Alright at this point it’s just a tradition. Happy Valentine’s Day, lovebirds…

***

The other day, while scowling at the absurdity of one of those feel-good chocolate hearts and roses Valentine’s ads, I placed my pointer finger against my face in the classic thinking posture and asked myself… “Hmmmm…what would an honest Valentine’s Day card say?”

And then, as this thought rolled around in my [acutely insane] brain, I realized that this is no simple question, but rather depends entirely on how long the couple has been together.

Because as you probably know…that shit CHANGES. (Relationships, that is. Men, not so much.)

So this small, profound monologue got me thinking about the fact that there are (in my opinion) three stages in a relationship/marriage, each of them obviously necessitating a different Valentine, were it to be honest and real and able to speak the truth of the insanity. Err, I mean “budding love story.”

Wow. Deep.

Anyhoo, I give you this. I ask that you please enjoy the clip art.

Stage 1

Years 0-2: The “I haven’t Been With You Long Enough to Realize How Much You Annoy Me” stage, comprised of long walks and hand-holding, starry-eyed dinners, cocktails, discussions, movie-watching, reasonable arguments, cuddling and pet names. Also, smug looks directed at women who are in Stages 2 and 3 with their men, and a distinct feeling of superiority, having obviously been deemed the first woman in history to not wonder if she could turn herself into a lesbian to avoid further intimacy with the male population. Also, women in this stage rest easy in the comfort and surety that they will never, ever want to pummel their little love kitten with a meat cleaver. Because he’s PERFECT. Duh.

A Stage 1 Valentine looks something like one of these:

And now…

Stage 2, Years 2-5: The “Holy Shit I had no Idea You Had These Sorts of Habits” Stage, also known as the “I Must Mold You Into Something More Like What I Had In Mind” Stage, characterized by a lot of discussions with girlfriends regarding the man’s deficiencies, as well as a decent amount of wonderment and awe as the female discovers The Male is not at all perfect (and may actually have some sort of disability, as evidenced by the fact that he can’t find stuff that’s 3 inches from his forehead and insists on passing gas in bed). This stage also involves the surfacing of all other incomprehensible tendencies, causing the female to realize she’s going have to fix this character if they’re ever going to make it. And therefore, she begins to WORK, which of course results in long, long, long discussions, unreasonable bickering, maybe therapy but for sure tears, cajoling, threatening, flailing and general malaise, and, most likely, the arrival of an infant or two.

Honest Valentines at this stage may look like this:

And then, if the couple in question makes it past Stage 2, they enter Stage 3 (years 6 – ?), commonly known as the “Well Obviously You are not Going to Change and I’m Tired of Fighting so I’ve Accepted you and your Weirdness” Stage. (Yes, these stages have awkwardly long titles. Not particularly catchy, I know. Don’t blame me. I didn’t make it up.) Oh wait.

As you can see, this is something of a deal-breaker stage – since it’s pretty much Stage 3 or Stage Bye-Bye. Stage 3 is characterized by a lot of glaring but less complaining, fewer divorce threats and a surface-level acceptance of small, irritating habits (such as buying odd gadgets that will never ever be used EVER, or eating onions before bed). It also involves some strange compromises (“Honey, if you pick up your bath towel from the floor every day, I’ll start squeezing the toothpaste from the bottom.”) and subtle retaliation (as opposed to the long, long, long discussions in stage 2 (or therapy)). On the plus side, this Stage results in a weird peace and vague sense of serenity and, occasionally, some intense relief  regarding the fact that you didn’t throw in the towel when things got rough (and therefore, thank god, you don’t have to deal with these hoodlum children alone). Women in this stage feel a little like badass survivors of some great calamity, like a tsunami, or fire. “We almost didn’t make it, kids. We really had to work HARD to make this marriage work. Ah, but look at us now…”

And we feel a little victorious. And yeah, alright, I’ll say it: A little in love.

Enough of the sappy crap.

Real valentines in this stage may look something like this:

Sometimes people ask where I come up with this crap.

In response, I give you one word: LIFE.

As proof, I give you this…

My own real life Stage 3 Valentine (from last year, but not much has changed).

xoxoxo

Sometimes I write about parenthood. Sometimes I don’t.

Today I’m writing about alcoholism.

For those of you who are new here, I am a recovering alcoholic. On March 5, I will celebrate 5 years of sobriety. So yes, I am a relatively new sober alcoholic. For background, please read this or this.

I don’t particularly love talking about motherhood and alcoholism. It’s not exactly the high point of my life to announce to a few thousand people that I was that mother, the trash, the hated one, the drunk, drug-addicted one, the one with two gorgeous, innocent children caught in the cross-fire. And her, that dirty bitch, selfishly killing herself.

But I write about it anyway, because after about a year of writing this blog, I realized I was only telling you people half the story, and I realized I might be of help to somebody, some day in some way and something, I tell you, something has to make those years worth living.

And sometimes, when a famous, brilliant actor dies with a needle in his arm, I read the comments from America and I can’t take it. There’s so much ignorance, so much blind condescension based on NOTHING. NOTHING. Opinion. Observation from afar. Some article you read somewhere. An addict you “know.” A drunk you worked with.

The comment that stuck with me like a knife in my brain is this one: “Yeah, addiction isn’t a choice, but shoving a needle in your arm sure as hell is.”

It’s as if people think we start with a needle in our arm. Yeah. Newsflash. WE DON’T.

Alcoholism and addiction are progressive diseases. THEY GET WORSE OVER TIME. We don’t start with a damn needle in our arm. We start drinking beer with friends in high school. We start like you did.

Do you get that? Do you see that? We don’t wake up one day when we’re 19 or 20 or 35 and say to ourselves “You know what I need? A motherfucking bag of heroin and a syringe.”

I started out like you. I partied and experimented with alcohol and marijuana and a couple psychedelics like a whole lot of other kids in school. Yes. I am responsible for that. I made that choice. If that makes me responsible for my alcoholism, well then I guess I’m responsible.

But do you think I knew I was playing with fire? Do you think I knew when I was 17 years old hanging at a friend’s house drinking Peppermint Schnapps that I would one day lose my children to this substance? That I would go to rehab FIVE TIMES, each time sure I would emerge “fixed?” Do you think I knew that my brain from the moment I tasted that alcohol was altered, that from that point forward my brain would tell me that “pleasure” equals “booze” and booze only, that I would one day pursue that relief, that feeling from alcohol, at the cost of everything of value in my life?

Do you think I knew I’d lose my job to the stuff, spend years fighting it, catch 3 or 4 psychiatric diagnoses resulting in ELEVEN different medications at one time, as the doctors tried to figure out what happened to this smart, promising woman?

Do you think I knew I’d end up in a mental institution, having spent a few days on a whisky binge in a small apartment with a dog shitting and pissing on the floor, and the doctor would look at me and say “We knew you were crazy, because no sane person would live in those conditions.”?

Do you think I knew I’d wake up one morning on a respirator in an ER with a doctor who was sure I was trying to kill myself because there were so many substances in my body? Do you think I knew I’d look at him and quite honestly defend myself with the words “Oh no, doctor, I’m not trying to kill myself. I do this every day.”

No. I didn’t know. I didn’t know or think any of this. I was a kid who got good grades and went to college and worked hard. I thought everybody had the experience I was having with alcohol. I thought I was “having fun” like everybody else.

And by the time I realized I was in trouble, I couldn’t stop.

By the time I realized I couldn’t stop, I COULDN’T STOP.

And that, my friends, is the piece you’re missing: By the time we realize we’re dying, we’re dying. By the time we begin to suspect a problem, we are in the grip of a deadly disease, a disease that lives in the body and the mind. The body demands more – aches and screams and begs for more; the mind says “You’ll die if you don’t have more. It will be okay this time. Just one more time, Janelle.”

It’s not rational. It doesn’t weigh options. It doesn’t think about kids or home or acting careers or any other fucking thing. It thinks about itself. It tells me “You’re fine, Janelle. One drink won’t hurt.”

How do you change a mind with an insane mind? Tell me, how do you? How do you alter the thoughts of a brain when it’s the brain making the thoughts?

Do you see the problem, folks? There’s where the element of choice gets really, really sticky. MY BRAIN IS MAKING THE CHOICES AND MY BRAIN IS THE PROBLEM. You’re telling me to “choose” different behavior when my brain is the thing that’s hardwired to choose more alcohol.

And then, the more I drink and the sicker I get, I start looking for other substances to fill an ache in my mind and soul and heart like I cannot describe – the alcohol isn’t enough anymore. I’ve progressed to a new level. I take everything, anything to kill the insatiable need that’s become like air to me.

For my family who will read this, who knew me as a cute little blond-headed, precocious kid, I won’t say how far that need took me.

Does this make you uncomfortable? Does it make you sick? Yeah, me too. But this is it, people. This is what it is. Most of us start out good and decent and wanting a real life with kids and a house and job, and we start out fooling around and maybe we’re a little overzealous but by the time we’re really, really in trouble, we’re dying, and we’re powerless, and the chances for recovery are really, really freaking slim.

Most of us rot in the streets and die in beds in the houses of strangers. We die in bathrooms with needles in our arms, while the world looks on and says “Why didn’t you just choose not to do it, you trash?”

Why don’t you ask a fucking schizophrenic to “just stop having those weird delusions.”?

Why don’t you ask a cancer patient to just stop creating cancer cells?

Why don’t you ask a person with asthma to just get beefier lungs?

What’s that you say? The disease model of addiction removes the element of responsibility? Really. So if you were told you had cancer and need chemo, would you respond “Nope. Not doing it. Not treating my disease. It’s not my fault I have cancer. Therefore, no chemo.”

Insanity.

I have no words

It wasn’t until somebody explained to me that I was dying of a progressive disease, that I could never consume alcohol safely IN ANY FORM, that my mind would always, always lie to me, that for me, to drink is to die – it was only then that a beam of understanding crept across my mind. It was only then that I began to understand my condition, what had been plaguing me the whole of my adult life and how I could, finally, live freely, like a real human, wife, daughter, employee and mom.

At this point I know I seem like I’m contradicting myself. I just said you can’t fix a broken brain with a broken brain, and now I’m telling you that an understanding of my disease helped set me free. I can only tell you this: all alcoholics and addicts have moments of lucidity – tiny cracks of sanity where we see the truth of ourselves and our lives. And I believe some of us are lucky to get the kind of help we need during that moment of clarity, or surrender, or internal death. And if we’re set on a path from that point, we might make it. That, at least, is what happened to me. But it’s a long, long desperate and dangerous path to get there, and some of us don’t make it.

Then again, maybe it’s just dumb luck. Maybe some are sicker than others. Why does treatment work for some cancer patients and not others? Why do some people die and some don’t? And is it the sick person’s fault? Should they be blamed for losing the battle?

Don’t ever put me up on some pedestal. Don’t ever tell me “Great job, Janelle. Look at the way you turned your life around.”

Don’t ever set me above the homeless crack-addict on the street, thinking I’m better because I survived my disease.

There’s no reason I’m here and she’s there, and there’s no difference between us. I don’t know why I got to live. I don’t know why I didn’t die alone in some bathroom, leaving two blond-headed children to wonder, and miss their mom, while the world packs up its trash in the form of one more useless addict, one more drunk, one more loser who “chose” to throw her life away.

I take a breath and hold my kids and weep for the ones still dying.

Me, at 24 years old, at the beginning stages of the deadly grip of alcoholism. I sure don’t look sick, do I?

1. I would just like to make one thing clear: I have never, ever in my life taken pregnancy selfies updating the world on my uterine happenings. And yet, I’m doing it for you. But also for me. Mostly for me. And here’s why: I realized I didn’t do it because I was embarrassed by my body. Like in other words, I’m fat. Also I thought it was fucking stupid. But mostly it’s the fat thing.
2. So in a violent protest against the voices in my head screaming “You’re too gross to take selfies whilst pregnant,” I GIVE YOU THIS, a photo in which I am not only displaying my pregnant belly, but also making a face so ridiculous I almost can’t look at myself. I call it “22 weeks and double chins, bitch.” Or: “What the hell is happening with my mouth?”
3. honestly I cannot take them seriously. I draw the line at serious pregnant selfies. In other news, I’ve been sick with a cold that tried to kill me. Not to get all “man cold” on you, but for real this was no normal cold. This was a cold that wanted me naked and shivering at the base of a tall mountain. Body aches, ridiculous exhaustion, insane headaches/sinus pain. During a particularly winning moment I found myself drinking a caramel machiatto and eating a scone in bed while watching “Forks Over Knives.” For those of you who don’t know, “Forks Over Knives” is a documentary about the healing properties of a plant-based, whole-foods diet and the way processed sugars, fat and simple carbs are killing us. So…right. Enough bitching.
4. No. Not enough yet. We moved into our new house on Saturday. I LOVE OUR NEW HOUSE. I got sick on Sunday. So in one glorious nutshell, I’m pregnant and moving and sick and in my 2^nd week of teaching new classes. Feeling pretty solid, I assure you.
5. The only thing that’s made the past week manageable is the fact that I pee on myself at least once a day when I sneeze. There’s always a bright side, people. Ya just gotta look for it.
6. SHOULDA DONE THOSE FUCKING KEGELS. (Btw, do kegels even work? The one woman I know who’s actually done them regularly says they’re bullshit. But since the entire pool of Women I Know Who’ve Done Kegels consists of a single human, I fear I may have inadequate perspective.)
7. Since I’m supposed to be documenting my pregnancy, let’s talk about current favorite features. Honestly, it’s a toss-up between super randomly itchy skin and peeing 49 times a day, each time somehow a real pee. Not a trickle. How does that even work? I’m too old for this shit. I’m never doing this again.
8. Nevermind. The best part has got to be the emotional/mental stuff. I don’t want to say I hate all people, but I pretty much hate all people (particularly if I’m related to them). I don’t mean to. It just sort of happens. Like they’re talking and I’m looking at them and I really want to not hate them, but then the way they breathe or stand or smell does something inside my head that makes me want to kick things, or run, or possibly weep. Speaking of weeping, why am I crying, people? Do I weep for mankind? Do I cry for the sins for the world?  Have I become the conduit for all sensitivity on the planet?
9. Oh that’s right. It’s nothing. I cry for nothing. Ignore the woman crying for nothing. (But do so away from my face, mmmmkay? cause you’re irritating me.)
10. Do I sound pleasant yet? Big ball of joyful reproduction? Good. Because I AM. Alright. FINE. I’ll give you the beauty: I feel the little one kicking around now every day and I like that. Of course, the feel-the-baby-move every day also launches the OMG I DON’T THINK I’VE FELT THE BABY MOVE syndrome/panic/terror – motherhood is such a trip. With every gorgeous moment comes a terrifying one.
11. But in all seriousness, I’m happy as hell. We moved into a fabulous little home that already feels like home even though it’s just bare wood floors and boxes. And I’m healthy and excited and over halfway done with this pregnancy (what?).  Sometimes, though, no matter how good it all is in the big picture, the day-to-day details are just hard. There’s nothing easy about being pregnant, sick, moving and starting a new job (all at the same time). There just isn’t.

I’m not gonna sugar-coat it. It is what it is. Some weeks are to be endured, lived through, survived, just so you can hit the other side.

And if you’re lucky, you’ll get a moment like I did yesterday, when my dyslexic son came bounding out of school “Mama! I got a 100% on my spelling test!” It was the first he’s ever taken. The words were like “map” and “cat” and “lap.” He’s in 2^nd grade and those are kindergarten words. But when your son has been unable to read any words at all and suddenly he’s able to recite some, you feel like your heart may explode as the tears pour from your eyes, though you think to yourself Damn I’m a dumbass. All pregnant and emotional and shit.

Although, come to think of it, you might cry no matter what when given news like that.

Here’s to good news, and peeing on ourselves, and not being sick anymore.

xoxox

P.S. I usually write these “week in review” posts on Sundays. I realize it’s Wednesday. OOOOOPS. I try.

Last week we had the 20 week ultrasound, but we didn’t find out the sex of the baby. And no, I’m not “team green.”

Please don’t call me “team green.”

I want off your team. I want off all cutely named mothering “teams.” I mean seriously. Is there some sort of secret mafia of mothers hiding in some bunker somewhere, sitting around all day thinking up cute shit? Baby sprinkles! Push presents! Gender reveals! Team green!

I’m team “Fuck your teams.”

I’m team “Just trying not to yell today.”

I’m team “What’s that shit on the floor of my car?”

Sometimes, I’m team “WHO ARE THESE CHILDREN AND WHY ARE THEY EVERYWHERE?”

I suppose I could be on the “attachment” team, since I dig homebirth and breastfeeding and baby-wearing and co-sleeping, but don’t you DARE call me an “attachment” parent because check this out, people: I fed my third baby FORMULA.

Oh yeah. I did.

Hello, my name is Janelle, and I supplemented my third kid with devil dust.

I tried pumping while working. I really did. I did it for months. I wanted to slam chopsticks in my eyeballs. Hauling the pump day in and day out. Cleaning it nightly. The TERROR of not having enough milk. Forgetting it in the car and having to throw away the liquid gold – hours of work and toil, gone. It spiraled down the drain with my tears and soul.

I was going insane. For my own well-being I had to let go. And yes. I admit it. When she was 7 months old I sent her to the nanny’s with a couple sacks of formula and it was the greatest fucking moment of my life.

Incidentally, she nursed until she was two. Just sayin’.

Maybe I could be one of those eco-hippie-mamas because I use lemons for deodorant and make my own hand salve, but I use plastic diapers, people. PLASTIC. Also cloth. But also plastic. WHAT ABOUT THE LANDFILLS? And I use Lysol cause frankly, I like the smell. And I don’t wear all organic repurposed hemp from local vendors and sometimes I eat Costco polish sausages.

Which reminds me, get me off the organic non-GMO health team. Another no-go. I try. I try not to eat processed foods. I try not to eat a bunch of sugar and crap and whatever.

But see above re: Costco. Also donuts. Also ice cream.

You see? You see the problem here? I can’t live up to your damn expectations. I can’t hang.

Keep your labels off my pathetic ass!

It’s not that I have anything against attachment moms or eco-tree-huggers or health people or Team Green or any of them, it’s just that the SECOND you stick that label on my forehead is the SECOND I FALL DESPERATELY AND TERRIBLY SHORT and walk around feeling less than and like I’ve betrayed something. My people. My team.

See, these teams, they’re gonna want me to abide by principles. They’re gonna want me to be consistent – adhere to guidelines and tried-and-true methods. But I can’t. I just can’t. I’m a great starter. Terrible finisher. Profoundly inconsistent. Excellent intentions, invariably poor execution, particularly in critical parenting moments.

What? What’s that you say? These are all loose guidelines to be tailored to each individual family? LIES.

All lies.

You and I both know that if I walk into an attachment parenting group announcing that the day I handed the babysitter a couple sacks of non-organic formula was among the finest moments of my life is the day holes are burned into my forehead from the death stares of the happily nursing.

Oh yeah I know. I’m exaggerating. Of course I am. None of this is that serious.

Except that I am deadly fucking serious. I want off all teams. ALL OF THEM.

I want nothing to do with any branch of parenting that has a name, approach, brand, label, representative book, magazine, spokesperson or Babycenter forum name.

On T.V. and in books and magazines and Facebook they all look so comfortable in their teams, so secure in their identities as this or that “mama.” Their smart parenting choices and thoughtful discipline techniques.

The other day I looked at my kid and asked, quite seriously, “No for real, what the hell is wrong with you?”

I apologized, but still. I’m pretty sure that move ain’t in Parenting from the Heart. Dr. Sears is officially not supporting that tactic.

Yesterday Georgia watched approximately twelve episodes of Handy Manny. Do the math, people. Do the math.

She should be playing with Amish carts and brown-skinned Waldorf dolls bought on Etsy, but instead she’s singing “Todos juntos!” with her face 4-inches from her brother’s Kindle Fire.

And yet, here I am, 20 weeks pregnant with my 4^th kid, hanging out with 3 perfectly healthy, thriving older kids, walking along happy as can be, mostly.

Team “Always falling short.” Team “I cook sometimes.” Team “Twice a year I do crafty shit.”

Team Human.

Team This is What I’ve Got.

Team Join Me in Reality.

Interested?

We’ll throw our hands in and cheer and stuff. And then show up late to all the practices, or forget them altogether.

And realize finally in a moment of total desperation that maybe we’re all on the same damn team anyway, so who really fucking cares? We’re just calling it different names to feel a little better about our shortcomings, our wanderings, our profound lack of direction, going nowhere, perfectly. A bunch of fucked-up mothers doing the job. And doing it well.

Or sort of well, depending on the day.

Team “On my own with you, doing whatever I do while you do what you do and we both try to not ruin small people.”

Yep. There it is. My people. My team.

Glad you’re here.

I am officially tired of people talking about “love” as the glue that seals a marriage. You know, the “all you need is love” mentality. Like if you “love” each other enough, things will stay cool. If your “love” is strong enough you will end up together in 59 years, rocking in old oak chairs on the porch of the home where your family was raised.

This all sounds nice in theory, and it sure looks good in Meg Ryan movies, but there is one [rather enormous] problem with this approach: When your marriage is really, really in trouble – when it’s actually at risk of disintegrating – the last thing you fucking feel is “love.”

Profound irritation? Yes.

Rage? Probably.

Desperation? For sure.

Loathing? (Did I say that?)

Boredom, disillusion and a profound sense of regret? Good chance.

But love? Nah. That’s something you wish you could remember from those early days when it still seemed a possibility. It’s that elusive thing you think will fix your marriage, if you could only get a hold of the slippery little bastard.

You see it around every corner: Your annoying little sister and her new wife. The love songs. The movies. The Hallmark cards. Damn. The adoration is palpable. It’s so believable, so seductive. That feeling you had with your first love in high school – what if I could have that again? I deserve that! Why don’t I have that anymore?

You remember those first few months or year or two you spent with the person you married – that feeling of falling home in their arms – when “soul mate” made sense to you and “you complete me” actually resonated.

What the hell happened? What exactly is this pile of shit I’m living in now?

Damn. If you could just “fall in love again.” If you could just “rekindle the old spark.”

Find that lost love.

But while you ache for the love that’s gone, there’s this man (or woman), in the house, annoying the shit out of you. He’s like all human. Excessively flawed. It’s not hot. It’s not interesting. And it’s certainly not love-inducing. You’ve become the worst of yourself and you know it. You can’t communicate with this person. He’s a stranger you know everything about, so you’re not just irritated, you’re BORED. You walk around raw, in a state of isolation surrounded by your family. Falling into a pit of “I can’t believe this has become my life,” you sink deeper in the surety that you made a huge, terrible mistake.

I guess you never loved him. Or maybe he never loved you.

It feels that way to the depths of your bones. It becomes like air to you. You grieve, but eventually you’re done fighting and you grow numb. There’s a chance you don’t care anymore.  You just want peace. You just want things to change.

In that moment you make a choice: Stay or go. Drop the bastard like a bad habit or settle for a shit life with a subpar human.

And in my experience, “love” is not the determining factor of that decision.

Why? Because in that moment I can’t feel “love,” so how the hell can it help me?

How can something I can’t feel have any effect on my life? How can something that doesn’t exist guide my choices like some sort of shining beacon of hope?

That’s right. IT CAN’T.

My husband and I have had some dark times. We separated for two years once. I was sure we were done. He reached a point where he agreed.  And yet, on December 19 we celebrated 12 years of marriage. (Of course I’m using that term “celebrated” rather loosely. We were actually fighting all day and didn’t “make up” until it was too late to “celebrate,” but whatevs.)

You know what’s kept my marriage together? You know what’s kept us from pulling the plug permanently?

WORK.

Just work. Sweat and blood and grime. Nasty, dirty WORK. The super ugly kind. The kind that covers you with black dust of unknown origin and clogs your nostrils and nearly stops your breath from exhaustion.

If that’s “romance,” well then shit, romance saved our marriage.

But it’s not. It’s not romance, not a rediscovery of sparks or whatever the fuck. Not a renewed commitment to love. Just work, fueled by a relentless, slightly irrational refusal to give up.

As in, I gritted my teeth, screamed “FUCK IT” into the universe and held on for dear life.

Why?

Because I could not stomach the alternative.

Another woman around my kids, co-parenting, the kids darting back and forth between houses the way I did when I was young, shared holidays, the fact that I would have to go through this same damn process with another man. SO yeah. That’s why I stayed. Isn’t that sweet?

No. It’s not sweet. It’s desperate. I couldn’t win. If I left, I faced a life I didn’t want. If I stayed, I faced a life I didn’t want.

And friends, I had some solid evidence for the “this whole thing was a mistake” theory. Most of you know this, but I’ll repeat anyway: My husband and I met in a drunken stupor at the ages of 19 (him) and 21 (me). I knew him for three months when I found out I was pregnant. We were both drunk for the majority of our three-month “courtship.” Though I was “sure: I “loved him” and there was something in him I had never seen before in a man, the truth is we were kids who married and had a kid. We “got to know each other” while engaging in the work of pregnancy and child-rearing. We had no business doing either. (Incidentally, I’m still shocked that baby has grown into a totally decent kid, which furthers my theory that parents have very little effect on the outcome, but I digress.)

After I had the baby, we moved into his parents’ house so I could stay home with her. We got married when she was one-month old, at the courthouse, on a cold December day. As if it were a sign, I wore all black. Ha! (No really I did.)

I’ll never forget the first time I realized without a doubt I had made the biggest mistake of my life. My baby was a day or two old. She had woken in the night and I got up with her. There was a rocking chair in our bedroom, facing a big window. I sat in that rocking chair and nursed my baby with aching nipples and fear. I looked back at the barely man sleeping behind me. I looked at my baby in the moonlight. I looked back at the man in the bed and I said to myself “You’ve ruined your life.” The words roared into my brain and planted themselves right at the center. They were true.

And I knew it.

But I also knew I was inextricably connected to both of these humans, for the duration, and I was terrified. I wanted out but there was no out. I had a life I was going to live, before. It’s gone now.

What had I done?

And that, my friends, serves as the foundation of my love story.

I realize not everybody has this experience. I realize some of you took your time and dated and shit and got married when you knew this was a human who could work with you as a domestic life partner (as opposed to having a kid and hoping for the best). Maybe you’re all swooning in love all the time and it’s always been smooth and good and loving. And you know what? Good for you. I mean it. I think that’s rad sauce. BUT I’M NOT TALKING TO YOU.

I’m talking to those of you who can’t see in and can’t see out. I’m talking to those of you who can’t find the love. And I’m talking to the people who have straight evidence (as I did) that they were stupid fucks and made a giant mistake.

So many people divorce because “they love him but they’re not ‘in love’ with him.”

Every time I hear that I want to respond: OF COURSE YOU’RE NOT. That’s what marriage is, dude: Loving somebody despite the fact that the “sparks” have gone. Committing to somebody beyond the initial “OMG let’s have sex in all the places.”

The “in love” period is a phase, the beginning phase of three-phase deal. That’s my theory, anyway.

Am I telling you to stay with your partner? God no.

Am I telling you not to divorce? Fuck no.

Photo by Tracy Teague

What the hell do I care what you do? I don’t know shit about marriage. I only know what happened to me, and it’s this: It was only after I settled, gave up, surrendered to a crap marriage with a man I knew I didn’t love that I fell into a love deeper than I ever knew possible.

It’s so backwards I can’t explain it. It makes no sense.

It was only after I threw up my arms and gave up fighting, figured “Well this is hell, but it’s your hell, Janelle, so get used to it” that I was, a year or two or three later, able to recognize that while I was busy hating my marriage and trying to “fix” the man I married, love had found its way between us and I stood across from a human who made my stomach flutter, a little, when he called. But not because of romance or newness or fresh flirtation, but because a life had been built beneath us – 13 years of struggle and work and joy and I was only 21 when we met. I’m 34 now. And there is so much meaning there. That’s the hottest shit there is.

I look at him and I see history. I see shit that matters. I see life and growth. And I’m grateful there’s been no cheating, or beating, or other absolute deal-breakers. And I’m grateful he’s been willing to work too, because it cannot be a one-sided mission. And I can’t believe he stayed with me, waited for me, a once worthless alcoholic, a woman who abandoned him and our kids and life. And I can’t believe he knew the moment to say “Kick rocks, bitch” and the strength of his soul and arms and heart complete me. Ha. Like a motherfucking soul mate.

No. Not like that.

Rather, like I see I’ve got a damn good deal with a fucking great man who I love with a depth beyond the surface, because of WHO HE IS and WHAT HE’S DONE in the time that I’ve been lucky enough to know him.

Love is not something that held us together.

Love is something that developed over the years that we were held together through bulldog like tenacity.

It sure as hell blindsided me, friends.

I guess because I had given up, I was able to see him for the man he is, not the projection of what I wanted him to be (cause that ain’t love, folks). Not the screen onto which I cast my expectations and needs, but rather a man who has stood by my side and built with me an insane gorgeous disastrous perfect life.

And I fucking love him for it.

And I want to get older with him, to see where it all goes.

And when our kids leave I’ll stand somewhere more wrinkly and kinda old and a little spent and I’ll look at him and remember 21 and 34 and 40 and 50 and he will be the constant, like a long lost beacon of hope – Ha! As if.

Nah, he’ll be what he is now: the one who’s committed to me as I’ve committed to him. The one who agreed to let go of the bullshit in light of that one single interest, in light of a life we’re building together, in light of this partnership. And what’s happened is that partnership has found its spot in the motherfucking cosmos – a little life of its own – and we flirt and laugh and hold hands again because it’s bigger than us, because it holds us up with a love we never knew was possible, a friendship that spans a decade and a connection that’s reborn in newborn breath and the squeals of our tween’s attitude and Santa Cruz and camping trips and each night when we crash into the same bed, over years, in pain and boredom and delight – and that alone is breathtaking.

It doesn’t always work. I know that. All I want to tell you is that there’s a chance it might.

Because that was something I never believed, until I saw it with my own eyes, and felt it with my own gut – the slippery little bastard that sits now like an old friend on a worn-out bedside table.

Stealing a kiss and taking a photo at the fair like a couple of goddamn newlyweds.