Pass the Tissues

Oh, you guys, the crying.

Something to know about me: I am not a crier. And I don’t mean that in that way that people say they don’t cry and then something happens and then, yeah, they cry. I don’t cry when I fight with my husband. Or my family. I don’t cry when I’m sad. I don’t cry when I’m happy.

I mean, I eat, which is probably why I don’t cry. Kidding. Kind of.

Basically I’ve always subscribed to a “Get on with it already” sort of mentality. It’s served me well, and allowed me to pick myself up, dust myself off and carry on with my life. I think when you experience death and sadness early in life you learn, if you’re lucky, that you’re in charge of what happens, you’ve got choices in life and it only gets better if you, well, get on with it already.

So I don’t do much with the crying. I don’t mind other people’s tears, and it doesn’t make me uncomfortable to cry or see others cry, nor do I place judgment on crying as a coping mechanism. I just don’t do it myself.

UNTIL NOW.

This week, I’ve cried at the end of How I Met Your Mother. I’ve cried listening to NPR. I’ve cried reading stories about people dying alone. I’ve cried when my husband read Winnie-the-Pooh to my belly. I’ve cried when I do yoga. I cried when walking through Macy’s.

I need to get the oil changed in the car next week. I fully expect the tears to flow at the Jiffy Lube.

This is all part of the experience, I understand, and none of it surprises me. Mostly it irritates me. Not because I’m uncomfortable with all of these raw, hormonally charged emotions, just that I can be sitting at my desk during lunch, reading my Facebook news stream, and foolishly watch this:

Danny & Annie from StoryCorps on Vimeo.

And BAM. I’m a puddle. Admittedly, you don’t have to be whacked out on pregnancy hormones to sob listening to Danny and Annie’s story, but those hormones will make you listen to it over and over again so you can continue to sob to the point of dehydration.  My eyes are perpetually raw and red and puffy. There is flaking around my eyes as I’ve managed to dry out the delicate skin there.

I’ve read that there is some science behind this switch that gets flipped once you become pregnant. You find yourself at this heightened emotional state in service to the survival of your kid, to its well-being. Knowing that much of this serves a biological purpose is, sadly, helpful for me. Despite my feelings to the contrary, none of this is unnatural. Quite the contrary, nothing could be more natural. I just need to learn how to navigate this new me.

I was thinking the other day about how dramatically things will change. If you’ll excuse the hyperbole, because it’s the only way I can think to describe this right now, it feels as though I’m living the last moments inside my own head. Though I have a husband who means the world, and whose happiness means more to me than anything, I generally spend the majority of my waking hours devoted to thoughts about myself and my needs. I know that come February, that changes. There won’t be the time and the luxury for myself and my own thoughts in the same way. And while I know that the chances are pretty good that I’ll not regret a single moment I give up, I mourn it all just the same. Much how I mourn my ability to not be thwarted by a sentimental song or moment in a sitcom.

The good news for me is that I have plethora of female friends who have become mothers, and very, very few of them speak in cliches and smooshy nonsense. The majority of you who read me and comment here give me hope that I won’t add such cliches to the long, long list of cliches I already employ to express myself.

I suppose in a lot of ways all of this anxiety about crying is the simple manifestation of someone who wasn’t ever sure she was built for parenthood, if she had what it took, if it fit in her life in the first place. Because if it’s crying now, what’s next?

For as much as I have always felt sure in that “getting on with it already” was a good way to live, I have been equally as sure that putting myself out there in the face of uncertainty is also a smart technique. I have some awful fears – heights, public speaking, driving in the rain, dinner parties. All of these things clothesline me and cause me to get bitchy and punchy when confronted with the sheer possibility of having to confront them. But then? I get on the ski lift in Utah because I don’t want to miss that view. I know the chances of me falling to my death from that lift are much slimmer than the regret I’d live with knowing I might not ever return to Utah and have that chance again.

This way of living has never conquered a single one of these fears – not a one. But it’s made my life richer, more whole. I am braver for it. And, much like the ski lift, I ascend kicking, screaming, swearing, desperate for the good part to start so I can get on with it already.