Last Year...

Last spring there was a lot going on.  I had started going to a marriage counselor with my husband.  That first session we both cried a lot.  What surprised me was after months of tears, bitterness, apathy and emotional stand off our wonderful counselor made the simple observation that we were two people who obviously still cared for one another and we were both hurting deeply.  I didn't know if therapy would work for us.  I didn't have much faith that it would.  But as the weeks went on and we began dating each other and being honest with each other I began feeling as if things might be okay. 

Something else happened.  Something unexpected.  This time last year I was in a state of denial.  I can't be pregnant, can I?  What fool conceives a baby with someone that they have been contemplating divorce with?  Me, I guess.  Let me tell you that I've never felt so sheepish as when I sat down with my father and told him I was pregnant.  Yes, yes, we were married after all.  Still I felt like I did when I was sixteen and had received my first speeding ticket.  Telling Dad was enough to turn my fair skin permanently red.  After all, hadn't he been my savior who had swooped in one very sad day in February, packed up my few belongings and sheltered me in his home after I had cried to him on the phone about how unbearable everything had become for me?  Dad was watching T.V.  I went in and sat next to him.  He put his arm around my shoulder and said before I could confess anything, "I hear we are going to have a new grand baby born in December.  Maybe you could name him Michael David and he'd be known as MD for short."  We chuckled as tears stung my eyes.  He continued, "I love you, Neesie.  A new baby is nothing to be sad about, no matter the circumstances." 

He didn't tell me how reckless I had been, how incredibly fickle this new development made me seem.  He told me exactly what I needed to hear.  Exactly what any child needs to hear when they are hurt, or making poor decisions, or in my case getting knocked up by my estranged husband...that they are loved.  I'll always be grateful for that moment.  It gave me the courage that I needed. 

It seems like a bad dream when I think back to last year.  That couldn't have been me, could it?  That wasn't us, was it?  I've been thinking about what happened last year a lot.  I was driving in the car one day this week and as I was thinking about how horrible it had all been I had the strongest urge to go home right away and tell Brigham how much I loved him.  I wanted to hug him and touch his face and make sure he was real.  I don't know how to explain it other than now that we are back together, pushing forward I'm on edge quite a bit of the time, Zoloft be damned apparently.  We almost threw this away.  Eight years and two children and the moment I looked in his eyes and knew I wanted to marry him.  Gone.  Disappeared.  What if now that we know how precious this family is, what if now one of us is taken from the other?  Wouldn't that be the ultimate lesson in humility?  I try to reassure myself that this won't happen.  But it's hard.  It's also a good thing, because it reminds me to take nothing and no one for granted.

The baby I was carrying in the above picture turned out not to be a Michael or a David, but a beautiful happy little girl named Brielle.  When I look in her eyes I know that we knew one another in another time, another place before this.  She grabs my fingers and hands when I am feeding her.  She strokes my arm, puts both hands on either side of my face, screams with delight.  And I know without a shadow of a doubt that even if things had ended in the worst way, if my marriage had gone down in flames that I would not regret for one second having conceived this baby.  She was supposed to be mine.  And I'd relive it all again if it meant that's what I had to do to get her here. 

It's Ava that had to deal with all the crap at the time and she may have to deal with it for years to come.  She is highly sensitive and attuned to any interaction her father and I have with one another.  I feel a great deal of guilt for putting her through it all.  I hope in the years to come she will see the happiness we share and the memories of turmoil will melt away.  She was also a baby who came to me right when I needed her.  She was my first experience with unconditional love. 

Why am I writing about all of this?  Because it's what I've been thinking about.  Many times marriages do not last, even having exhausted every resource available.  Families unravel.  Regardless it's important to tell those we love that we love them.  Hold them tightly.  The only thing that is truly valuable at the end of our lives is the love we give to others and the love we receive in return.