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for the first time, and I reached down toward my spread-apart
legs, anxious to touch her. A nurse placed her on my chest.
Jamie kissed my forehead as I lifted my head to look at her, but
I felt like I was looking down a long, spiral rabbit hole. My
world started to spin, faster, faster, and then it went black.
When I woke up, I was in the recovery room, Jamie at my
side. I’d hemorrhaged, he’d said, but I was going to be fine.
Maggie was perfect, and I’d be able to have more children.
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I barely heard him. I was stuck on the word Maggie. Who
was Maggie? I had a cramping pain low in my belly and thought
I was still in labor. I was frightened by my confusion. It took
Jamie several minutes to set me straight.
I didn’t get to hold the baby until thirty-six hours after she
was born. When she was placed in my arms, I felt absolutely
nothing. No maternal tug of recognition that this was the
familiar little presence I’d been carrying inside me for nine
months. No longing to explore her body. Nothing.
“Isn’t she beautiful?” Jamie stood next to the bed, beaming,
and that’s when I pasted the smile on my face. Now at home,
everyone seemed to think I’d returned from that rabbit hole.
I was the only person who knew I was still stuck somewhere
between the black abyss and the real world.
“Is she eating well?” Miss Emma asked.
Jamie looked to me to answer, which meant I was going to
have to somehow force words out of my mouth.
“I’m—” I cleared my throat “—I’m having some trouble,”
I admitted. “She doesn’t latch on well.”
How I’d longed to nurse an infant! Working in the pedia
trician’s office, I’d watch with envy and anticipation as mothers
slipped their babies inside their shirts for that secret, sacred
bond. But my nipples were too flat for the baby to latch on
easily. In the hospital, nurse after nurse tried to help me. A
counselor from the La Leche League showed up in my room
in the hours before I was discharged. Sometimes I was able to
get the baby to suck, but more often she wailed in frustration.
The woman from the La Leche League swore the baby was
getting enough nourishment, but I was worried.
“Oh, switch to formula,” Miss Emma said now, as though it
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was no big deal. “I bottle-fed both my boys and they turned
out all right.”
Jamie’d turned out great, I thought, but Marcus was ques
tionable. He was still being bottle-fed. I felt tears fill my eyes,
though, at receiving her permission. She was the first person
who made it sound like no big deal to stop nursing.
“Well, it’s important, Mama,” Jamie said.
From where I sat, I could see the baby’s face tighten into her
pre-howling expression. A knot the size of a boulder filled my
stomach.
“Oh-oh,” Miss Emma said. “What’s the matter, precious?”
She raised the baby to her shoulder and rubbed her back, but
the howling started anyway. “She wants her mama, bless her
heart.” Miss Emma handed the baby to Jamie—he already
handled her with more assurance than I did—who walked
with her toward my rocker.
“I’ll try to feed her.” It took all my strength to get to my feet.
Jamie settled the baby in my arms and I walked toward the
bedroom. I needed privacy, not out of a sense of modesty but
because I didn’t want witnesses to my failure.
In the bedroom, I sat on the bed with my back propped up
against the pillows and started the battle to get the baby to latch
on. She cried; I cried. Finally she started sucking, but not with
the fervor I’d witnessed in other infants. Not with the content
ment of being in her mother’s arms. Her expression was one
of resignation, as though she had to suck on my breast because
it was her only option. She would rather be anywhere else but
with me.
From the bedroom, I heard Marcus come home.
“Hey, Mama.” I pictured him striding through the living
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room, leaning over to kiss Miss Emma’s cheek.“When did you
get here? Have you seen my little niece yet?”
“Lord have mercy, Marcus!” I heard Miss Emma say. “You
smell like a barroom.”
I couldn’t hear the rest of the conversation, just the muffled
sound of their voices—including that of a young woman—and
I knew Marcus had brought home another of his girlfriends.
He seemed to have one for every day of the week.
Closing my eyes, I listened to my own voice inside my head.
Your baby doesn’t like you.
I know. I know.
You can’t even give her enough milk.
I know.
The baby turned her head away from my breast, wrinkling
her nose in what I could only interpret as distaste. I felt dizzy
with tiredness.
“Jamie,” I tried to call.
I heard laughter from the living room.
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