| A lot of changes are on the verge of occuring here, at Chez Duckworth. Not the least of which is Matt getting a new job. It's a job he's been busting his hump for for a long time, and a rank which suits him. I'm extremely thrilled for him, for us, really, and this new venture into the life of a Warrant Officer's family.
Have I mentioned, however, that I don't handle change too...gracefully? It's true. When things are getting ready to happen; marriage, baby, surgery, I tend to find eighty million things to discuss in the realm of "what if??".
So, we were sitting having a discussion about all of the changes we see happening, and how we're going to start fresh in this new direction, and it's really going well. A very big change that will be coming with Matt's new job is in regards to insurance. It will be coming through my employer, and for the first time in my adult life, that I can remember, there will be a out-of-pocket cost associated with visiting the doctor, or the emergency room. It is a very small fee, in reality, and the entire plan is very very good. But, a fear surfaces. I make sure I do the right thing, and share it with him, carefully.
"I am terrified that we're going to plan things right down to the penny, and we're going to need to take Leilana, or ourselves, to the doctor, and we're not going to have the money to do it, without screwing other things up. I'm terrified that we're going to be doing things so according to plan that we won't be able to take care..."
And that's where he stopped me.
"Christina, this is me you're talking to. I understand your fear, I know where you came from, and the experiences which make you scared that we won't be able to go to the doctor. But, as the Man of this house, I will not, ever, let our family go uncared for. There is nothing which will make me not able to bring us, or our child to the hospital. I will always take care of you, and our family. I am the Man of this house, and that is my job, and I will damned well do it. I can't take away your fears, as I know where they came from, and I can't tell you not to think of them, because it's your right to think of them, all I can do is ask you to wait and see. I will take care of you, and our children."
There was more that he said, but I don't remember it. All I remember after that are the thoughts that were going on in my head.
He's right. These fears come because my siblings and I spent the vast majority of the time NOT going to the doctor, because my mother believed she couldn't afford it. And, really, she couldn't afford it in more than one way. The way she spent her money, she probably couldn't come up with the $20 co-pay for an office visit. But, I believe, more than that, she knew she couldn't afford for one of her children to reveal how she treated me, to a health care professional. Pretty much everyone knows that health care professionals are required by law to report any known, or suspected, forms of child abuse. And you can bet your bippy that there was more than enough going on in our house to be suspected. To this day, I don't know why none of my elementary and junior high school teachers stepped forward - but, I digress.
Additionally, though, are the other fears that I've brought into adulthood.
When Matt and I decided to start a household together, my biggest fear/obsession was in regards to the amount of food in our cupboards. Again, this is due to my mother's inability to keep the pantry and refrigerator stocked well enough to feed three children decent quantities of food in order to maintain our health. I can remember months where all we ate were egg noodles with peas and cream of mushroom soup or those damned chuckwagon patties on a bun. And, I can remember times where my mother would make up some inane reason to punish me, and send me to bed without dinner; poorly hiding the fact that we really only had enough food to feed my brother and sister. So- Matt and I used to get into raging fights, because I was damned sure never going to not have food in my house to feed my family.. and he for whatever reason couldn't get me to see that the smucking cupboards were pretty far from empty. He came to show me first, that he would make sure our stomachs were never empty for lack of food, to show me that we could eat decently, and that it wasn't horrible to have Hamburger (Chicken, Tuna) Helper a couple of nights a week, because it is tasty food after all.. and then, he put that in my hands. Over time, he made the groceries, and their bill, my responsibility.
I've also dreaded messing up the relationship between Matt and Leilana (and eventually other children, maybe). I honestly don't know the way that fathers and their children are supposed to interact. I have no experience to draw from. I do not have an understanding of the way it's supposed to be between a father and his daughter. So, coming into a parent-team has me very concerned. Intellectually, I understand that the father and the mother offer different things to their child(ren), but as to where that line is? Got me.
I've spent a good portion of Leilana's two years here, and some months prior to our plucking her from the Cabbage Patch, wondering how I was going to be a good mom, and let Matt be a good dad, without jacking it up. I want the two of them to have the idyllic father-daughter relationship. But, the only part of that that I can visualize in my mind's eye is the adult-child part of it. And only that, because I watch far too many movies. Often I sit back and watch them interact, and snipe out with something snarky. Whether it be because I think that he's being more strict than I would be, or he's roughhousing more with her than I think I would like if I were her, or a million other things that me, the mom (duh!) wouldn't do or say.
But sometimes, and more now than before, I simply zip my lips. And things turn out fine. Of course. Matt knows how to be a father, both because he had a pretty o.k. example, and because his role comes naturally to him, just like the fine points of motherhood come naturally to me. He's not hurting her when he's whipping her around the room in her blankie. He's teaching her how to have fun with him; he's teaching her she's safe with him, even when it is a little scarey. And he's not hurting her when he's putting her in her naughty spot, even though I would have given her a little more time to grasp what she's doing wrong. He's teaching her his limits, and the behavior he deems acceptable. They are on the same track as mine, but the threshold is different. Because he's the dad. And at the end of the day, after the bath, when she snuggles with him on the couch, and prefers her last goodnight kiss to come from him, I realize, he's put another of my fears to rest. He'll do his job, and in doing so, teach me where the line is between the mom's job and the dad's job.
Then, there's the control issue.
Growing up in a house with an alcoholic, a drug addict, and an abused wife, who was also an abused child, and went on to abuse her child, life is nothing but chaos, doubt, pain, fear, and uncertainty. Studies of children who survive this lifestyle have proven that they grow into adults starving for control. If they break the addictive/abusive cycle, they morph into A-type personalities, struggling to gain the control that was so absent in their childhood. This is me, to a "T". Today, I believe it to be the reason that I was so willing to join the Army. Because I knew it was the only way to get out. I knew it was the last stop on the way to adulthood and the only way to learn discipline before I got there. And I did. I ate it up. I did well in basic training, and AIT because I fought so hard to please and impress the cadre. I excelled in my units because the more structured, and "dress-right-dress" I made my life, the better Soldier I was.
In my first marriage, I had to fight to hide the uncertainty, and angst that complicated my life. I, in many ways, reverted back to wearing the mask I wore during my childhood. I hid his alcoholism that tarnished my life, from my family, and from my employers. I lost my job in sales because I couldn't maintain driving him back and forth to work from jail, and bailing him out, and driving him to court, while tending to the clients I had. I became helpless, I handed my control over to him and his "disease". I manifested my mother's legacy into my own life. I became passive. I did things and agreed to things and accepted whatever came my way without considering whether or not it was right for me. I let my self-esteem go down the drain, my weight go through the roof, my health go to hell, and I passively accepted it. By passively accepting it, I gave up chances to create the life I wanted.
So, moving into a relationship, then a life with Matt, I was damned if I was going to not take charge of every damned thing out there. I made decisions that I knew were bad decisions, just to say I made a decision. There were times when I was stressing so badly because of a poor decision I had made that I wanted to talk about and work out, but I refused to budge. I had driven [whatever] off into the ditch, and I was going to be damned if I gave the control of fixing it over to someone else. I so badly needed Matt to help me, yet I refused to ask for it, and I lied to make him believe I didn't need it. Eventually, Matt figured it out, and decided that all things that directly, or indirectly, impacted him, he was going to be in charge of. He was going to fix it. And just like that, I was suddenly only in control of making sure that I, and the baby, were bathed and functional.
He methodically identified everything I had worked so hard to ruin, developed a plan and set into motion the fixing of our lives. He slowly parceled out information to me, giving me understanding of where things were, and how they were going. He allowed me to earn back his trust after the lies I told and the decisions about his life that I had made without his consent. And then he started giving me things to control. He showed me an outline, and gave me small tasks to learn how it worked. It wasn't always fun - we weren't always nice to each other; outside stressors got in the way and all. But he was bound and determined to show me how to undo, then prevent, what had happened. And we work on it, constantly, and consistently. We discuss the bigger picture, and the finer points that are important to each of us, and come to the same place at the end.
I suppose though, that there is a certain strain of addiction that will always be with me. I firmly believe in my heart, that there is a part of me, that will always need to be reined in and controlled. This part of me that seems to sink back into passiveness, and make decisions that may not support the bigger goals. I'm trainable, though. And Matt is teaching me how to create the life I want. He's teaching me purpose. And in doing so, he is absolutely without doubt stopping the legacy of chaos, uncertainty, fear, and day-to-day living in our family. He is ensuring that our child(ren) will not start adulthood with our neuroses handicapping them.
Thankyou, Matt, for showing me time and time again, that you will not carry on the chain of uncertainty, and chaos that I brought to "us". Thankyou for placing me at the forefront of your life, and loving me enough to be willing to meet the needs I bring to you. And thankyou for making the decisions that show me daily that you will, indeed, see that we as a family are cared for. |
