Thank you for clicking through to read this, it means the world to me. I just need a space to explore some of these thoughts in my head and let them just take up space. Sometimes, when the thoughts are solely in my head, the line between fact and fiction tends to get a little blurred. So I’m trying this new thing where I explore these thoughts with words. So you reading them makes you a part of that journey and I’m forever grateful for you to be here.
Living with bipolar disorder, I struggle a lot. I’m sure many of you can relate. But, there’s one thing I struggle with more than anything else. I like the whole YOLO thing and never having regrets, but there actually is one thing I carry regret about. I’m not really sure what my feelings are about it to be honest. It’s from a time before my bipolar diagnosis.
I got together (in that way) with a friend from high school when I was 19. I had just graduated and went through a major break up. I did the whole break up thing where you dye your hair (my poor hair) and I ended up losing a lot of weight. I started chatting with this friend from school during the winter of 2009 and he was away at some army thing.
When he came back we hung out here and there. It was casual. But, friendly. I had casual before that and it was way more casual. I don’t know, is there like a scale to casual? Anyway, we did the deed once. One time.
And seven weeks later, my entire life changed. And it’s this moment that I carry regret about. I know I’m not supposed to regret my child. And I think it’s more complicated than that. I don’t regret my child per say. But, it wasn’t an easy path and I didn’t choose it becasue it was what I wanted. In fact, it was the opposite of what I wanted.
I didn’t want to be a mother. I always believed myself to be too broken to ever love something enough. I wanted to write my heart out and be alone. Hiding behind the tales I could spin in the imaginary world that only I would live in. I had spent my whole life never living up to the standard and I wanted to be in charge and control of my life.
When I found out I was pregnant, I told him immediately. I was really shocked and upset. He was nice for a few hours. Just let me cry. But didn’t offer anything. I guess I should have known at that point.
The next few weeks I’d try to text him to say we should probably talk. I had been to the doctor at that point and was facing a deadline in making some life altering choices. He ghosted me. For the entire pregnancy.
I came from parents who don’t believe there’s a place for abortion in our world. I asked my mom if we could talk about my options one evening. The sky was a beautiful evening blue and the sun had moved over so I wasn’t dying of heat exhasution. Though I was trying to act like the pregnancy hadn’t affected me at all, I can assure you, I felt ill all the damn time. I went from being on top of the world, best I ever felt to lower than the dirt underneath my shoe. My expensive shoe. Which, if I was to bear this child, I probably wouldn’t have very many of anymore.
My mom looked at me shocked and said “what do you mean talk about your options? You’re pregnant. You’re going to have a baby. If you didn’t want that, then you shouldn’t have had sex.”
The biological father while ghosting me went to college and started a mechanics program. He ended up finishing the program before he even met the baby.
Somehow, everything I was going through was all my fault. I carried the entire weight of the world on my small shoulders. I was broken. I felt hopeless the second I heard those words leave my moms mouth.
At that time, or really any time in my life, I didn’t have a support system. I had my parents. It was during this time where I got pregnant that I was finally starting to build my own life. I was thriving. But, I didn’t have a strong support network. And, I felt it would be so awful to not listen to my parents, specifically, my mom.
So – eight months later my oldest son was born. And I’ve been struggling ever since. I’m not the mothering type and it’s been the hardest thing I’ve ever encountered. I know you’re thinking, “well, yes, motherhood is hard”. But see, I didn’t want it in the first place. So giving up all my goals and dreams for something I didn’t want felt insufferable. It felt defeating.
I’d pray that I’d die giving birth. That would be the only way that I could do what my mom wanted and also what I. I didn’t want to be a mother and according to her, I didn’t have options.
It was a a horrendous nine months. I didn’t take any photos whatsoever. I was sick all the time and couldn’t easily afford the prescription to stop being sick. I had to get off the bus to throw up on the side of the road, just to catch the next bus and be in trouble for being a few minutes late to work. I was miserable.
And don’t even get me started on the pre-natal classes that my mom signed me up for that I went to ALONE. Where everyone else had their partner, I literally had no one.
The level of shame I constantly felt was agonizing. Every night I went to bed I’d pray I wouldn’t wake. My mom couldn’t be mad at me if I were dead, right?
Everything about my pregnancy was horrible. I wish so badly I could tell you that I somehow found my voice and took back control of my life but that’s just not what happened. I surrendered to all the things that were wrong with me and they just multiplied.
I lived in such darkness every day. I worked 11 hours a day sitting at a desk, my back would ache so much. I worked downtown and had to walk down some sketchy streets and would just hope so much that someone would just step out and stab me. Pierce me through my heart and let me leave. I hated me. I hated my life and what I had allowed to happen. All because of fear. Fear of losing my mom. Because I probably would have chosen one of those options I wanted to discuss with her. But I was too afraid.
I was mistreated in the hospital. There was no father for the baby so I just looked like a young slut for lack of better words. That’s what they’d whisper. It was all my fault. The whole pregnancy was completely my fault. How was it that he got to go date, go to college, and have such a peaceful life when I was laying in agony and despair. This was someone I thought was my friend at the beginning.
I never spoke badly about him. I never told anyone who the father even was. I don’t know why I felt the need to protect him. He sure as hell didn’t give the same courtesy.
I didn’t want to have a baby or be a mother at that time and I knew that from the bottom of my heart. And if that makes me an awful person then so be it. I’m an awful person then.
I always cared for the baby. I bought everything he needed. I did all the things that a good mom would do, but I did them numb. I did them knowing I should be feeling something but just failing to completely.
Regret a feeling of sadness about something sad or wrong or about a mistake that you have made, and a wish that it could have been different and better.
It’s always been complicated for me to know which part of this journey did I regret. Maybe all of it. Maybe just not choosing the decision I knew would be best for me. I’m not sure. But if there’s something you’ve been carrying too, know you’re not alone and you’re not a bad person either.
Don’t Forget To Read These Ones
Related Posts
One thought on “I Live With This One Regret Everyday”