Suburban Goddess

It’s May 16th, and I’ve officially made it through half the month without my baby girl.

I struggled with this; the first year where my ex would have his “summer month.”  I’ve never been away from my daughter this long.  After growing so accustomed to seeing her beautiful face every day (except every other weekend and alternating Tuesdays & Thursdays), the house is almost unbearably quiet.

I hate it.

This is not the family life I anticipated as I held her that first evening she was born, although her father’s behavior should have been a warning sign of rough times to follow.  It was my first hospital stay in my entire life; somehow I’d managed to make 30 years without any major catastrophes.  I told him more than once that I was terrified to be in that hospital alone.

It’s a very rare occasion that I allow someone to see me “need.”  He is the reason I’ve buried that need even deeper now.

Of course, he said he would stay.  But at 9 pm, he grew tired, leaving me and this tiny, wriggling, crying creature to our first night alone.  As I looked down into her wrinkly little face, I was suddenly overwhelmed with a terrifying fear; what am I supposed to do with it now?

As the night wore on, it cried.  I tried to feed it, but it didn’t seem interested.  Eventually, it slept for a little while.  I stared at it… the miniature fingers, the tiny toes… it woke up crying again, and I tried to console it, not quite sure how and absolutely terrified that I’d break it.  I remember pulling it up close to my face and singing to it, which seemed to calm it slightly. The cold, sterile, blue walls faded away until it was just me and her, alone… and she completely needed me, this tiny, helpless creature.  There in the hospital, more than a child was born.  It was also the birth of my strength, my motivation. One new life was born, and an old life died.

It is that strength that carries me through this month; it is that motivation that drives me to provide a better life for my child, no matter what hand fate dealt me.  We’re on the road to something greater now… something that I can’t describe but just know….