Silence is the fourth member of our family. He comes with us everywhere, enfolds us, shushes in our ears. And he is with us in the car on the way home. Neither of us knows what to say. Our marriage is strained to the breaking point. Every conversation devolves into arguments, and no topic is safe. There is so much pent-up anger, resentment, and sadness that any kind of heat brings it to a quick and roiling boil. Last night it was dinner. Whose turn was it to cook? Our rage at each other overflows the pot in a heartbeat. I am ashamed to say that there has been violence-a vase tossed (me), a hard push against the wall (him). And it’s strange to say that there’s a certain relief that comes in the fighting; it’s the only way we connect now. Rage is the new sex. Bitterness stands in for passion.
Is it wrong to say that our child has destroyed our relationship? It probably is. But I’ve earned so many of the bad mommy badges, that one more can’t make much difference. And it is all my fault; I know this. I have seen it over and over again, that look on the faces of health professionals, other parents, even my own sister. Sure, it masquerades as understanding, compassion, a desire to help. But really? It’s judgment, plain as day.
Because everyone knows that a real woman, a good mother, has a healthy and happy baby. And a bad mommy has a troubled child who cries and can’t sleep through the night, who simultaneously rejects her and won’t let her out of his sight. The child of a bad mommy doesn’t get invited to playdates and Kindermusik and Mommy and Me yoga classes. She has a scent-it’s fatigue and unhappiness-and all the other mommies can smell it and stay away. What if it’s contagious? What if my child starts to rage instead of playing the tambourine? What if he throws a book that hits another child in the face and shows no reaction at all? What if he arches his back and screeches when I try to help him to do baby downward dog?
And they look at you, with that look, trying to figure out what exactly you are doing wrong and hoping that they’re not doing it, too. And I want to tell them that I am just like them, doing all the same things and making the same mistakes. But silence holds his hand over my mouth. And I just walk away, don’t go back to yoga, look for yet another pediatrician, try another activity. We don’t need anyone, I think. We’re better off alone. But of course that’s not true.
“What’s wrong with him?” my husband asks softly. Outside the day is bright and beautiful. We have the windows down and I can smell blossoming lilac. It was not the question I expected. Usually he rails against the teachers and the doctors, or launches accusations against me. You coddle him. You always give in when he cries. You let him into our bed. You don’t discipline him.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I really don’t.”
And I don’t. For all my self-blame, there’s something inside me that knows he came to us this way. We didn’t do this. I say as much, and I see a single tear travel down my husband’s face. I have never seen him cry, not even at his father’s funeral. My heart breaks for about the millionth time.
When we get home, the phone is ringing and I pick it up. It’s Mrs. Peaches, the head of the school.
“I have a list,” she says. “Of more appropriate places for your son. Should I e-mail it to you? Can I make some calls for you?”
“Oh,” I said. “The teacher, she didn’t say he couldn’t come back. Just that if he didn’t improve-”
“Don’t misunderstand,” she said quickly. “We’re not punishing him. It’s just that he needs an amount of attention that we can’t give him.”
“So,” I said. “He can’t come back?”
I could feel my husband looking at me, feel my stomach getting queasy with upset. I loved that school, everything about it, from the beautifully landscaped grounds to the bright, colorful classrooms to the stables.
“It might be best if he didn’t,” she said. Then, “I’m sorry. His teacher, I’m afraid, didn’t make it clear how urgent we consider the situation. For the other children, especially.”
I hung up in a fog, stumbled over to the couch. I think my husband murmured some words of comfort. We’ll figure it out, he said. We’ll be all right. But tomorrow I knew he’d go to work. And I’d be home alone with our son, figuring it out alone. Usually, I would make some kind of slicing comment. But today I didn’t have it in me. Maybe because I didn’t, he sat down beside me. We were alone, my son and my mother at her place for the day while we dealt with the school. There, on the couch, for the first time in months, we made love. It was sad and slow, desperate. I was grateful to realize I still loved him, and I could see he still loved me.
What happens to a marriage? Before the baby, we were truly happy-with our lives, with each other. After he came, we just started to come apart. Would it have happened anyway? Maybe parenthood is a crucible; the intensity of its environment breaks you down to your most essential elements as a couple. Rather than bind, we destabilized. Maybe any other stressor would have done that to us. Maybe we were neither the people nor the couple we believed ourselves to be when times were good.
It was the birth control thing that really started to unstitch us. He felt so betrayed when he realized that I’d been taking the pill for the year he thought we were trying for another child. I had put on a charade for him, feigning disappointment each month, pretending to track my ovulation, taking prenatal vitamins. I’m ashamed of it now, the act I put on. Why did I do it? he wanted to know, utterly mystified. Why didn’t I just tell him that I didn’t want another child? Why didn’t you know? I asked. Wasn’t it obvious that I didn’t? In motherhood, I am half the woman I was before. Couldn’t he see that?
But that afternoon, both of us together on the couch, all of those arguments and the high emotion that caused them seemed distant and far away. We lay in the sunlit living room, giving ourselves a little vacation from our problems. Yes, I still loved him, the scent of him, the feel of his hands on me. Then we heard my mother at the door, our son’s high-pitched voice. Is Mommy home? We quickly gathered up our clothes and bolted to the bedroom, naked and laughing.
“We’re home!” my mother called.
“We’re home!” he echoed. I heard him try the knob to our bedroom, which we had luckily remembered to lock.
“We’ll be right out, sweetie,” I said.
“Why is the door locked?” He tried it again, harder. I could hear him pushing his body against the door. Once, twice, three times.
“Just a minute,” I said, pulling on my clothes. “Mommy’s changing.”
He gave a hard kick to the outside. “Fine,” he said. I heard him storming off. My instinct was to rush after him, to comfort him. He wanted me and I wasn’t there. I took a deep breath. Loving and caring for your child doesn’t mean you owe all of yourself to him, every second, my shrink had said. She worried that I was overfocused on my son, that it was hurting both of us, fostering the unnatural dependence in him. She posited that all the trouble he was having in school might just be a ploy to stay home with me.
I looked over at my husband and saw that all the laughter had died from his eyes.
That night when I was tucking the baby into his bed, I saw him staring hard at the wall behind me.
“What is it?” I asked.
“There’s a man behind you.” I turned to look, but I knew there wasn’t anyone there. There never was.
“Time for sleep,” I said.
“He’s a bad man,” he said. His face was grim, but not alarmed. No. Never that.
This was not new. There were imaginary friends and pets, people lying at the bottom of our pool, lingering outside our windows. There were voices that told him to do things-like unlock and open the front door in the night, setting off the security alarm and rousing us from deepest sleep.