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A little encouragement from across the fence
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by J E F F L E E , M D
Everybody stumbles, everybody falls Let’s strive to live and love every day as if it’s the last — for us, for our kids, and for all our loved ones I have a friend who’s known for her sunny disposition. While the rest of us are reeling from the day’s headlines and the state of the world, she somehow sees a light at the end of that dark tunnel. When she was pregnant, she was no different. She had serious complications, but she never lost faith, and in the end, she gave birth to a beautiful, healthy daughter. At first, she seemed to parent with the same optimism that she brought to everything. But one day, when her baby was just a few weeks old, she called me. She needed to talk about something — urgently, and in private. We met the next day and went for a walk. She told me she’d been having nightmares about her baby dying. In some, she would hold her daughter in her arms, breastfeeding or rocking her peacefully, and suddenly the baby’s head would fall off. In others, she’d drop the baby on the floor, or out the window, or off a cliff. Worst of all, she was beginning to have these visions even when she was awake. The day she called me, she had been standing at the kitchen counter slicing a tomato, and suddenly had an image of the knife slicing through her baby’s arm. I tried my best to reassure her. I told her these kinds of thoughts were common, and that I’d had two other patients who also dreamt that their
babies’ heads fell off. Still, she was terrified. I told her to get some sleep, to ask for plenty of help from the people she loved, and to call me whenever she needed. For the next few weeks, we checked in regularly, and then the dreams and visions went away, as suddenly and mysteriously as they had appeared. So where do these strange, intrusive thoughts come from? I’m not a psychiatrist, but I think they’re a manifestation of the vulnerability we feel when the center of our universe shifts to a tiny, helpless baby who’s completely dependent on us for protection. We’re pretty good at denying our own mortality, but once we have children, that’s no longer enough. Their fragility is undeniable, and it fills us with a sense of mortality by proxy that’s impossible to ignore. Of course, sleep deprivation, hormonal surges and mood swings make it worse for mothers, but fathers experience it, too. I remember the first time my daughter really hurt herself. She had just learned to walk up the stairs, and when she reached the third step, she turned part way around to make sure I was watching. Suddenly she lurched backwards, just beyond my reach, and landed headfirst on the hardwood floor with a sound so loud, I was sure her skull had cracked like an egg. Forgetting all my training, I grabbed CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE >
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