Mama's Got Flair

This weeks’ Mama’s Story Wednesday post comes from my pal, Anne. We met via the Twittersphere and became fast friends. She’s a fabulous photographer (check out her blog), a funny mama, and oh so clever. She friggin’ cracks me up. When she told me she’d like to share her story, I jumped at the chance. Thank you, Anne, for sharing with us all.

And now… Anne’s story…

I’m a big fan of Jessi’s. I love her writing style – it’s a perfect combination of smart, funny and eloquent. A few weeks ago, I checked out her blog and noticed her feature focusing on mom stories. Prior to this point, I never planned on sharing my ‘story’ on this platform, but I thought to myself that ‘hey, maybe someone out there might be interested in what I have to say.’

There may have been a glass of wine involved.

Or two.

Here goes.

I’m a single mom raising a 14-month-old little boy.

I didn’t set out to be a single mom. My partner and I knew we wanted to have kids when we got together, 9 years ago. She knew that she didn’t want to carry and give birth to a child, but really wanted a family. I started undergoing fertility treatments in November of 2007. After a miscarriage, we made the huge leap to IVF and tens of thousands of dollars later, were fortunate to get pregnant on our first embryo transfer.

In the middle of this, we got married during the brief window when gay marriage was legal here in California. We didn’t have a ceremony or anything, we just went down to the County Clerk’s office one day after work and tied the knot.

Now, for those of you who are not sure if you are in favor of gay marriage, hopefully you can find a little comfort in the fact that ours turned out to be just as farcical and absurd as Michael Jackson and Lisa-Marie Presley and the next 6-8 Kardashian weddings will be.

The birth and recovery from C-section was relatively easy. I think it was the Universe’s way of saying, “In about 2 months, I’m going to have diarrhea all over your head, so I’ll give you a pass right now.”

Breastfeeding was also a piece of cake, but not so much the sleeping. He just didn’t sleep unless he was on me, latched on. For the first four months, while I was on maternity leave, I ‘slept’ propped up on a couch with my son attached to my nipple. I remember the first time I got 4 hours of sleep in a row – it felt like someone had just handed me $500.

Anywho, when our son was 10 weeks old, my wife informed me that she realized that day, that she didn’t want to be married anymore. Within two weeks, all of her stuff was out of our house.

It was surreal to simultaneously experience the gut-wrenching pain of a marriage ending with the pure joy of falling in love with a baby. I had moments where I was so sad, I didn’t feel like I could breathe, and then my baby would smile or grab my finger and I was immediately transported to a happy pile of goo.

As I’m sure it will come as no shock, she started having an affair with a mutual coworker of ours during my 3rd trimester. (Oh, didn’t I mention that? We work together! The three of us work together. We have the same boss. Jealous yet?)

If you’ve taken a look at my blog, you might know that I hail from Chicago – the land of awesome pizza and even better friends. During the first few weeks after the incident, I was talking to a friend who gave me some of the best advice I’ve ever received.

He told me to imagine that he was my son at age 30. He said that he has received all of his cues from me. The entire foundation of his personality is based on his experience with me, so if I would like my son to have a healthy relationship with a wife or husband someday, to go get myself some therapy and work out my relationship shit.

I went to a therapist. She suggested that I pretend my ex-wife is a pillow and then express my anger at said pillow.

I’m currently in the market for a new therapist.

We got married and pregnant in 2008, about 15 minutes before the bottom fell out of the economy. Our company, like most, took a huge hit. Both of us were fortunate to retain our jobs, but our salaries, titles and responsibilities were dramatically slashed.

So much of her identity is based upon her work. She had an especially hard time coming to terms with her downsized position. She appeared to be working longer and harder in an increasingly negative environment. I didn’t take it quite so hard, but in my attempt to be a good wife, I tried to be as light and hassle-free as possible.

• If I was having crazy-third-trimester-preggo-brain, I called my best friend, not her.

• When my feet hurt, I rolled my feet over a golf ball, I didn’t ask her for a foot rub.

• When I had an OB appointment, I went by myself because I knew it stressed her out to be away from work.

I took up as little space as possible in order to be the one thing in her life that wasn’t sucking energy. Little did I know the extent to which I was screwing myself. By establishing this kind of dynamic, all of the sudden, any real, valid thing I needed all of the sudden became a huge request and required an ‘extreme sacrifice’ on her part.

During my last two weeks of pregnancy, she ‘needed’ to go out with her friends, because she had to let off some steam. Work was so stressful that she needed an outlet and needed to have fun. I asked her that if she did go out, to please be within 15 minutes of our house, so that if labor started to happen, I wouldn’t be alone for too, too long. It was as if I asked her to give me a kidney.

While I was in the hospital recovering from my c-section, she ‘came down with a cold’. She would go home at night to get a good night’s sleep and then spend the day with me at the hospital. During those first few days, my son didn’t sleep at night and he didn’t sleep during the day unless he was being held. I would beg her to get to the hospital by 7 am, because the only time I could sleep at all was when she was holding him. Asking her to do this was apparently the equivalent of asking her to start wearing a burka.

I will definitely take some of the blame here. I should have stood up for myself. I should have taken up space – ANY space at all. I should have demanded that I be treated with decency and kindness. I asked for nothing and that’s exactly what I got.

I was trying to be a good wife. I thought this was the kind of room she needed in order to come to terms with the blow that the job downsizing had dealt her.

So, in a 6 month period of time, I had a baby, watched my marriage end, put my house (we bought it, but it was in my name) up for shortsale, moved into an apartment and returned to work.

It hasn’t been easy, but here’s how I’m choosing to look at my situation.

1. Better that she walked out on him at 2 months rather than at 5 years old. Kids don’t recover from that.
2. 100% of me is infinitely better for my son than 50% of me and 50% of her.
3. He and I are so much better off not being bound to her for the next 17 years.

While this was a horrible thing to endure, I’m starting to realize more and more that I wouldn’t have it any other way.

My family has been unbelievable supportive over the past year. My mom comes out 2 weeks each month to take care of him while I’m at work. My mom and I have a wonderful relationship and I have to say that one of the best things about becoming a mom is seeing my mom become a grandmother. Raising my son with my mom has been the most beautiful surprise to come out of this horrible, wonderful, terrible 12 months. My son is so lucky to get to have a real relationship with his grandmother, who is selfless, loving and completely crazy about him.

To give you just a small example, my mom has this cute 4th of July outfit. The shirt has blue and red stars stitched around the collar. When my son was a few months old, he noticed the stars and would coo and giggle as he would run his fingers over the shapes.

I know, right?! ADORABLE.

Since then, my mom has completely replaced her wardrobe. Now, every single one of her shirts has some kind of shape or animal that he can look at. A couple of these shirts are not, how do I put this nicely, fashion-forward. Let’s face it, they are pretty ugly and not something that she would have bought two years ago – I don’ t even think Tim Gunn could make these shirts ‘work’. But, my son loves them and eagerly looks for the latest shape or animal every time she goes into his room to get him after a nap. Because of this, she happily wears these shirts every single day.

I’m not the first woman in the world to marry an asshat, I certainly won’t be the last.

I’m still not exactly sure how I’ll explain his story to him. I’m not sure how, if at all, she’ll fit into the narrative. I’ve got a little bit of time to figure that out.

Over the years, as friends have lamented about the abyss that is the heterosexual dating scene, some have said to me in exasperation, “It must be so much easier being with a woman! The COMMUNICATION, the sensitivity, the consideration!” The next time someone says that to me, I think I’ll say, after pouring two very large glasses of tequila, “let me tell you a little bit about my last relationship…”