And Then I Cried

Day two was a lot more of an emotional struggle than I could have ever imagined. There should be a packet or something that you can sign up for that will tell you tips and hints to becoming a step mom – or perhaps just a booklet full of tips and hints from other step moms.

On the way home from school on Monday, Middle Boy said to me, “This isn’t my last house. When I get older I’m going to live with my mommy.”

I sat there a little stunned … what do you say to that? I tried, “We’ll you’ll have to talk to your daddy about that, but right now you’re living with your daddy and me.”

He responded with, “I think mommy will like me living with her.”

My heart ached. How do you tell a 5-year-old child that his mommy didn’t want him? That she didn’t care to have any sort of custody or responsibility for him. What the hell are you supposed to say to that?

I told the boyfriend later that night, I’m really not sure if he’s talked with him about it or not. But the look on his face seemed to be of the same pained, aching expression of “How do I tell him this?”

My heart continued to ache though. I pushed it down like I do with most uncomfortable emotions that I feel – that was, I learned later that night, the wrong thing to do. Day Two was most definitely an emotional roller coaster.

Not an overwhelming “I can’t do this” sort of thing. Not even really an “Am I crazy? What am I doing here?” sort of thing. It was most definitely an “I’m really scared …No one told me how unnatural and painful this could be” sort of thing.

I’ve handled change. I’ve handled change of all kinds, but, the change was generally my own. It wasn’t shared with three children and a boyfriend. It was like my sensory was turned to extra sensitive. I seemed to feel everything. I even felt for the cats yesterday.

And then I watched my favorite all time little guilty pleasure (One Tree Hill). And it was one of those heart-wrenching shows … the kind that you know is going to probably going to make you cry so you grab a box of Kleenex. And then you watch it, and you really cry. But once the show was over, the tears didn’t stop – they just kept falling. Once they start, it unleashes the floodgates of bottled up emotions. And oh wow, there was a lot built up in there.

The bath didn’t seem to help, and neither did the shower and neither did lying on my bed in the dark trying to calm myself down. And of course, when the boyfriend and the boys got home from his sisters house, I tried really hard to suck it all in. There was no fooling the boyfriend. And I felt them, the walls going up. Trying to push him away, literally trying to will him to move back and leave me. “Don’t do it!” I pleaded with myself. “But this is what I’ve always done!” I replied. “Well, not anymore!” I said back. “It’s time to change.”

That is the most annoying thing I’ve ever been told “It’s what I’ve always done.” I refuse to let this bring me down. I can make it through this, even if it’s always going to be like this. I will find a way to live this life, because I want it badly enough. I wish that I had a better clue of how to handle it, but I know that I’m not alone. I know that other women have done this before me, and I can and will do this too.

This has always been my philosophy and the way I’ve lived my life: "Risk more than others think is safe. Care more than others think is wise. Dream more than others think is practical. Expect more than others think is possible."
-Claude Thomas Bissell