling in your shoes.

$2.89 a gallon didn't make it any more bearable.

This whole trip home, I'm having the wildest thoughts. Foremost was the conversation I'd have to have with my boss if he called and asked me where the hell I was. I drove past the day care where my baby boy was, then I drove past the school where my daughter was attending her studies, and I realized I was bawling.

It was all just so surreal.

I called my counselor when I got to my house. Surely he would know what was wrong with me. I felt like I could snap at any moment. Snap, and do what, I didn't know. I was starting to imagine this is what people who jump off bridges feel like before they do it.

I got the therapist's voice mail. "John, please call me back and talk me off this ledge."

And 15 minutes later, just when I was driving past the baby's day care back to work, he did call me back. And he talked me off the ledge.

I pulled over in the car and gushed to him. Your body is going through changes, he told me. You're juggling so much at once. He told me some breathing exercises and told me to call my physician, because when I begged him to give me something, ANYTHING, I learned for the first time, he's not one of THOSE counselors who can dole out the happy pills.

I was better when I hung up. But I was still shaking and light-headed and fully realizing I was in some altered mental state, so I kept telling myself that when I crossed the bridges to get back to work, I was NOT to get out of my car for ANY reason.

I slipped back into work, unnoticed I don't know, and shortly after, my lawyer called me to respond to the rambling message I had emailed him. I went into a nearby conference room and listened to him; if he knew I was sobbing, he didn't let on.

He told me a little about what people in my situation go through, he told me Joe's side too, about the initial reactions and the process of catharsis and how they schedule mediation a few months out just for this reason, so all these feelings can pan out and reason can be introduced...

And then he put a name to my exact problem: separation anxiety.

I miss my baby so fucking much.

As soon as he said that, I felt like... like I wanted to find the nearest person who I liked and ask for a hug and get back to work.

I wasn't healed, but I felt like I could gather up a few of those loose ends, and to at least remember to change my tampon every hour.