One: He is the most stressed out person I know.
I knew he had issues with anxiety and temper, but I didn't understand the extent to which it could manifest. He is scared when outside his home environment. He freaks out in traffic. No problem, however small, is simply dealt with and made into history: it must be churned over in his mind, bitched about, and then vomited up in discussion for days afterward. The fact that he took the freeway going the wrong direction today to return the car meant he called me to tell the tale immediately upon reaching the airport and this story will be rehashed, with rolling eyes, gritted teeth and flailing arms, to anyone who will listen over the next month.
Two: He is racist and rude.
Constantly with the racist jokes, which don't even begin to be funny. Then he turns around and flirts with the Latina motel maids in his high school Spanish. Strange. He tips horribly low. His mother, who visited with him, is directly rude to servers at restaurants, to the point where Mr. Aran and I wanted to hide under the table in shame. Then she chews with her mouth open, does her gurgling smoker's laugh-cough, chunks of her dinner flying... I digress.
Three: He knows nothing about raising babies.
This was the big shocker. My dad can barely hold an infant. When he does, he seems uncomfortable and hands him over as soon as he can find an excuse to do so. He thinks the kid and I can just traipse all over God's creation shopping or sightseeing in the ninety degree weather, a week and a half out the chute. If I fall asleep over lunch, he says I should really get on the anti-anxiety medication, instead of suggesting that maybe I go home and take a nap. He was annoyed thoroughly by my napping. After a couple of days, I had to be rude and give him no choices. I dropped him off at his motel and told him I'd call when I was rested. Boy, did that cook him.
My ma sheltered him, is the problem. He never understood that she threw up after making his breakfast every day during her first trimester because of his love of bacon. He was never alone with my brother and I until I was two and a half and my brother was a few months old. After two hours, my mother returned to find him outside in the garden, freaking out. My brother had been crying the whole time. My dad had to get away from us.
***
I was more interesting before, when I was angry. Now I'm too tired and scared to be angry.
***
From "Two Stories About Emma," a short story by Margaret Atwood:
"I'm told the fearlessness goes away when these women have babies. Then they become cowards, like the rest of us."
***
I am such a delicious mess! Every shirt and bra stained with my yellow milk which, Mr. Aran reports, tastes slightly sweet. Sometimes I make too much and the kid can't get a good latch, so instead, he rubs my nipple all over his face and hands, like some freak, balding fetishist. I have to attack with the burp rag, and try again, the whole time telling him to be patient.
His sucking has gotten stronger. When he gets his latch, it hurts so much, momma. I suck in air, hard.
***
Today I go to the doctor to explain that I'm not going to kill anyone, that my anxiety stems not just from hormones and sleeplessness but from having been uprooted from my home near the ocean and cute little job and friends and gym and hell, let's include my abs in that list. The skin is getting tighter, but it still feels, like Anne Lamott said, like a waterbed mattress covered in flannel.
Last night I did five situps.
***
I went back to Weight Watchers after a mostly sleepless night, on Saturday morning, at seven a.m. I'd cried through much of the last several hours, begging God and the kid and whoever would listen to give me just one hour, just one little hour, of sleep. I did this until I was too tired to cry or beg anymore. After that, I know I fed and changed and soothed the kid, but I don't remember it. I fell asleep many times with him in my lap, then I'd wake up with his whole face in my belly and panic, knowing I'd suffocated him. I'd yank him away, he'd do one of his multi-tiered sighs, and I'd fall back asleep on accident.
The air was good, at seven a.m. People were out with their dogs. It's a five minute walk from my apartment to the Weight Watchers. The leader there is a badly-dyed blonde gay boy, very serious but flaming, which confuses me. I weighed in twenty-five pounds lighter than I'd been eleven days before.
posted by Samus @ 12:06 PM
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