On Reflection: Anger

One thing I know about anger is that it permeates every area of one’s life. There is no compartmentalizing anger. No wrapping it up in sparkly boxes with pretty pink bows and stuffing it way down deep inside (this method has characteristically been my coping mechanism for life’s uncomfortable issues). Anger festers. It cannot be contained.

When we received the news that Liam was going to be born with spina bifida, I was seething. I mean SEETHING. I was so full of rage that my body was actually sore. Even my teeth hurt. For years I had watched other women -- women who didn’t take care of themselves during pregnancies -- give birth to perfectly healthy children. I felt it was unfair. It was more than unfair; it was unjust. I had done what I was supposed to do, and my baby was going to be born with a birth defect. I felt like there was some conspiracy against me. Although, truth be told, the anger was somewhat easier to deal with than the grief that hit me initially. But that grief inevitably turned to rage.

About a month after receiving the diagnosis, a co-worker was telling me about a pregnant friend of hers who had gone for a routine ultrasound. During that ultrasound, there was some issue with the baby’s heart, which prompted their doctor to send them to a specialist -- much in the same way that we had been sent to a specialist. It turned out that their baby was perfectly fine; the heart monitor used during the first ultrasound had simply malfunctioned. It was a fluke. But do you know what I felt hearing her say that? I felt angry. I’m ashamed to admit it, but I was angry. I was angry that we had gone to a specialist and received bad news, and they didn’t. I was angry that our specialist had said, typically we don’t find anything, but in this case we’ve found some deformities. I was angry that their baby was ok. I was angry that my baby was sick. As these thoughts were racing through my mind, something happened. Something that will stay with me for the rest of my life. A voice in my head said:

Really, Brigid? Really? This is who you’re going to be now? A person who wishes illnesses on unborn children? Really? This is who you want to be?

With that string of questions, my anger vanished. It completely disappeared. It was one of the defining moments of my life. I can pinpoint it as the exact moment when my anger turned to acceptance. My new mantra became It is what it is. I realized there was nothing I could do to change the diagnosis, so I made a conscious decision to stop wasting precious energy fighting against it.

That decision changed the course of our lives. I knew that my anger wouldn’t serve a purpose – not a positive one anyway. I truly believe that Liam would be a different person had I not caught myself at that moment -- caught myself and made a choice about the person I was going to be, about the mother I was going to be.

Now, of course, I am thankful that Liam came to us. It is the thing I am most grateful for in my life. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t look at him and think: I am so thankful you came to us. I am so glad you were born in the United States. I am so glad you were born in the 21^st century, a time when spina bifida isn’t a death sentence. I am so glad you came to an independent Mama who was somehow able to handle it all. So thankful you came to a Daddy who never once complained that his son was going to be different -- a Daddy who always seemed to know that you were your own person. A Daddy who always had the knowledge that playing sports or walking without assistance or living without a wheelchair wouldn’t define you as a man.

I think about some of the men in my own family, who would’ve felt slighted having a child with special needs, who would’ve viewed it as a negative reflection of themselves; men whose egos were always too much in control of their lives. I think about those women I was angry with and envious of, and it is so clear to me now that they, most likely, wouldn’t have been able to handle it like we could. I now understand why Liam came to us, and not one of them, and I am so grateful. So grateful. There are some things you simply can’t understand while still in the midst of them.