Three Things I Know
By Adrienne Garrison
@adrie.garrison
At four months postpartum, I am experiencing a small-scale identity crisis. It is unclear where I start and where the baby ends. Nursing on demand, through the night with two older children peppering me with questions and needs throughout the day, it begins to seem that my very thoughts belong to them. Checking in with my own needs and desires feels like shouting across a canyon, “Are you still in there? Are you okay?” But even the echoes coming back are other voices: “I don’t want to,” and “More fruit snacks.”
In the chaos of our days, I gather up small moments like discarded socks left on the floor. I carry them from room to room, unsure of what to do with them and what to do with myself. Mismatched observations, like how Sammy, at four months, is utterly captivated by the ceiling fan. Delighted by it, even. He greets it like a dear friend each morning as he slowly blinks open his eyes.
And how Theo, at four years, is bothered by the damp and heavy feeling of his eyelashes when they are wet with tears. I have stumbled across him a few times behind a door or at the base of the stairs after a harsh word from his sister, dabbing at his eyes and frowning, trying to work out what exactly is happening with his face.
Then there is my six-year-old daughter who has a mind full of pictures. A pencil or marker in her hand sparks some kind of divine connection, and she sketches away, drawing on any and all surfaces—her bedroom wall, her bare legs, and most recently, the tidy boxes of my weekly planner.
I carry these images around with me for weeks, considering them from multiple angles. I bring them with me to a job interview, but they do not contain the answers to the questions I am asked.
Ahead of the interview, I cold-call four college girls in order to find childcare, and eventually have to beg a favor from a friend. I wake up early to steam the wrinkles out of my favorite shirt, tuck a nursing pad against the one leaky breast, and carefully slide my resume into a leather bag that does not contain one single diaper. On the drive, my nerves hum inside me and I count backwards eight, or maybe even ten years since the last time I have done this thing—interview for a job.
Once sitting across the table, I feel fine, aside from the fact that I have no idea where to put my limbs. I’m excited about the company, the flexibility, the pay, but not especially jazzed about the job itself. Perhaps that shows in the end. Because of that, or, for a hundred other possible reasons, I do not get the job, and a week later I am saying to my husband: “It wasn’t so much that I wanted to go back to work, but that I was wishing someone would just tell me what to do with my life.”
Give me a designated role to fill with steps and a process and allow me to meet or exceed those expectations. It’s what I’ve been doing my whole life until becoming a stay-at-home mom. Give me a place, a magical place, outside of my own home where I can go to collaborate with other adults. And when I have done my job, acknowledge me with words and compensation. This is what I wanted when I surprised everyone who knows me by applying for a job.
“Oh,” my husband says. “I wish I’d known that’s what you were looking for, Babe.”
I can tell he’s proceeding cautiously.
“I would have told you that a job isn’t really like that. You won’t get… ” He gestures at the idealistic words still hanging in the air. “I would have reminded you,” he concludes.
I know it is true the moment he says it, and also I know I couldn’t have realized my true motivation without going through every single step of this process.
I wasn’t looking for a job. I was looking for the chance to do work that was valued and seen.
My transition to three kids may look relatively smooth from the outside, but at four months postpartum I am starting to crack. I have lost myself inside the beautiful minutiae of constantly caring for others, and I’m flailing around awkwardly as I try to find myself again. Perhaps I should have seen it coming, because every one of my childrens’ births has led me through this clumsy season of reinvention. But now, toggling between gymnastics sign-ups and wondering whether I remembered to actually run the dishwasher, I have forgotten all the things I once believed about the work of motherhood. There was a time when I knew without a doubt that this work is important, holy, even. That it has an impact far beyond the reach of these four walls and eighteen years.
All I know at this moment is that nobody seems to see me, even though I am working as hard as I possibly can.
Whether looking for a job or for a sense of self, this search has only turned up more questions, so I look for peace in what I know. I know that Sammy, you might remember, has become best friends with the fan in our bedroom. When he leans back after nursing and spots it there on the ceiling, a gummy smile blooms across his face. It is a strange love, I admit, but I think I am beginning to understand. It’s about the comfort of home. It’s a signal that he is in the place where his needs will be met, where he will be cared for. It’s an assurance that all is well.
Later, I find Theo sitting at the foot of his bed pressing his fingers against his eyes in an attempt to stop an inconvenient gush of feeling. I get down on my knees and wait until he squints up at me, his expression a mixture of anger and sadness, and I know the light touch of my lips against his forehead will serve as a promise that he is not alone in this strange new landscape of emotion.
As for Penny, by the time I discover how she’s defaced my planner, she is nowhere to be found. In the luck only children of writers have, she is saved by the sheer metaphorical value of what she has done. All across my Tuesday and Wednesday of next week, she’s drawn strange creatures on top of a mountain, waving their cartoon hands at the stars I have used to indicate essential items on my to-do list. She has made art out of my best laid plans. This girl is so abundantly full of energy for making that she doesn’t even care where her creations end up. She’s on to the next thing and no one could stop her if they tried. If only I could be like that.
I see these small moments of their childhood that no one else sees, moments that would slip through the cracks of time, insignificant to a world in such a very big hurry. If feeling unseen is a part of doing this good, hard, holy work, I will endure it. I will find myself again through all the strange and simple things that are worth knowing in this little world we have made together.
Adrienne Garrison lives in Bloomington, Indiana with her husband and their two little ones. Her essays have appeared in Coffee + Crumbs and New Millennium Writings, and her short story “No Longer Mine” was recently featured in LETTERS Journal. Adrienne believes magic takes the form of heart-to-heart conversations, petit-fours, and walks in the woods. You can find more of her writing on her website.
Photo by Jennifer Floyd.