Wiped!

by Rebecca Eckler

7 A.M.

  It’s the baby’s three-month birthday. She sleeps through the night, which the Fiancé and I don’t realize until we wake up. I know something feels different when I wake up actually feeling refreshed. “I can’t believe it!” I say. “She slept through the night! She slept through the night!” I start jumping up and down on our bed.

  “Halle-fucking-lujah!” he says, and we kiss.

  I can’t believe that at exactly the three-month mark, to the day, the baby slept through the night. In fact, she slept twelve hours straight. She had fallen asleep at 7 P.M.

  “We made it! We made it!” I cry. “We made it to the three-month mark. This is when it all starts getting easier.”

  January 18

  The baby slept three nights in a row, all the way through, for at least ten hours. She’s no dictator. She’s a joy.

  And then she doesn’t sleep through the night.

  At midnight, just as I’ve dozed off, I hear her wailing. What the fuck? I thought we were done with all that.

  “We have to do the tough-love thing now,” the Fiancé says.

  “No.”

  “Yes.”

  “No.”

  “Yes. It’s been three months, and we have to show her that she can’t always be the Dictator around here, and that we’re not going to run in and see her every time she screams for us. She has to learn to sleep through the night.”

  I knew this was coming. The Fiancé has been saying for weeks now that it would soon be time to start training her, if she didn’t learn to sleep through the night on her own.

  She wails and wails. Every muscle in my body gets tense listening to her screams. After twenty minutes, I sit up in bed.

  “I can’t deal with this. I can’t!” I say to the Fiancé.

  “You have to be strong. Don’t go in there,” he warns.

  Ten minutes later, she’s still screaming. I start to cry.

  “Don’t cry. It’s hard, but we have to do this, or she’ll never learn,” the Fiancé says. When did the Fiancé become such a hard-ass? I’m not sure if I’m crying because I’m worried that my baby is in pain, and that I’m traumatizing her for life by letting her scream, or because I am going mental listening to the noises. My tears are half tears of guilt and half tears of frustration. Why was she so good for only three nights? Why is she being bad again?

  “I’m going to get her,” I say.

  “Don’t get her.”

  “I’m going to get her,” I say, jumping out of bed. “I can’t deal with this.”

  As soon as I pick her up, she stops crying. “We’ll try again tomorrow,” I whisper in her ear. I get back to bed at around 3 A.M. I’m mad at the Fiancé because he was able to do the tough-love thing. Is his heart made of stone? Am I living with the Tin Man?

  January 19

  2 P.M.

  I call the Fiancé.

  “How are you?”

  “I feel like shit.”

  “Me too. So, when are you coming home?”

  It’s like we’re back at week three again. The baby is not sleeping through the night. The Fiancé is feeling like shit, and so am I. When will this ever end?

  6 P.M.

  We’re at the in-laws’ for dinner. The baby is extremely fussy. The mother-in-law picks her up. She won’t stop crying. The father-in-law tries to quiet her, to no avail. Even the Fiancé can’t calm her down. But as soon as I pick her up, she stops. She must know it’s me! I know I’m probably not supposed to gloat over this, but I can’t help it. My baby loves me best! And now they all know it too! Of course she loves me best. I’m her mother.

  I just hope they all remember this little fact.

  January 21

  10 A.M.

  “Oh, my baby sleeps through the entire night and then naps for hours in the afternoon,” Sara says.

  I have just complained to her over the phone about my Devil Child, the Dictator. How is it possible that her baby sleeps so well? Her baby is younger than mine! It isn’t fair.

  “You’re so lucky,” I moan.

  “And she had her first haircut!”

  “What? You’re joking, right?”

  “No, her hair was getting so long it was going in her eyes.”

  “Well, at least five times a day people tell me what a cute little son I have,” I tell Sara. “So I went to Wal-Mart and bought her those headbands.”

  “You did not!”

  “I did!”

  “Those things are so hideous.”

  “I know! But she looks like a boy if I don’t put one on her!”

  I don’t add that Sara’s the one who changed her voice-mail message to include a two-week-old baby. What’s worse? A mother who puts a stupid headband on her bald baby girl or a mother who puts her two-week-old baby’s name on their voice-mail message?

  I get off the phone slightly grumpy. I kind of feel Sara was bragging about her baby. It bothers me. We aren’t supposed to be the type of mothers who brag about their babies. No, those women are annoying. Then again, these days most things bother me.

  January 24

  The Fiancé is grumpy because we are at the mall.

  We need more onesies and more sleepers. And going to the mall is something to do on a Saturday. We take in all the other parents, pushing their strollers around aimlessly at 10 A.M. I act like I’m okay with this, but I’m not really. I don’t really want to be here either. The Fiancé doesn’t even pretend to be enjoying himself.

  Before the baby arrived, this was our worst nightmare—that we’d become parents who were, well, not cool. It’s definitely not rock-and-roll to be buying baby sleepers at 10 A.M. at a mall. I try to get the Fiancé’s mind off the fact that he’s now a father and is one of those early risers who go to the mall.

  “Look at those girls. How old do you think they are?” I say, pointing out a group of preteens standing around a bench. They are showing way too much skin. They are wearing way too much makeup. They look like mini-prostitutes. Prostitots is what they are.

  “They look around thirteen,” the Fiancé says. I agree with his assessment.

  What if one day my perfect little baby pierces her lip and dresses like a hooker? Will I be okay with that? I will not allow that to happen. One day, I start to think, my baby will be hanging around the mall, showing too much skin, with a pierced nose and her hair dyed blue. One day she’ll hate me. Oh God, one day she’ll be having sex!

  It’s the first time it hits me that I’m not just raising a baby and that one day I’ll be raising a teenager. Now, that’s a scary thought.

  January 26

  I’m starting to realize I’m acting way older than my thirty-one years.

  “God, I’m starving,” I say, sitting down at the table. The Fiancé and I have met for dinner. The baby has changed drastically in a matter of weeks. No longer does she sleep through entire meals. She can sit in a high chair. Mostly, though, she prefers to sit on my lap, which makes eating out less than relaxing. It is good, however, for my weight-loss goal. (Don’t ask. Don’t even ask!) I can never finish an entire meal, even if I want to, with the baby sitting on me.

  “It’s empty in here tonight. Is there some sort of event going on in the city? Where is everyone?” I ask the Fiancé. Usually, this restaurant is packed.

  “Beck?”

  “What?”

  “It’s five P.M.”

  “Really? It’s only five?”

  We’re now eating dinner like senior citizens. “I am not pathetic,” I think. “We are not pathetic.”

  “We’re so pathetic,” says the Fiancé.

  “Hey, I was just thinking that!”

  We eat dinner and are home by six-fifteen. This is the wonderful life of being parents.

  Though it’s been only three months, I can’t remember what not having the baby in my life was like. And yet, at the same time, I still don’t feel like a mother. I still feel like me. The baby is still not sleeping through the night, and I’m still fighting depression. But the pills
are working. I think. I don’t cry as much.

  At least three times a day I’m still told by strangers what a cute little son I have, the in-laws are still driving me mental, and the Fiancé and I have had sex maybe three times. I have to make a doctor’s appointment to get the baby’s shots and also to see if she’s cross-eyed. My ass, though I have been watching what I eat, is still the size of a movie screen. This whole mothering thing is depressing.

  Forget about those statistics and experts who say that the first year of marriage is the hardest. I’m amazed that any couple can make it through the first year after having a baby. And it’s only been three months!

  Ten Mommy Moments People “Forget” to Mention

  1. You will lose your hair.

  2. You will still think you’re fat.

  3. You will accidentally hurt your baby…at least once.

  4. The “constructive criticism” will not stop.

  5. You will start falling asleep earlier than you used to leave to go out at night.

  6. You will wonder what happened to some of your “best friends.”

  7. Boring becomes a good thing.

  8. Babies have no manners.

  9. You don’t want your baby to watch television. Still, you will rerun a baby DVD for two hours.

  10. You will look around your home and wonder when it turned into a daycare.

  January 30

  I’m supposed to be in paradise. But I can’t stop feeling I’m also in my own personal hell.

  The Fiancé, the baby, and I are now in Maui. Sure, there are palm trees everywhere, soft sand on the beach, the clear blue ocean, the fabulous sun and glorious heat. But the worst thing I’ve ever been through is happening to me. (Except for that time one of my ex-boyfriends dumped me after he cheated on me, which was, I’ll admit, pretty awful.) But what’s happening to me now, in paradise, is worse. Much worse.

  I’m going bald. That’s right. I’m going bald.

  This morning, while I was taking a shower, I looked down to discover hunks of hair in the drain. The drain had been completely hair-free when I hopped in. (I always check for hair and spiders before jumping into all showers. I also always check to make sure there are no masked men wielding knives behind the shower curtain.) Then, after my shower, while I was brushing my hair, a bunch of long strands came out into my hands. My shoulder-length hairs, which I have been growing long for years after the bob-cut debacle of 1990, were all over the place. There were hairs sticking to my fingers, in the sink, wrapped in my hairbrush, on the floor, and stuck to my face. Some hairs were even in my mouth. Strands of hair were everywhere, like it had just rained hair.

  “Something is wrong with me! Something is wrong with me!” I yell to the Fiancé, racing out of the washroom with only a towel wrapped around me. “Something is really very wrong with me. I think I’m dying. I’m dying!”

  “What’s wrong?” the Fiancé asks, using a tone that actually implicitly says, “What are you going on about now?”

  “I’m going bald!” I tell him.

  “You are not going bald,” he says, and sighs.

  “Yes. I am. I am going bald. Look!” I say, running my hand over my scalp and then placing into his hands the hairs that had fallen out.

  “Um, that’s, um, very interesting,” he says. “Can you please take your hair back? It’s gross.”

  “What do you want me to do? Glue it back on? What is happening to me?”

  “Just throw it in the trash,” he says. “Maybe you’re just shedding because it’s so hot here?”

  “I’m not a fucking dog!” I yell. Why doesn’t the Fiancé seem to care that I could be dying here? What other possible reason could there be for all this hair falling out?

  I sob while the Fiancé goes back to reading his GQ magazine.

  January 31

  Okay, I feel a little better after spending an hour on the Internet researching “hair loss.” From my research I learned that this hair-loss-ruining-my-life concern is a perfectly normal hormonal development that many women go through after giving birth. Why? I don’t know.

  What if I have to get a wig? What if I get bald patches? What if my hair never grows back? I wonder how much hair weighs though. Maybe I’ll weigh less with less hair. I’m pretty sure, though, that hair doesn’t weigh much. Sigh.

  Who else can I complain to about the possibility that I’m going bald but the Fiancé, the one person in the world who is supposed to be supportive in all aspects of my life, at all times, especially when I’m super-hormonal and have been diagnosed, by a professional, with depression. Even my friggin’ hair, apparently, is hormonal. “Does my hair look thinner?” I ask the Fiancé, for the fourth time today. It’s only 10 A.M.

  “No,” answers the Fiancé, for the fourth time today.

  “Seriously. Take a look. Does it look thinner?”

  “No,” he says, not looking at me.

  “You didn’t even look! I’m thirty-one and going bald,” I moan.

  “You are not going bald.”

  “Then how come when I brush my hair it falls out in hunks?”

  “I don’t know, Beck. I thought you said it was normal.”

  “Fine.”

  “Don’t fine me,” he says.

  “Fine,” I say. “But don’t expect me to be supportive when your hair starts falling out.”

  I’ve decided not to brush my hair until this hormonal hair-loss thing is over. To lose sleep because of this baby is one thing, so is gaining weight because of this baby. But to lose my hair because of this baby? It’s unacceptable. How long will my hair fall out for? What if it never stops falling out? I do feel for the Fiancé, who will now have to listen to me ask, “Do I look thinner?” as well as, “Does my hair look thinner?” every other hour. Okay, make that every ten minutes. But at least he has hair. Well, he does now. I’ll wait ten years and see how he reacts when he starts losing his hair. Then he’ll regret not being more sympathetic to what I’m going through now.

  February 1

  A lot of my single fabulous friends (that is, childless friends who still go out and have one-night stands and drink to get drunk and whose only responsibility is making sure they get their rent paid on time) think I’m very lucky to be here in Maui and are quite envious. They think, “Hey, she’s had a baby and she gets to go to Maui for two months. She has the best life ever.” And it is true. Aside from losing my hair, not having had a solid night’s sleep for months, still being more than twenty pounds overweight, and suffering from postpartum depression, I am lucky.

  These days, maternity leave in my country, Canada, where it’s the law that you can take a year off from your work, is no longer just about having time to bond with your baby.

  The Fiancé and I are not super-wealthy. Trust me. The condo we rented here for two glorious months could very well make us bankrupt. But I’ve always wanted to spend more than two weeks in Maui. This will be the only time I can do this, I argued, when we were debating the pros and cons of renting a condo in Maui while I’m on maternity leave. I’ll never again be able to just take off from work for two months to travel—bosses frown upon that sort of thing like they do about employees napping under desks at the office—and I won’t be able to take two months off to go anywhere when my daughter is in school, will I? Maternity leave might be the last time in my life—until retirement—that I’ll be able to go anywhere for a long period.

  So, for the first time in a decade, I have no work responsibilities. I’m on maternity leave! I can just as easily bond with my baby in warm weather, in beautiful surroundings, in a fantastic rented condo overlooking the glorious ocean, can’t I? Also, the Baby is not running around yet, or even standing or crawling, so she’s at the easiest stage in her life to travel with. She basically slept the entire plane ride here. I thank God for that miracle.

  Also, thanks to my depression—the only positive thing about being depressed—the Fiancé thinks getting away will be good for my emotional state. There’s noth
ing like seeing the sunshine when you wake up every morning to put you in a better mood. At least for me.

  Before we arrived, we rented a crib, a portable playpen, and a swing from a company in Maui that actually rents cribs, portable playpens, and swings. They delivered them to our condo and set them all up before we arrived. Who knew there were companies out there that did that kind of thing?

  The Fiancé is only staying ten days with us (ha ha—he has to go back to work!). Then my parents will be coming for one week. Then Nanny Mimi will stay for one week to help out, and then I’ll be alone, for a month, with the Dictator, otherwise known as my baby, before the Fiancé comes back to Maui to pick us up.

  I know how lucky I am to be able to spend two months in paradise. It’s just that I can’t stop thinking about going bald! Trust me, if suddenly hunks of your hair started falling out by the handful, you’d be obsessed about it too.

  I remember once making the mistake of telling the Fiancé his hair looked like it was getting thinner on top. He didn’t speak to me for two days. Losing hair, for everyone, is a big, big deal.

  February 2

  The truth is, while my friends are envious of my two months in Maui, I have told almost none of them about the depression I’m experiencing. I now understand why so few people admit to postpartum depression; I admire Brooke Shields for laying it all out in her memoir. I could barely admit it to myself.

  Postpartum depression makes you feel like a failure and that something’s wrong with you because you can’t control your emotions, no matter how hard you try. Everyone expects that because you’ve had a baby, and because having a baby is such a miracle and “so rewarding,” you should be overflowing with joy, feel blessed. And you’re supposed to be concentrating on the baby, not yourself.

  Once you have a baby, you’re supposed to stop being selfish, right? All that should matter is the baby’s health and happiness. Postpartum depression is very difficult to explain. You’re sad, but you can’t explain why. You just are. You cry for hours, and it’s hard to just get out of bed some days—yet you aren’t sure why you’re crying or why getting out of bed seems like climbing Mount Everest in heels. How can you possibly tell your friends and family that you’re so miserable after having a baby, supposedly the best thing that’s ever happened to you, when everyone is so friggin’ happy for you and expects you to be happy too?