Drunk Mom (5 page)

This thing, this happiness, it was falling out of me, it was uncontainable, excessive, spilling along with my tears. My guts under the scalpel.

Walking around with the stroller, this is what I think about a lot: Frankie’s birth. As an animal I’ve fulfilled my function. You’d think I’d get bored with thinking about it but I don’t. When I saw him for the first time, it felt as if something detonated in my head, a big bang: hello, this is a new universe.

I was his mother from the first ultrasound. There was the windowless waiting room of orange plastic chairs and old magazines as I waited to be seen by the robotic technician who smeared my stomach with clear goo and laconically recited: there’s the baby, this is the heart, do you want to listen to the heartbeat.

On the grainy screen of the ultrasound, thousands of dots and zigzags came together, tightened, then expanded, almost falling apart at the edges.

She said “the baby.” And it was.

Afterwards in the bathroom, I tried to cry but I couldn’t. The emotion was fetal—there but not fully formed. It hurt and soothed at the same time.

As I walk, I pass other mothers—women like me or not like me at all, their hands tied to the handles of their Bugaboos and Stokkes. Aren’t we a strange bunch, I think: adult women completely unplugged from our regular lives (our grown-up lunches and conference meetings and
business trips and bachelorette martini parties and the gym) in order to attend to these helpless, alien creatures?

I suspect many of us aren’t as shell-shocked as I seem to be, but occasionally I catch someone’s eye and it’s like meeting in the trenches: What the hell are we doing here? I have no idea. But I love it.

In my ongoing confusion over motherhood, I go back to replaying the moment when my son was finally out, to remind myself of that overwhelming happiness, to remind myself what I’m doing here. And I feel comforted, reassured even, and I flash back a smile to the next mother who passes, the look of recognition on her face.

I tell myself: It’s going to be okay. I’m a mom. This is my mission. There’s nothing strange going on here.

But even early in the day, there is already another ongoing thought cycle running alongside this one. I pretend it’s not there.

It’s thirsty.

When my boyfriend offers to take care of the baby in the evenings, I go out to ride my bike. I do this a couple of times that August. I ride my bike to the liquor store first. I get a six-pack of light, lime-flavoured beer. The beer cans start to sweat as soon as I get them outside. It’s been impossibly fantastically tropical today. Patio weather.

And the drinks? They’re not really drinks.

It’s not even like drinking, drinking this stuff. It’s summer. It’s because it’s summer. Everyone drinks in the summer.

I pedal as fast as I can to the park by the lake. I find a bench far from the bike trail. The cans look like Sprite cans—the tint of green is close enough; there’s the same illusion of freshness contained in the lemony
graphic. It’s perfect. I’m just a bike rider taking a break by the lake, having my pop.

The water is lovely, nice dark blue peppered with clean, white boats. The park is full of runners and rollerbladers, moms with strollers. The sun is still out and I’m wearing a T-shirt even though it’s past nine.

I drink two cans fast.

On the third, I feel my body click and tingle, the warmth spreading from my chest, down my belly, straight into my cunt and then further down to my feet.

It’s a total jolt of joy. Despite the jolt I seem to be made out of caramel. Or toffee. Or whatever makes me feel so sweet and so relaxed that I could melt.

I just love everything. I love everything. I love everybody.

I need to tell someone.

I can’t call my house because I’m supposed to be riding my bike.

I call my father.

I never call my family. I don’t know why. They’re sweet people.

No, they’re not.

They are loving and funny, hateful and completely humourless.

They believe that Jesus Christ is our saviour, but I remember them making fun of religious freaks when I was a little girl and they were atheists. They are intolerant of non-Europeans. But sometimes they are stunned by the small-mindedness of their Polish community here in Canada, people who they say judge too much.

I don’t call them because I’m never sure that I won’t hang up. In that way, I’m a product of my parents. I’m a product of two people who
refuse to be defined and whose most powerful weapon is surprise and the predictability of being surprising.

My sister: “You know what mom’s like.”

Me: “Yeah. She freaked out, right?”

My sister: “She was totally calm. We had a really nice chat.”

I don’t talk to my parents because there’s only so much unpredictability that I can handle, having myself to deal with. I cannot rely on my own two feet to walk me out of liquor stores—the disconnect between my mind and the ground I’m stepping on seems too great.

But when I’m buzzed, like right now, I don’t worry about who’s going to answer: which dual mom or dad. It doesn’t really matter at all. I’m generous and feel infinitely tolerant when I’m drunk.

I smoke and drink another two cans as I talk to my father about the baby.

My father listens. Tries to say something but I’m talking now. I know I’m talking too much, Dad, but I just wanted to explain how I’m so full of happiness and everything is working out, isn’t it? And I’m just calling to share my happiness.

He says—

Please, let me finish.

I drink my last can.

I talk more. And talk. Suddenly I share secrets with him, tell him that I never planned to be a mother but now that I am, I can’t think of a more wonderful experience.

I tell him that I actually feel fulfilled for the first time in my life. And that I also feel a little cheated since I always thought myself to be above such basic biological determinants. I guess I always thought I’d be some kind of an academic or an artist and derive my satisfaction from that, I say to my dad. But like you—I boldly refer to a touchy topic: his
abandoning his own writing aspirations—I think I can be quite content just being a parent. Perhaps I’ll write later when the kid is older, right? I say, and my dad grunts something on the other end, something that I take as encouragement to talk more because I keep going.

I’ve never said any of this to anyone, I tell him. I tell him I’m that I’m glad we have this kind of relationship, where we can just talk. I say that they’re really confusing sometimes, he is, not just him but Mom too. The whole family. But I love them no matter what. I love him. I love my baby. Because now there’s a new family member! Family is very important. Perhaps it’s the only thing that matters, I mull. Family. It’s great.

He starts to speak—

Oops, what time is it? I say.

I’m done with my can.

Once the last drop makes it out, I hang up.

I get back on my bike. I pedal home. I’m slightly buzzed but not buzzed enough to sing out loud. So I sing in my head, letting the end fragments of songs spill out of me once in a while as I keep going.

At home, my boyfriend says he’s forgiven me for the night before.

What night before.

We kiss.

I hope the lemon smells strong enough to overpower the other, beery smell.

He holds me even closer.

Who cares what night before. I’m not going to ask.

When we make love I hold on to him with all my strength—I’m full of gratitude for his forgiveness. This gratitude is genuine.

I’m full of gratitude because I got away with whatever he has forgiven me for. I love him so much. I’m so happy.

I’m so happy because I remember something. Although it’s not like I really forgot about it. I remember something that is waiting for me after we finish.

He holds my head and says that I don’t seem to be entirely there, what’s distracting me?

No, nothing, I assure him. I pull him even further into myself.

I can’t come but the evening isn’t entirely lost yet.

I tune in to his body reaching further inside mine, try to estimate how far from coming he is. I hold on to his ass. There’s a tension of muscles underneath the palms of my hands. Close. Closer.

I say, Come on, come. Come for me.

The tension gets even stronger.

Come on.

There’s still an almost full mickey hidden in a box in the basement.

T
here are lots of evenings when I go out on my bike with my pack of six beers. It’s never just six beers either. The amounts, they increase. They have to as my body gets used to alcohol and it makes more space for it. It makes more space for it because it doesn’t just want more of it—it needs more.

A need implies that this, my drinking, is something that is necessary.

Is it not necessary. Yet it is a need.

What kind of a need is it, then?

It’s not a physical one. At least not yet. My lacking this thing is not going to result in death, not even a serious withdrawal, probably no alcoholic seizure.

This is a need that’s psychological—sustenance necessary to keep troubling thoughts away. The thoughts of guilt and worry.

I can’t imagine dealing with my guilt and worry without the
anaesthetic of alcohol—the guilt and worry that haunt me when I’m conscious and aware. Sober.

Maybe another day, I can deal with it. Maybe tomorrow I can deal with it. Maybe after the weekend. Right now I just need a break.

It is ingrained in me now that once I take a drink, I will get the break, will get the relief. Yes, I know—intellectually—that the relief is brief and that the consequences can be awful, but I no longer have any defences. I’m looking for the perfect out from my situation, and even though I know sobriety is the perfect out, it seems like an absurd concept. Can’t get sober till I feel I’m ready to face the guilt and worry; can’t face the guilt and worry when I’m sober.

I have to wonder, too, if in seeking this ultimate break I’m trying to subconsciously annihilate myself—if this is some manifestation of
Todestrieb
, a death wish. I wonder if my addiction is a strongly expressed death wish, nothing more, nothing less.

I don’t consciously think of dying when I’m drinking. In fact, the desire that I imagine drives my drinking is the desire to live, to live loudly and freely, without any care. I want to jump, want to run, want to want!

But then there’s the parallel, perhaps less conscious desire, which is to numb myself to the world. To deal with the world tomorrow.

Living is difficult. Dying is difficult. Being dead is not difficult. And what else is a blackout if not death?

Because of blackouts there are entire days when I try to avoid my boyfriend out of fear that he’ll ask me about something from the night before.

The truth is, I don’t remember the night before. Most of the time I remember only how I got there; there’s some kind of a beginning—me drinking on the metal staircase outside—and then there’s nothing for a long time, and then I’m in bed, waking up.

Sometimes there are painful, tender places on my body that I feel right away on waking, clues under the disguise of bruises. But I don’t get to know the whole story despite the clues. The best I have are some guesses, like, I must’ve tried to prevent some serious fall judging by the way my shoulder feels.

We make love often, my boyfriend and I, because I want to distract him, to stop him from talking. We usually make love in the morning, but possibly not just in the morning because sometimes he’ll say something or do something—like he’ll tug on my hair—that will also seem to be a clue as to what happened the night before. Maybe something intimate, sweet, or something very, very filthy, but I wouldn’t know.

Despite my avoiding him, my boyfriend is starting to ask questions too. The lovemaking is not enough to distract him. He asks about the tender, bruised places on my body, the way I smell, why I was so out of it—again—the night before when we had some friends over. Why I smoked an entire pack of cigarettes.

I think I know he knows and he probably knows I think I know he knows. But we still haven’t really talked about it—about the fact that my drinking is starting to get out of control.

I’m not that bad. I need help. There’s nothing wrong.

The doublethink is exhausting enough for me, I’m sure it’s taking its toll on my boyfriend as well. But we never talk about it.

There are times too when I suspect my boyfriend wants to talk about it. But instead he is not talking to me at all, and that scares me too because I need him on my side—he’s all I’ve got on my side.

At the same time, I’m grateful for his silence—it asks no questions and therefore there are no answers to give. So I don’t ask him why he’s quiet. I don’t want him to answer. I don’t think he wants to
answer. We both pretend his silences are a new part of his personality.

The new parts of my personality are when I no longer mind that he still goes out a lot.

Since he’s a new parent just like me, his sleep gets dramatically cut down and he doesn’t go out as much as before, but he’s still happily flitting from bar to bar at least a few times a month.