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“…You Never Told Me”
by Kristi Grigsby
As I sat with my Caesar salad, I wondered if my girlfriend noticed my close examination of her. While I lifted the fork to my mouth, my eyes searched for the visible signs of stress that the past year had bestowed upon me. Surely there was something there…something I hadn’t yet noticed.
Jody had been one of my closest friends for the past ten years. While we kept in close contact over the years, the hundreds of miles between us had kept us apart during the past few years. But this weekend she had made a special trip to meet my daughter who was just about to turn one.
Jody had been my confidant through it all. Her two sons were ages three and eighteen months, so in my eyes, she was a seasoned veteran to this thing called motherhood. She was always there for me – to listen, to offer advice, or to offer reassurance. But as I discovered throughout our conversation, she’d been holding out on me…in a big way! Inevitably, the stories began.
At the top of my list was breast-feeding. I had no idea how demanding it was going to be, and I knew Jody had been through it twice. “There were times when she ate every hour around the clock. I was exhausted,” I groaned. “Oh, I know,” Jody replied. “My youngest one did that to me.” Suddenly, I felt as though I was sitting across the table from a complete stranger. After all, it was strangers – unknown authors – who had prepared me to believe that my child would need to be fed every three to four hours, which in turn had led me to believe (albeit incorrectly) that I would actually get some rest in between feedings. Surely my friend would have warned me that this might not be the case. Why didn’t she tell me? I couldn’t help but think that if she had just forewarned me of the toll this demanding schedule would take on my body (not to mention my mind), I could have prevented some of the insanity that plagued my life during those first few months.
Then I told her I was shocked at the volume of hair that had fallen from my head, and that it was now finally growing back in. "Oh, I know,” she quickly responded. “My stylist called it baby balding.” Aghast, I sputtered out, “What! You never told me that….” But Jody nonchalantly interrupted with, “Yeah, it happens.” Little did she know that had she forewarned me of this, she would have prevented the panic attack I experienced in the shower one day, convincing myself that whatever was happening to my body must be terminal.
Jody turned the subject to hormones. “Did you have any postpartum depression?” I reluctantly explained how embarrassing it was for me to recall what a crazy woman I had become. By now I could have guessed that she also held this deep, dark secret before she confessed, “It’s awful, isn’t it? I had it too..”
Here she was, one of my best friends, and I couldn’t figure out why she hadn’t told me these things before. I thought to myself, “you’re my FRIEND. Doesn’t that mean you had an obligation to warn me that I was about to embark upon a journey that would turn my life upside down, and inside out…and that I would never be the same?”
The conversation continued, covering all sorts of unpleasantness from childbirth to fussy, crying infants. And through it all, I kept wondering why she hadn’t told me these things beforehand. Finally, I asked.
“Jody, why didn’t you tell me these things?” After taking her last bite of dessert, she simply explained, "you wouldn't have believed me.” And as simple as it sounded, she was absolutely right. No, I never would have believed it. And until I had experienced it for myself, I never could have imagined the amount of physical and mental endurance that is necessary to raise a baby.
As she took her last drink of cappuccino, Jody smiled at me and said, “and I never told you how much you’d love her, did I?” My eyes suddenly filled with tears, for she was right once again. The love I feel for my baby is like nothing I have ever felt before, and certainly nothing I could have imagined. And with that thought, I motioned our waiter for the check, for I couldn’t wait to get home and hold my baby.
Kristi is focusing her efforts on her family, as well as www.SendAChildASmile.com. The Send A Child A Smile program was developed to bring a smile to the face of a child who may not be feeling too special - whether it be from an illness, from a loss, or from another life event. She writes as a hobby.
©2001 Kristi Grisby. All rights reserved. Article used by permission.
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