PART4: She Came Home After Giving Birth, and I Asked, “What’s for Dinner?” — What Happened Next Changed Me Forever

PART 4

When I returned, it was almost 1:20.

Allison was asleep on the couch.

Mateo was asleep against her chest.

The television was on with the volume muted.

I stood there holding the pharmacy bag.

I didn’t wake her.

I set the medicine on the coffee table.

Then I noticed something beside it.

A folded piece of paper.

At first I thought it was a hospital discharge instruction.

I picked it up.

It was a handwritten list.

At the top, Allison had written:

Things I need help with.

Underneath were seven things.

Pick up medicine.
Wash bottles.
Take out trash.
Make dinner.
Change Mateo’s diaper at night.
Call pediatrician.
Ask me how I’m doing.
I stared at the last one.

Ask me how I’m doing.

Seven words.

Seven things.

I had managed to fail all of them.

I folded the paper and put it back.

Then I saw another piece of paper underneath.

This one wasn’t a list.

It was a letter.

I recognized my name at the top.

Daniel,

I stopped breathing for a second.

I knew I shouldn’t read it.

I read it anyway.

I don’t know if I’m going to give you this.

Maybe I’ll tear it up tomorrow.

Maybe I’ll be brave enough to say it out loud.

I’m scared.

I sat down slowly.

I’m scared that having Mateo won’t change you.

I’m scared that everyone will tell me I’m lucky because I have a healthy baby, while nobody notices that I don’t feel like myself anymore.

I’m scared to sleep because every time I close my eyes, I remember the operating room.

I’m scared that if I tell you how much pain I’m in, you’ll think I’m weak.

I’m scared that if I ask you for help, you’ll think I’m failing as a mother.

Then came the line that made my eyes burn.

And I’m scared that the man I married is becoming my third child.

I put the letter down.

I couldn’t read anymore.

I looked at Allison sleeping on the couch.

Her hair was messy.

Her hospital bracelet was still around her wrist.

There was a faint mark on her cheek from the couch cushion.

She looked nothing like the woman in the photographs from our wedding.

She looked smaller.

More fragile.

And somehow, I had been expecting her to return from the hospital exactly the same person who had left it.

I had expected dinner.

I had expected clean towels.

I had expected normal.

I had never asked what normal was going to cost her.

At 2:04, Mateo woke up crying.

Allison immediately opened her eyes.

I stood.

“I’ve got him.”

She looked at me suspiciously.

“Let me try.”

I reached for Mateo.

He screamed louder.

I panicked.

“He doesn’t like me.”

Allison almost laughed.

It was the first real expression I’d seen on her face all night.

“He’s four days old, Daniel.”

“Oh.”

“He doesn’t hate you.”

I held him awkwardly.

He cried against my shoulder.

I walked around the living room.

“Hey, buddy.”

He screamed.

“I know.”

I kept walking.

“I know.”

After a few minutes, he quieted.

I looked down.

His tiny hand had wrapped around my finger.

Something broke inside me.

Not in a dramatic way.

Quietly.

Like a wall cracking after years of pressure.

I realized I had been waiting for fatherhood to feel like something that happened to me.

It wasn’t.

It was something I had to do.

CONTINUE READING PART5…