My Lilith Moments

I wrote a story from the daughter's point of view and then it was suggested it would be a richer story from the mother's point of view

My Lilith Moments

           

“Look! Mommy! LOOK!”

I sigh as my sweet Lilith jumps, the power in her legs lifting her high into the air, her chewy sausage legs propelling her farther in her mind than in reality. I used to think that wanting to devour my baby was pathological until my friend Samantha confessed she had thoughts about nibbling her daughter’s toes off. I even typed the phrase “eat your babies” on my Internet search. Several mothers admitted to fantasies of gnawing their babies’ hands, feet, arms and legs. Apparently something in a baby’s smell triggers the reward center in the mother’s brain, which is the same reward center that gets an addict to crave crack. It makes perverse sense that I love my child like an addict craves crack.

It is mesmerizing witnessing the first time Lilith learns how to jump; exhausting the two-thousandth time she implores me to watch. Again. And Again. My mind wanders to our syrup-soaked, half-eaten pancakes, which are still sitting on their plates on the kitchen table. During breakfast earlier that morning, Lilith had a meltdown as she realized there were no chocolate chips in the pancake. I figure that it is time to distract her with a walk to the playground. I’m so tired the coffee mug looks like it says “SSttaarrbbuucckkss”, but maybe she’ll get exhausted enough to nap after running around the jungle gym. She’s got Mount St. Helen levels of energy and I’ve got a sad baking soda volcano made of paper mache at a fifth grade science fair.

My princess of chaos lands on the concrete sidewalk in a squat, ready to launch herself again into the sky. Raising a toddler would have been so much easier if I was twenty-four. At least I wish my body was twenty-four again. The smooth plains of my stomach are now rolling hills of stretch marks, muffin-topping it over the waistband of my mom-jeans. I try to remember how amazing my body is to have given birth at age forty-three. Natural birth too, because it’s never too late to talk myself into doing it the hard way. As I walk along the sidewalk with my daughter, I try to forget how my own mother asked me to get plastic surgery last week when she saw my stretch marks in the dressing room at Lohman’s. I really hope Lilith will always feel amazed at how far her body can jump instead of how thin her body isn’t. That’s possible as long as my parents die before she reaches puberty and if we move into a yurt in Vermont with no TV, no magazines and no Internet.

“Mommy, Mommy, WATCH!” There she goes again. Hop. Hop. I keep on reminding myself to cherish this day since it’ll just be ten more years and she won’t give a shit about what I watch.

How many more hours do I have until Mark gets home? Of course he’s going to ask me what I’ve done all day and I’ll somehow keep my right fist from punching him in the face. At least when he gets home, I’ll get to pee with the door closed.

            “Stop! Lilith! No!” My impulsive demon-seed makes a run for the curb and I grab her right hand right before she has the opportunity to get hit by a car. My left shoe slips off my foot and I almost trip over it. She hasn’t started school yet and I can already fill a telephone book with all the near-death accidents she’s had.

            Lilith pouts and walks with heavy steps beside me, dragging my right shoulder down about four inches below my left. Only toddlers and suicidal people possess that strange melancholy when they have skirted death. I think about how much lighter she was when Mark and I had prayed over her three years ago in the NICU nursery at St. John’s. She had gotten a little excited in the womb, swallowed “meconium” and came out a little sicker than your average newborn. We were excited to be parents after trying for two years of painful fertility treatments and three miscarriages, but things don’t always go as planned. Mark and I had worried that our past indiscretions as wild twenty-something’s were coming back to haunt us in the form of having a dying baby.

            Despite that rocky start, my sweet Lilith is a miracle. And now I get to watch as my little miracle runs towards the playground and holds her head high even as she trips into the woodchips and sawdust. My heart sinks as I prepare for the worst. And then- my Lord, she has a set of lungs. The whole playground and the surrounding jurisdiction can hear her now, which is a good sign that she’s not badly hurt. The mothers see me run sheepishly behind her and pick her up, brushing off the chips and sawdust as I dodge her flailing arms and legs. Looks like the swing is the best bet to soothe my sweet savage beast today.

            “Higher, Mommy. High-er! Mommy! HIGHER!” Lilith giggles as I push the swing. The sun is shining, the wind is brisk and now I have a happy toddler. These are the moments I live for. These are also the moments I think about when I’m tempted to trade my toddler in for a cat. I give my daughter some fish crackers to prolong the moment. This is motherhood. This is what the Gerber Baby Commercials promised while I was trying to get pregnant and failing miserably. In a good week, 40% of the time it’s a Gerber Baby commercial. 60% of the time, it’s like the movie “The Exorcist” with a demon possessed toddler that wants to barf up pea soup everywhere.

            “Out! Mommy! Out!” Lilith has lasted for about five minutes on the swing before crying for escape- a new record. Fortunately, I find a spot to sit and watch as my little ball of miracles runs around, plays with the other kids and tires herself out. I am half-listening to the other mothers as I watch Lilith; I don’t really care about who Justin Beiber is dating or who designed George Clooney’s bride’s gown. My daughter’s diaper holds more relevant and interesting information.

            Finally, Lilith comes to me, wanting to eat lunch. Now, Mommy, now!, her body seems to say as she grabs my shirt and swings back and forth. Tuna fish sandwiches sound good right now. Tuna fish and a glass of Riesling.

            We walk the same route, Lilith jumping the same distances, giggling at every block. I see my neighbor Tammy walk towards us. She smells of patchouli, is always sucking on watermelon Jolly Ranchers and wears clothing purchased at a Renaissance Faire.  I like Tammy well enough; I just can’t look at her for more than ten minutes without hearing a Stevie Nicks song in my head. She waves her hands around, the silver rings bouncing rays of light into my retina as she tells me about the latest news about her organic garden.

            “That’s great Tammy,” I fold a hair behind my head and in an instant, feel about thirty pounds lighter. It takes about two seconds to watch as my daughter breaks away from me and sticks her foot into a pile of dog shit about half a block away.

            “No! No!” My hand still feels the shadow of my daughter’s grip as I run over.

I carry my daughter away from the poo, assess the damage and feel my tears flow unconsciously as this is one more thing I really didn’t need this morning. My daughter is standing there bawling, realizing for the first time in her life what dog poop smells like. It’s not even lunchtime. Six hours until Mark gets home.

            Tammy runs over. “Can I help?”

            “Oh it’s fine,” I say, a small tear running down my face. One hand is banging a shit-covered shoe in the grass and the other one is holding a crying toddler. I probably look insane. “I think it’s time for us to go home now.”

            Tammy takes the hint and walks on. I sit there for a while, letting my tear dry on my face, tasting its saltiness, watching my daughter cry while banging her shoe on the grass. Fuck it. They’re trashed. I take the other shoe off and carry my barefoot daughter in my arms. I grab the shoes by the straps and walk over to toss both of them into the garbage bin. There will be other shoes and other piles of dog poop. This is motherhood.

“We’re going home, honey,” I sigh. “Juice and crackers?”

Lilith moments

For once, something in the present tense. 

My Lilith Moments

           

“Look! Mommy! LOOK!”

I sigh as my sweet Lilith jumps, the power in her legs lifting her high into the air, her pale sausage legs propelling her farther in her mind than in reality. It is mesmerizing witnessing the first time Lilith learns how to jump; exhausting the two-thousandth time she implores me to watch. Again. And Again. My mind wanders to our pancakes, which are still sitting on their plates on the kitchen table, syrup-soaked and half-eaten. During breakfast earlier that morning, Lilith had a meltdown as she realized there were no chocolate chips in the pancake. I figured that was a good time to distract her with a walk to the playground. I’m so tired the coffee mug looks like it says “SSttaarrbbuucckkss”, but maybe she’ll get tired enough to nap.

My princess of chaos lands on the concrete sidewalk in a squat, ready to launch herself again into the sky. Raising a toddler would have been so much easier if I was twenty-four. At least I wish my body was twenty-four again. The smooth plains of my stomach are now rolling hills of stretch marks, muffin-topping it over the waistband of my mom-jeans. I try to remember how amazing my body is to have given birth at age forty-three. Natural birth too, because it’s never too late to talk myself into doing it the hard way. I try to forget how grossed-out my own mother was last week when she saw my stretch marks while changing in the dressing room at Lohmans. I really hope Lilith will always feel amazed at how far her body can jump instead of how thin her body isn’t. That’s possible as long as my parents die before she reaches puberty and if Mark and I move into a yurt in Vermont with no TV, no magazines and no Internet.

“Mommy, WATCH!” There she goes again. Hop. Hop. I keep on reminding myself to cherish this day since it’ll just be ten more years and she won’t give a shit about what I watch.

How many more hours do I have until Mark gets home? Of course he’s going to ask me what I’ve done all day and I’ll somehow keep my hands from punching him in the face, but when he gets home, I’ll get to pee with the door closed.

            “Stop! Lilith! No!” My impulsive demon-seed makes a run for the curb and I grab her right hand right before she has the opportunity to get hit by a car. My left shoe slips off my foot and I almost trip over it while saving my child from another bad decision.

            Lilith pouts and walks with heavy steps beside me, dragging my right arm down about four inches below my left with the disappointment that she has skirted death. I think about how much lighter she was when Mark and I had prayed over her three years ago in the NICU nursery at St. John’s. She had gotten a little excited in the womb, swallowed “meconium” and came out a little sicker than your average newborn. Mark and I had worried that our past indiscretions as wild twenty-somethings were coming back to haunt us in the form of having a dying baby after trying for two years through painful fertility treatments and three miscarriages.

            Despite that rocky start, my sweet Lilith is a miracle. And now I get to watch as my little miracle runs towards the playground and holds her head high even as she trips into the woodchips and sawdust. My heart sinks as I prepare for the worst. And then- my Lord, she has a set of lungs. The whole playground and the surrounding jurisdiction can hear her now, which is a good sign that she’s not badly hurt. The mothers see me run sheepishly behind her and pick her up, brushing off the chips and dust as I dodge her flailing arms and legs. Looks like the swing is the best bet to soothe my sweet savage beast today.

            “Higher. High-er! HIGHER!” Lilith giggles as I push the swing. The sun is shining, the wind is brisk and now I have a happy toddler. These are the moments I live for. These are also the moments I think about when I’m tempted to trade my toddler in for a cat. I give my daughter some fish crackers to prolong the moment. This is motherhood.

            “Out! Mommy! Out!” Lilith has lasted for about five minutes on the swing before she wants to get out. Fortunately, I find a spot to sit and watch as that stinkin’ little ball of miracles runs around, plays with the other kids and tires herself out. I am half-listening to the other mothers; I don’t really give a shit about who designed George Clooney’s bride’s gown. My daughter’s diaper holds more relevant information than those vacant conversations.

            Finally, Lilith comes to me, wanting to eat lunch. Tuna fish sandwiches sound good right now. Tuna fish and a glass of Riesling.

            We walk the same route, Lilith jumping the same distances, giggling at every block. I see my neighbor Tammy walk towards us. She smells of watermelon Jolly Ranchers and dresses like the Woodland Fairies barfed in her closet.  I like Tammy well enough; I just can’t look at her for more than ten minutes without hearing a Joni Mitchell song in my head.

            I’m sure I look like I’m wrangling a wild horse, not holding the hand of a three year old as Tammy tells me about the latest news about her organic garden.

            “That’s great Tammy,” I fold a hair behind my head and in an instant, feel about thirty pounds lighter. It takes about two seconds to watch as my daughter breaks away from me and sticks her foot into a pile of dog shit about half a block away.

            “No! No!” My hand still feels the shadow of my daughter’s grip as I run over.

I carry my daughter away from the poo, assess the damage and feel my tears flow unconsciously as this is one more thing I really didn’t need this morning. My daughter is standing there bawling, realizing for the first time in her life what dog poop smells like. It’s not even lunchtime and so far my daughter has run me through five out of the nine Circles of Hell.

            Tammy runs over. “Can I help?”

            “Oh it’s fine,” I say, tears staining my face. One hand is banging a shit-covered shoe in the grass and the other one is holding a crying toddler. I probably look insane. “I think it’s time for us to go home now.”

            Tammy takes the hint and walks on. I sit there for a while, watching my daughter cry, banging her shoe on the grass. Fuck it. They’re trashed. I take the other shoe off and carry my barefoot daughter in my arms. I grab the shoes by the straps and walk over to toss both of them into the garbage bin. There will be other shoes in the hand-me-down tub of clothes and shoes in the closet.

“We’re going home, honey,” I sigh. “Juice and crackers?”

My Trader Joe's Moment

This is my latest writing assignment: Writing a personal memoir piece. Here is a piece of my life. 

Trader Joes and the Black Hole of Dignity

            I hate bumping into patients outside of the office. It reminds me that I’ve got a reputation to maintain. I have to stop myself from mumbling when choosing a melon.  I can’t take the bag of chips that would literally be calling my name if I were schizophrenic. My patients seem to enjoy seeing their doctor in the wild but are slightly bewildered. I’m not sure how they feel about seeing me at Trader Joe’s- “My doctor likes the dark chocolate covered almonds too!” Or perhaps our encounter deflates the significance of every piece of advice I’ve given them- “My doctor is eating all the sugar, gluten and dairy! She is full of shit. I’m falling off the wagon RIGHT NOW.”

During these flashes of social awkwardness, there comes a time when my patients may realize I’m often in worse mental shape than they are. Patients have run past me while I wear my “crazy cat lady” costume for the “Love the Run You’re With” 5K. At the local pharmacy, I bumped into one patient while shopping for drain cleaner while looking like someone who couldn’t take a shower because her drain was clogged. At times like these, I avoid eye contact. Best to pretend that moment never happened. Nobody is dying to know their doctor is a flawed weirdo like every other human being on the planet.

            2014 had been a particularly bad year. While mired in a depressive episode triggered by the dissolution of a bad relationship, a new antidepressant that I had been started on in January had given me insomnia. The minute I woke up in the morning, I was thinking about the moment when I could come back home and go to bed. It was pretty evident my stressful lifestyle was frying my brain and making me crazy. An evening of grocery shopping and watching a funny movie in my pajamas while eating dinner out of a box was all I could handle by the time the clock struck “fuck this shit-o-clock”. Crazy or not, I had to eat.

            On one particular day, I bumped into a patient who I had seen earlier in the week. Thankfully, I only had a kale salad and tofu rolls in my basket at the time. Trader Joe’s is a fine grocery store with its own line of products that are affordable and healthy such as antibiotic/hormone free meat. None of which I particularly craved. She didn’t see me subsequently toss in 2 frozen pizzas, a bag of cheese and caramel popcorn and a box of chocolate covered almonds. My patient and I exchanged pleasantries and went on with our shopping. Crisis in reputation management: over.

            I checked out, making sure my patient wasn’t in line with me. At the end of my transaction with the cashier, I ended up with my head literally inside my bag searching for my keys. Precipitously dangling on the edge of panic, I pictured myself stranded and taking sink baths in the washroom at Trader Joe’s. The cashier seemed concerned at my escalating distress and offered a back counter to look for my stuff. I quietly unloaded all the contents of my purse. Despite my diligent search, no keys were unearthed. I was like a Beverly Hills housewife without her chardonnay.

            At this point, other employees looked over in concern and an employee named “Rob” bounded over to me, his surfer dude curls flying in his wake, offering to help me retrace my steps. Rob and I scoured the store. Nothing. He asked me where I parked my car- I replied “In the parking lot” a little louder than I wanted. We walked outside, my eyes downcast, looking for the familiar set of metal things I depend on for access to my house, the office and my 2002 Toyota Camry. Rob was pointing to my car when I reached him.

            “Is this your car?” He pointed and looked in the window. “It’s running with the keys in the ignition.”

            Leaving the keys in the ignition of a running car was something I laughed at when my friend’s brother did it eight years ago. It seemed my proverbial chicken had come home to roost at Trader Joes.

Rob was so happy we found my keys that he insisted that we high-five.

I drove the 20 minutes home berating my epic absentmindedness. What kind of physician could I be if I couldn’t be trusted to turn my car off before entering a grocery store? I almost cried with relief when I parked my car at home. Then I looked in the back seat.

            I had, in my hysterical bout of embarrassment, driven off without my groceries.

             After briefly calculating how much I spent on groceries and how I couldn’t afford to just leave them at the store and buy new ones at Harris Teeter, I drove the 20 minutes back. The manager responded to my inquiry about my groceries with “Yes we have them. No words. No words.”

As in, “No words can express how badly I think your day is going.”

            Rob was happy to give my groceries back and threw in a bouquet of irises- perhaps as an award for “Customer in most dire need of dignity”. I drove home humiliated that I graduated from medical school and still couldn’t get my shit together, but happy that things were actually going to be OK. My car wasn’t stolen. My groceries hadn’t disappeared. I had my dinner in my pj’s, watched “Office Space” and went to bed. My dignity was a small price to pay for such comfort.

We had to use a certain type of "opener" to get our story going and to indicate what was to follow. I used one of my recent Facebook posts as the opener and came up with a story. It is absolutely NOT what my ex was like, but he did like his video games. 

I Messed With The Bull And Got The Horns

            My ex-boyfriend had ended our last conversation accusing me of being “angry, bitter and passive-aggressive”. Which I probably was. Because he was a dick. Five years later, I received a subpoena, which sent a lava floe of rage up my spine. I was being summoned to testify as a character witness regarding the civil case of “Byrne vs. Schoenstein”. It took me a few seconds to realize that “Schoenstein” was my dick ex-boyfriend, “Alan Schoenstein”. I hadn’t talked to him in years and now I was going to be dragged back into his life.

I was still angry I hadn’t broken up with him first when he told me I looked fat in my favorite dress. After a long day of counseling veterans, I had made that soul-sucking 90 min drive to his place multiple times a week. Then three years later, he broke up with me because I was “no longer worth the effort”. After that, we stopped all communication. I celebrated with a bottle of wine, a fistful of Xanax and a bag of chips.

            Now it appeared his ex-wife was suing him to get the house and sole custody of the children. Their divorce case was all over the local news showcasing his perfunctory “I am not a dick” statement against his ex-wife’s grisly deposition. There were photos of bruises on her thighs and neck, stories about being restrained against her will and his unwillingness to provide any relief when she was busy taking care of his mother who was recovering from hip surgery. One night while he was playing Epic Battle Fantasy 4, she asked him to help get his mother in bed.

            “It’s your fucking job,” he said, allegedly. “You’re a fucking nurse.”

            That part was probably true, given my experience with Alan.

Ironically, Alan happened to be a beloved high school math teacher who had taught in the county for almost two decades. The students took to him like goslings to a Father Goose. After the news broke, not only did their Emperor suddenly have no clothes on, he was being accused of choking his Empress. Still, I heard he took good care of his two kids. As God supposedly molded man in His image, Alan loved molding children in his.

            A week later, the process server showed up at work to give me the subpoena.

            That night, my psychiatrist gave me a refill on my Xanax.

The day of their hearing, my head buzzed with each step towards the courthouse. My hands were red from rubbing them together and my nails were sore from picking at them. The judge was sitting at the head of the table. On one side were Alan’s ex-wife, her lawyers and a court stenographer. On the other side, Alan sat next to his lawyer. His lawyer greeted me and motioned to the seat on the other side near the judge. Alan nodded in greeting. His ex-wife looked like she was in her late twenties and reminded me of my best friend.

They made me put my hand on a book, “ to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth” and asked about my history with Alan. It felt like a colonoscopy without anesthesia.

            Alan’s Lawyer/L: Did he ever force you to do anything you didn’t want to do?

            Me/M: No.

            L: Did he ever cause bruising or other injuries during your consensual activities?

            M: Yes.

            L: Did you pursue medical attention for the injuries?

            M: No.

            L: Did you ever see him threaten or be violent to a minor?

            M: No.

            L: Would you say he is good with kids?

            M: Yes.

            L: Do you think he would ever make a child feel unsafe?
            M: No.

            L: Did you ever feel unsafe when you were with him?

            For the first time during my testimony, Alan looked up at me. I didn’t move.

            M: No.

            I was humiliated and ashamed of myself, but I was never unsafe.

            It was the ex-wife’s lawyer’s turn to cross-examine me. I expected him to attack my credibility since I didn’t know the ex-wife and hadn’t talked to Alan in five years.

            EWL: Can you tell me about why you two broke up?

            M: He didn’t want to drive to my house because it was too much effort for him.

            EWL: Did he have any health issues that would keep him from doing so?

            M: No. I guess it stressed him out.

            EWL: But he expected you to go to his house multiple times a week?

            M: Yep.

            EWL: Did the 90 minutes sitting in rush hour traffic stress you out?

            M: Yep.

            EWL: Is the distance to your house different than the distance to his house?

            L: Irrelevant, Your Honor.

            Judge: This is a character witness telling us about his character. It’s relevant to me.

            EWL: Did he ever threaten to leave you?

M: Well, he said if I didn’t start wearing sexier clothing, he would stop thinking about me romantically. So basically, yeah.

If his shirt buttons could have melted with rage, Alan would have been covered in second-degree burns. I had already talked about the hand-cuffs; might as well talk about everything else.

            EWL: Why didn’t you leave him?
            M: The sex was good. Alan made me feel I was lucky anyone wanted me.

            My lack of self-esteem was now on public record along with anecdotes about our sexual proclivities.

Her lawyer knew that nothing I said was going to support the allegations of abuse, but at least I could corroborate the part about his controlling behavior. Being with Alan was like punching myself in the gut every day. But it was my own fault for messing with the bull and getting the horns. I was the one who thought I could change the bull into a kitten.