The evening continues in much the same way. After everyone heads home around 10:00 p.m. (including my mother, after a lot of encouraging), I tell Gordon we should probably try to establish an evening routine. We turn down all the lights, change into new pyjamas, and bring the bassinet down to the pull-out couch. We discuss permanently relocating our sleeping quarters to the main floor, where I could avoid stairs and be close to everything we need for the baby — the sink, the kitchen, and the makeshift change table we’ve set up in our dining room.
“We’re in survival mode now,” he says. “I think it’s a great idea to stay down here.”
During an orientation visit to Western University, about 250 kilometres from my hometown in Brampton, I found a flyer saying that the school’s internet service provider, RezNet, was hiring for September. I couldn’t have known at the time that finding a part-time job also meant I’d meet my future husband.
On weekend visits to my dad’s house that summer, he and I had spent most afternoons discussing hardware, internet speeds, or hilarious viruses that could obliterate the desktop machines of silly users who clicked links they shouldn’t. We joked about megabytes and proxies and modem speeds. I was headed to university to study media, however, having selected the Faculty of Information and Media Studies (FIMS) program in hopes of blending my love of English media with my excitement for the “World Wide Web.”
Applying for the job as a tech support person made a lot of sense to me. I was pretty sure I was qualified, and I thought maybe my affinity for Macs would set me apart. I sent in my application and waited to hear back. When I received an email about a summer interview I jumped up and down in my room screaming, “I’m on fire!”
But Impostor Syndrome runs deep, so I spent many summer hours preparing for the interview. I later found out I got the job precisely because I had “a well-rounded knowledge of Mac computers,” according to my boss at the time. In the early 2000s, the age of all things Windows and Microsoft, the ability to trouble-shoot Mac problems was a niche skillset. I have my father to thank for that. A diehard Windows user, he always encouraged me to push myself to understand the inner workings of the Mac operating system, a platform not everyone else understood. Add in my years of retail customer service experience through high school and I nailed the job without breaking a sweat.
A job on campus, especially within university housing, came with the privilege of being able to move into residence a week before all the other first year students arrived. I felt as though I’d been given a special honour usually reserved for straight-A students and scholarship winners. I’d earned the right to avoid the crowds and settle into my new home before everyone else.
The reason for the early move-in was to attend a training week for my new RezNet student job. On the very first day of training, I met Gordon. He was much taller than me. The geeky software engineer stood in front of a residence room and gave me instructions for a mock scenario where I’d be trying to troubleshoot why a student’s internet wasn’t working. Inside the room was an older student pretending to be a distraught first year, upset because they couldn’t get their class schedule to load on the school’s webpage. (This, of course, was before the age of streaming movies and music. We would describe internet speeds in terms of how many hours it could take to download one MP3 song.) I remember Gordon’s young smile so well. I was beyond intimidated, as one of only two people who identified as a woman on the team, I felt like he was judging my technical skills differently than he was judging the guys.
“Hey, so you’re the Mac girl, I hear?” he said with a smirk. Gordon held a clipboard he used to evaluate all the newbies. I remember struggling with the deep configuration settings on the computer, but also could have figured it out if I hadn’t had two older guys standing over me, watching my every click.
We didn’t start out romantically. We were friends. We spent many work evenings together, laughing and comparing notes while he teased me about the stark contrast between his engineering assignments and my film essays. After my second year, we both landed full-time summer jobs working for the same RezNet team, and I spent my second-year summer break winding Ethernet cables, updating the department website, and preparing technical handbook materials. Right before the school year, my third, was about to begin, Gordon took a family trip to South Carolina with his sister, mother, and father. When he didn’t return on the Monday morning I expected him to, I raced to my desktop to look up the weather.
Hurricane Gaston had hit on August 29. I was sick with worry. I printed out a map of South Carolina and updated everyone at work with the status of the hurricane in relation to where Gordon was. We were just friends, but others on the team teased me that I was love sick, not worry sick. I rolled my eyes while constantly refreshing CNN.com. A week before he’d left for South Carolina, I had thrown him a birthday party at the house I shared with five of my girlfriends. It was a massive rage party; Max took the train up to celebrate with us, knowing how big of a night it was for me to organize. I explained to everyone that Gordon deserved this massive party in honour of his “champagne birthday” — turning twenty-two on the twenty--second. I wasn’t his girlfriend, but I sure acted like I was.
It turned out that his return flight from South Carolina was only delayed by a day, but it felt like a lot longer. The day he got back, I ran up to him and jumped into his arms, incredibly relieved that he wasn’t hurt.
“I’m happy to see you. I missed you,” I said, meeting his eyes with the most electric smile. My stomach tingled when he pulled me into a tight embrace. It was warmer than a friendship hug is meant to be.
Gordon and I worked a full training prep day after he returned from his trip, staying up really late printing and stapl-ing materials for the incoming first-year students. When we walked out of the building sometime after 2:00 a.m., I pulled a sweater over my head and said, “It’s late. I probably shouldn’t take the bus. I’m going to grab a cab.”
“Well,” he said, pausing to let the word hang in the air, “I live closer to work than you do. Why don’t you just crash at my place and we’ll head into work together in the morning. Morning is what, four hours away?” It was an invitation, but felt like an innocent one.
Of course, we didn’t sleep. We did make out a lot, but that was it. Romantic innocence. It was a night that felt really average, just friends hanging out, but also really wild, because this was an older guy, a work colleague, with whom I’d spent the last two years talking about his dating adventures … and now it seemed like I might become the dating adventure. My friend Blake was furious when I told him I hooked up with Gordon, saying, “You’re going to wreck that man. He doesn’t know your drama.” I wanted to believe it was an overreaction.
As we start to settle on the pull-out couch, Fiona starts to cry and Gordon suggests I try to feed her again. I start to wail alongside the baby. Why is my breast the only solution to this non-stop screaming? It doesn’t soothe her and it actively hurts me, so I can’t believe it’s the only way to make the baby stop crying. Gordon sits down beside me and tries to help me latch her. It doesn’t work. I can’t get a proper latch the way Rose showed me. I begin to grow desperate. Fiona resists, twisting her head side-to-side avoiding contact with my nipple. I pull her shoulders more aggressively into my chest hoping if she feels a firm grasp she will understand what’s about to happen. Her job is to grab a hold of me and eat. Then she lets out a bone-shattering scream — a sound we haven’t heard from her before. A shudder travels up my spine and all the way to the top of my head. She’s scared. I am, too. She finally latches but it doesn’t feel quite right. The pinch from her mouth sends an uncomfortable suction sensation along the sides of my body. I wince in pain but don’t remove her from my breast, seeing how much work it took to get her on in the first place.
I’m also starting to feel hungry again, but I have Fiona on my breast and both my hands are occupied. It’s frustrating to feel regular body signals like hunger and be unable to do anything abou
t it. I look up at my husband with tears in my eyes.
“Could you get me a slice of pizza and feed it to me?” I whine like a toddler.
Gordon brings me a reheated slice of pizza and holds it up to my mouth. I take a bite. It burns the roof of my mouth.
“Will anything ever be the same?” I ask with tears in my eyes. Do all mothers cry this much? I’m logging more tearful moments than I am calm ones. My brother must have noticed when he was over earlier, since he’s now texting Gordon with links to articles about the baby blues.
Please tell Amanda what she’s feeling is normal, and will pass. It’s a hormonal shift and it won’t last.
The thought of Max worrying about me makes me cry even harder over my leftover pizza. We launch into a pattern of walking, rocking, and feeding transitions for a few more hours, until Fiona falls asleep in my arms.
Time passes. Gordon falls asleep next to me, but he’s lying at an awkward diagonal angle that prevents me from fully stretching out beside him. I start to edge my bum along the couch so I can lean back slightly with the baby naked on my chest. It’s been humid all day and we are all sweaty and sticky from the humidity in our non-air-conditioned house. The awkward couch position creates tension in my back. I’m still incredibly sore; my stitches throb and it hurts to be seated at all. And my breasts are starting to feel full and tender. I realize this must be my milk coming in. Couldn’t this have happened during daylight hours? Why now? My thoughts centre on my physical trauma as panic rises in my chest. I can’t calm the thoughts of how much my breasts hurt right now. There’s no way to unhook the tension from my chest and there is certainly no way I’ll be able to sleep. “Sleep when the baby sleeps” is a cruel phrase. One I hope to never hear again. At least Gordon is resting, I think. If he rests now, he can take over tomorrow. I will not sleep tonight. This is my cross to bear. I wanted to be a mother. It’s my responsibility to wear down my energy until there is nothing left. I asked for this.
June 19, 2014
MOST PEOPLE differentiate their days from their nights by sleep. But what is the difference between day and night when you’re up all the time? When you don’t break between evening and morning? When you don’t rest your eyes, your body, your soul, your ears, your brain — who says it’s time to honour a new day? Can you begin if you didn’t end?
My brain is constantly spinning. I’m not sure I’m going to make it through motherhood if this is what it is — this is so claustrophobic, so tightening, so restricting, so painful. Gordon and I are working in two- to three-hour shifts to care for the baby. I sent him upstairs earlier to sleep alone, in bed, undisturbed. I now have a little human lying right on top of my heart. I am not free. I never will be again. I want to wake Gordon and ask him if this is going to be this hard forever, but I’m scared that his answer might be yes. So I sit still, holding the baby, careful not to wake her.
Light and silly morning shows make me feel a little less melancholy. I turn on the TV to find a 9:00 a.m. talk show, the kind that targets stay-at-home parents — women especially — with recommendations for home decor and beauty and with non-committal and uncontroversial parenting advice. The familiar commercials soothe me. Until I notice it’s 9:11 a.m. I’m having a 9-1-1 emergency.
Television shows allow me to distract myself, making the minutes pass more quickly. I resolve to let Gordon sleep for five hours while I sit with the baby. I know that if Gordon logs a little more rest he will save me from this terrible desperate feeling by at least holding the baby for a little. He’ll recognize what this new family needs and find the solution to bring me back. I’ll stay in this position as long as I can, because the more he rests, the safer I will be.
Five hours pass, maybe a little more. I sleep a bit, but no more than twenty minutes at a time. I know that she could suffocate in my arms. It’s my duty as a mother to stay awake and watch over her. It’s late morning, the sun is up, and daytime TV has a way of blending the hours right through to two or three o’clock. When the baby cries a little, I try to breastfeed and record the feed on my phone app. I need to remember to change her cloth diaper, so I set a reminder in my phone to wake us both up in an hour.
Gordon rushes downstairs in a panic. His eyes are wide, sore, and dry.
“What happened?!” he says, shuffling over to me with not-quite-awake movements.
“I wanted to let you sleep.”
“You need to get real rest. You should have woken me up. I appreciate sleeping, but I wish you had woken me up.” He’s upset. He hasn’t come back from his sleeping space with warmth and love, but instead with confusion and more exhaustion. I wonder if the little sleep he did get reminded him of our old life, that magical time just last weekend when we could sleep for more than four hours in one go. Maybe it’s because the five-hour stretch of sleep he got means he’s starting a new day at three o’clock in the afternoon, and that’s a strange time to start a new day, so he’s cranky.
Should we eat breakfast or dinner? Is coffee appropriate at the start of our midday day? Should we try to step outside for a little fresh air? These decisions feel monumental and I start to cry as my mind reels. Sadness and drowning. All I can feel is sorrow and a sense that I’m drowning in my living room. I’m gasping for air I can’t catch.
Rose returns. I thought she told me she wasn’t coming for a visit today, but maybe she realizes I’m losing my mind? Either way, the sight of my midwife in my living room makes me cry. Again. Her first questions are scolding.
“Why are you downstairs? Why is the TV on? You should have a bowl of fruit and a glass of water next to you — why don’t you?” She criticizes my insufficient setup. Because there’s no space to breathe upstairs, no connection to the outside world. My bedroom isn’t a sanctuary, it’s a place where bad things happen. Where thoughts have nowhere to go. Rose calls out for Gordon to take me upstairs while she examines the baby. She’s not happy with our breastfeeding progress and says the latch isn’t correct. She thinks I’m not trying hard enough.
Gordon rushes downstairs and comes to my side, awaiting further instructions. “Will you help me upstairs?” I ask. “I guess that’s where I need to be.” My lip gets quivery. While I crawl upstairs, aching from the vaginal tearing, I feel the tug of the new stitches. I hear Rose tell Gordon she’s going outside to get breastfeeding supplies. Breastfeeding supplies? I thought all you needed to breastfeed was a baby and a breast? I’ve failed to prepare again and my baby is two days old.
The front door slams and out my bedroom window I see Rose running to her car. Why is she running? We must be inconveniencing her. She’s trying to get away. She has more important places to be, but because I’m such a failure, she had to stop in here on her way home. I am that pathetic.
Rose returns with two items that are as foreign to me as a pen to a dog. As she hands them to me, I say out loud to the baby, who looks unconcerned, “What are these? How am I supposed to use them?” No response from the two-day-old.
The first item is a nipple shield. It’s a soft, round piece of plastic with a “nipple” at the centre and a wide semi-circular border that reminds me of a sunny-side up egg. The nipple part has three little holes in it, and it’s shorter than a baby-bottle nipple but definitely longer than my insufficient flat ones. It’s designed to protect my sore, bleeding nipples from the baby’s wicked wrath and to help her latch to something decently sized. I’m supposed to squeeze out a bit of colostrum, which Rose describes as “liquid gold” — a highly nutritious substance that fills your breasts before the regular everyday milk — and use it to attach the nipple’s plastic border to my skin, making sure my real nipple is properly shoved into the artificial one. Then the baby sucks on it, getting milk through the little holes. Rose demonstrates how the baby latches much more easily with the shield. I hate it. But there’s more.
The second breastfeeding supply item involves thin plastic tubing, kind of like a super-long straw. One end fits inside the nipple shield and we are to stick the other end
into a bottle of formula.
“If baby isn’t eating enough of your breastmilk, you can supplement with formula through the nipple shield,” Rose explains. The process couldn’t be more convoluted. I’m to sit up straight, hold the tube straight up in the air, possibly wrapping it around my shoulder, and connect it to this bottle of formula that is either hanging behind me or being held by someone else. The flow of formula onto my breast and into her mouth will cement what I already know to be true: My body cannot keep this baby alive. She will starve to death without this contraption. There isn’t enough milk flowing naturally out of my breasts. I need medical intervention to get it out. I can’t decide if this feeding method is truly artificial or if it just feels that way because Gordon and I spent so much time saying we didn’t want to use formula. For months, all we heard in prenatal classes was “breast is best.”1
These “supplies” feel catastrophic. These are the external devices one must deliver to the mother who cannot naturally keep her child nourished. They’re purposefully convoluted to remind everyone that I’m not capable of feeding this baby. (You can feed her, says a voice in my head, you just don’t want to.)
Gordon watches me sigh and frown at the new tools, and says we cannot give the baby formula. He seems upset even at the suggestion, which I didn’t outright make, but certainly thought. My brief moment of relief that the baby might be able to survive without me is dashed away. Seeing how upset Gordon is, I know I’ll have to try feeding her again and again until I get it right. My jaw tightens. No part of me wants to keep going this way. My breasts really hurt and there are new bleeding cracks on the surface of my nipples that aren’t healing with breastmilk the way Rose told me they would.
I offer Gordon an explanation that removes more of my guilt than his: “Maybe my breastmilk hasn’t fully come in yet. I can make more. When more milk flows we’ll return to our natural plans without further intervention. Okay?” He sighs but says nothing.
Day Nine Page 6