by Jamie Berris
There had to be over three hundred people in attendance, and they served the best filet of sole I’ve ever had. They had a sushi bar and served lobster, crab, prime rib, mussels, and oysters. The dessert table was exquisite, complete with a chocolate fountain. And this was only the engagement party—I can’t wait to see what the wedding and reception will be like.
After dinner is where the night gets quite fuzzy. I remember dancing and doing shots. Shots! What the hell was I thinking? I don’t remember so much after that. I recall laughing at Kurt when he kicked open the door to our hotel room because he was carrying me and had no free hands.
We went straight for the bed and began to tear each other’s clothes off! Poor Kurt, he really wanted me to tell him what an animal he was last night, and unfortunately, I have no recollection. None. I can’t remember a single thing after going through the door.
At this point, all I’m concerned about is trying to find a greasy cheeseburger to settle my stomach. I pray that my five-hundred-dollar dress isn’t ruined from a wine stain that mysteriously appeared at some point during the night. Not to mention the tear along the zipper. It was definitely a wild night!
June 18, 2009
I cannot shake this hangover sickness thing, and it’s been three days!!! I will never mix my meds with alcohol again. I’ve learned my lesson—twice!
Seriously though, this blacking out crap and not remembering anything really sucks. It’s one thing when I’m in the comfortable presence of my own husband, but something I can NOT do around other people. At least when I blacked out the first time on Marcus’s boat, I was with a longtime friend, someone I know more like a brother and who was kind enough to drive me home safely. How embarrassing it would have been had I been with someone else.
I called my doctor, and she said it was definitely a bad idea to consume a lot of alcohol while taking benzos, but that I shouldn’t still be this sick. Well, I am!
I’ve thought about easing off some of my meds to avoid some of these side effects, but I’m too scared. I would never admit this to anyone else, but I feel like my life depends on and is controlled by the medication. I know I feel better and don’t have the radical mood swings, but knowing that I have to be drugged up to act like a “normal” person is incredibly irritating at the same time.
Taking a low dose anxiety and depression medication sounded so harmless in the beginning. I can’t imagine functioning without my benzos. There has to be another way to escape this way of living.
June 20, 2009
Ugh, not only do I still feel like crap, I have been tossing and turning the last few nights and feel like a zombie. Not to mention I have been having the strangest dreams ever. I had a dream Kurt left me for a twenty-year-old bartender, another dream that Jayna was kidnapped, and also a nightmare that I had sex with Marcus, ew! Where in the world do dreams come from?
I’m thinking I need to go to the doctor and either get on antibiotics for a stomach bug or see if my meds need to be tweaked because I’m miserable.
Here it is summer vacation and the girls are bugging me to take them to the beach, and I have been nothing more than a slug, wanting to hibernate in the air conditioning and sleep, so unlike me. The second the heat hits my face, a bout of nausea washes over me. I can’t even bear to be sick in a lounge chair by the pool!
“Did you know mom took depression meds?” asked Jayna.
Sadie shook her head no. What Sadie did remember was her mom taking her multi-vitamin, a B-12, and a D-3. She knew this because she also set the same vitamins out for Sadie.
Jayna wouldn’t swallow anything, so she still took the gummy bear vitamins—but they tasted so good that the entire family ended up eating the gummies every day.
Sadie closed her eyes and thought hard. Were there any other pills that she saw her mom swallow? Were there any strange bottles in the cabinet?
“SADIE,” Jayna whisper shouted, “READ!”
June 22, 2009
My period is twelve days late. It’s NEVER late. I doubled up on my anti-depressants today to try and lessen the panic settling in my gut and the anxiety-induced heart palpitations. Kurt knows something is up with me. I can feel his eyes looking me over, studying me.
Not only has my “hangover” from the engagement party lasted an entire week, I got up to use the bathroom twice last night. I never get up to go to the bathroom in the night, well, except when I’m pregnant. That’s usually my telltale sign I know I’m pregnant even before I take a test. Some women don’t get up until late in their pregnancy. My weak bladder starts right off the bat. This morning I was gagging while brushing my teeth, and when I popped a mint in my mouth while driving, I had to spit it out the window! I can NOT do mint when I’m pregnant!
I’m also craving salt like a crack addict needs her next high. I downed almost an entire bag of chili cheese Fritos this afternoon, and I’m eating soup every day for lunch when it’s eighty-five degrees outside. The nausea builds as the day goes on, and by night, I feel like I’m on the verge of puking everything, including my organs, out of my body. Unfortunately, my body never surrenders.
These are all identical symptoms from my pregnancies with Sadie and Jayna!
I’m scared to death to take a pregnancy test!
Did I mention how tired I am? I took three naps this week!
June 23, 2009
I bought the pregnancy test today, but didn’t take it. Ugh, I was so nervous I was going to run into someone I knew at the grocery store and they were going to see it in my cart or on the check-out counter. I hid the test between Sadie’s chocolate chip waffles and Jayna’s Fruit Loops.
What am I doing buying them this garbage? I never let them eat that sugary processed crap. I just don’t feel like arguing. I just want them happy and out of my hair because I’m too sick and exhausted to deal with anything.
Seriously though, I can’t handle another baby. What would happen if I got post-partum depression after another baby on top of being whacked out already? How could this happen, anyway? Kurt had his vasectomy years ago.
Funny how I can sit here and stress myself out with worry, and I haven’t even taken the stupid test yet, but I can’t! I hid the box behind the towels in the bathroom cabinet the second I got home. I’ll take it in the morning. Isn’t that when it’s most reliable, anyway? I know stalling won’t change anything. Do grown, married women give their babies up for adoption? Wait. I would never consider that. Or would I?
June 24, 2009
My worst nightmare has come true. I’m pregnant!!! This poor, poor child. What kind of life is it going to have with a mother like me? Sure, I’ve been able to keep it together well enough for Sadie and Jayna, but will this be my breaking point?
How the hell did this happen? I will sue the doctor who performed Kurt’s vasectomy for every penny he is worth, that son of a bitch! Even as I write this, I can see what a nut case I am. What kind of person reacts to a pregnancy like this? Especially when I’m married and already have two children? Sadie and Jayna would be ecstatic to have a baby brother or sister. What a crazy, selfish bitch I am!
Sadie and Jayna looked at each other, wide-eyed. “I’m having second thoughts about reading this, Sadie. I don’t think I could live with knowing that Mom didn’t want Nicholas and considered an abortion.”
“Don’t jump to conclusions, Jayna. We both know how much Mom loved Nicholas. She was probably just in shock, not to mention she was on medication, confused, and hormonal!”
June 26, 2009
I have to tell Kurt that I’m pregnant before he comes right out and asks. Why am I so scared? Why do I feel so overwhelmingly distraught? It’s not like Kurt was dead set against any more kids after Jayna. He was the one that left the decision up to me.
I can’t even call Marissa. She has her own problems to deal with. Besides, she always wanted an entire brood of kids, and Marcus was dead set against more than one. It’s not right for me to go to her and throw a fit about being pregnant with a thir
d child.
If I decide to keep this baby, I’ll have to get it together at some point and fake happiness. If I decide not to keep this baby, this may be the first secret I ever keep from my best friend. Maybe Marissa could adopt this child. She would certainly be a better mother than I could be.
I’m paranoid that something isn’t right though. Why? Why and how have I gotten like this? I’m worried about something I can’t even write in my own diary. I’ve never in my lifetime not been brutally honest in my diary, but this, I just can’t bear to put it in writing.
June 28, 2009
Kurt woke me up last night because I was crying in my sleep. I had to change my pajamas because they were soaked with sweat. Kurt wrapped his arms around me and told me he was concerned about me. I have made it so that he’s so uncomfortable talking about my depression and mental status that it’s as if it barely exists. It’s becoming the big white elephant in the room, in our relationship.
I made up a story that in my dream we were in a horrible car accident. He knew not to push any further, and soon I heard his breathing become steady as he drifted back to sleep. I stared at the clock the rest of the night, scared to death about the recurring dream I’ve been having. It’s beginning to haunt me.
June 29,2009
Kurt left early this morning for Chicago and won’t be home until tomorrow. What a relief. I’m so exhausted, both physically and mentally. I couldn’t bear to keep up a charade in front of him this evening.
Sadie and Jayna were both invited to friends’ houses this afternoon, so I am thanking God for that since I slept the entire afternoon away. The sky was a beautiful bright blue and a comfortable eighty degrees, so I slept in the screened porch. I rationalized my nap with the fact that I wasn’t in a dark bedroom on such an amazing day. I am not the kind of person to be inside on a summer day, so this feeling alone gets me down.
I picked the girls up from their friends at dinner time and took them out for Mexican, even though I was on the verge of throwing up across the booth. They wanted to go for a bike ride when we got home, but I couldn’t muster up the energy. They both looked at me very accusatory. I never turn down a bike ride, and usually I’m the one always begging them. See. I can’t even be a decent mother to the two children I already have!
June 30, 2009
Since I feel at my best in the morning, I thought I had better not cancel on Marissa and our doubles match. Julia and Gretty are our biggest rivals; I had no choice but to suck it up and play my hardest. I should play under pressure and sickness more often—we blew them away.
Unfortunately, my day did not stay on a high note. I overdid it and didn’t drink enough water or eat soon enough. Kurt got home from Chicago early and decided he wasn’t going back into work the rest of the day, so we planned on an outside lunch at the bistro in town, followed by a lazy afternoon, swimming in the pool with the girls.
Walking to our table on the terrace, I felt it coming. The wave of nausea swept over me quickly, along with the clouded, blotchy vision, and muffled conversations around me. I knew I was going down, and there wasn’t a thing I could do to prevent it. Luckily, we had reached our table, and I was able to clutch on to the side of it, thinking I could go down easy. Not the case!
My passing out was anything but graceful! I bumped my head on the chair so hard it knocked me out cold. Kurt was on his cell dialing 911 immediately, and next thing I knew I was being loaded up in an ambulance. At this point, I should have just blurted out that I was fine, only pregnant, and overdid it playing tennis in the heat, but with the girls and Kurt all staring over me, telling me they were following me to the hospital, I just closed my eyes and wished it were all a dream.
So I told Kurt the news at the hospital, and he was relieved. I think he thought there was something seriously wrong with me. We decided to keep it quiet from the girls and everyone else until we know how far along I am and that everything is healthy.
After I assured Kurt I wasn’t having any steamy affairs, he has been gloating all night that our crazy evening in Chicago at the engagement party released some ferocious sperm that were bound and determined to reach my eggs despite his vasectomy! I pray to God he is right.
Sadie hadn’t realized she was holding her breath and exhaled in relief. “I knew Mom wasn’t capable of having an affair!”
“I hope Mom is done talking about her and Dad, sex and sperm, and vasectomies.” Jayna giggled.
July 4, 2009
I somehow made it through our annual 4th of July pool party. Entertaining thirty people was the last thing I wanted to do, but I made it through. The fireworks were spectacular! Of course, Kurt had enough fireworks of his own that it wouldn’t have mattered if we couldn’t see the town fireworks from our backyard.
I actually felt pretty good today, probably because I didn’t have a second to think about it. I feel like Marissa knows something is up. I hope she doesn’t ask if something is wrong because I’m afraid I’ll break down and cry and spill my guts. I’m just not ready. It was odd having her here without Marcus, not that I missed him, but she and Marcus are the only ones to have split in our circle of friends. She did well, probably because she was able to drink margaritas all day while I had to sneak inside and fill my glass with the non-alcoholic pitcher I hid in the back of the fridge.
Two more days until my appointment with Dr. Carter. I know I’m going through withdrawal from quitting my benzos cold turkey. Hopefully, I can get some meds that are safe to take during pregnancy. Maybe I’ll be able to see all this clearer, possibly even accept it, and somehow be at peace. I’m scared.
July 5, 2009
Kurt is insistent on making an appointment to have the doctor check his vasectomy so if he needs to get it fixed he can do it well before the baby is born so we aren’t both laid up at the same time.
I feel ill when he talks about it. But I feel ill all the time for that matter!
July 6, 2009
I’ve never been so happy to see Dr. Carter and walk out of her office with a scrip in my hand. Usually, it makes me feel defeated, but today I felt liberated. I just wish I could have talked to her more about my concerns. I clammed up! Maybe at next week’s appointment, after I have been on these meds, I will be relaxed enough to open up.
My dreams are getting out of control. I can’t yet write about them. There has never been anything in my life so terrible that I haven’t been able to write about it in my diary.
July 12, 2009
I’m sitting here at 6:00 a.m. with a cup of tea by the pool, watching the sun rise. I still can’t stomach coffee this early in my pregnancy. This should be a blissful summer day. Instead, I think it may be the beginning of the worst day of my life. Kurt is going to the doctor to get his vasectomy checked. I’m such a coward. Why haven’t I confronted my worst fear?
The dreams are always the same. They are so vivid it’s frightening! If the dreams are actual memories, I don’t know what I’m going to do!
With every passing day, Kurt gets more excited about this baby, asking when we can tell the girls they’re going to have a sister or brother.
July 12, 2009
My life is a freaking mess of a nightmare! Kurt’s vasectomy checked out perfectly. No swimmers. Here I am at 11:30 p.m. sitting out by the pool, alone, wondering where Kurt took off to. He’s been gone for hours, not that I blame him.
All his excitement vanished, gone! What if he leaves me? And here I can’t even explain how it happened. And that is the truth!!!!
The girls heard us fighting, even though we had locked ourselves in the bedroom. So now they’re upset too. Sadie came downstairs at 10:30, asking if Daddy was home yet and why he was mad. Ha! I don’t even know the answer to that!
I told Kurt about my dreams. I explained, pleaded, that I don’t remember any of it actually taking place in real life, but it would explain . . . How pathetic am I? This isn’t even real life! This is crap that happens on fake reality shows!
July 13, 2009
When I saw the headlights come down the driveway around 3:00 a.m., I met Kurt outside. By the look on his face, I knew instantly where he had been—to visit Marcus at the marina on the boat I’d like to sink.
Apologetic, Marcus confessed everything, saying we had several bottles of wine and it just happened. Kurt couldn’t go into detail. It was too painful, and honestly, I don’t need to know much more, except one thing: who initiated? Unless I ask Marcus, I may never know that answer, and even then, I may not get the truth.
It might not make one bit of difference, but I am glad I blacked out after our night in Chicago and don’t remember anything about that night either. I brought it up to Kurt, and he shot me a look that, even in the dark, I saw in his eyes he didn’t want to hear my excuses.
Kurt said he was tired and had to get a couple of hours of sleep so he could function at work. He turned away from me, and when I went inside an hour later, I found him sleeping on the couch. In our fourteen years of marriage, neither one of us has ever slept on the couch.
Sadie stopped reading and put her hand to her mouth. She looked Jayna square in the eyes. “I can’t flippin’ believe it!”
“Mom and Marcus,” whispered Jayna in disbelief. “So, Nicholas . . .”
A gazillion things were running through Sadie’s head. Her mom slept with Marcus! It was Mom! Marissa did nothing. My own mother slept with her best friend’s husband. She cheated on dad! Mom cheated! Mom cheated! She slept with Marcus!!!
Chapter 32
Sadie
“Nicholas is the spitting image of Marcus. He looks nothing like Dad. How could we have been so blind?” said Jayna.