Part 4 - Ten years ago...

So apparently cliff hangers are the way to go....
This section of the story is uncomfortable to write and will be, if he ever reads it, uncomfortable for Dan. I share these details ONLY because in order to understand the full scope of emotional turmoil waged on my spirit that year - you must have, at the very LEAST the facts - For this section, I tread lightly on details. Still too painful, still too raw.
A few weeks after I made my decision to continue on with the pregnancy, I called up my old boss Joan and told her what was going on in my world. I asked her if there was any way she would let me come back to the store and work very part time - I needed a diversion from the praying and the obsessing - I needed something to do other than contemplate all the possible scenario's, all the possible endings that could be coming my way - I had been a "TA" (teachers assistant) for the Greer elementary 5th grade up until the diagnosis, but I had taken leave and at that point school was out anyways, I had to do something other than watch marathon's of TLC's a baby story and bawl my eyes out, jealous of every beautiful birth and outcome.
It was there on my beloved downtown mall that I received the smack down that would send me into a very quiet, angry, sad, alone place where I would stay for a very long time. Hell, where pieces of me still remain.... This day was the beginning of the breaking apart, of not only my marriage, but my friendship with my husband.
I had gone to the Nook for a piece of quiche and I made my way slowly back down the mall towards the store. Right in front of the fountains I ran into a woman whose child I had had in my pre-school class from my days at Bright Beginnings. I hadn't seen her in forever, although a few years previous we had been quite close as I saw her daily and was the primary care-giver to her child. We hugged and chatted, 'caught up' - I didn't mention the baby because I never did - if I did - I cried and she didn't notice because of my empire waist dress that concealed my little tummy altogether. She looked at me, her head cocked slightly to the side, her hand reaching out to grab lightly on my arm and said "I'm sorry about you and Dan"....
What?
What? huh?
I processed the words and processed the words and tried to put them into scenarios in my head that made sense.
I came up blank.
And then I knew - flooded with a reality that changed my whole life in an instant.
What I knew five seconds ago - married, two kids, pregnancy with a baby with a clogged ventricle in his brain, suddenly looked easy.
I was back in the car looking at the trees thinking how simple it all had been. (figuratively)
Perspective... 5 seconds earlier - I was managing my hell - now everything was changing again.
I took in a deep breath as the reality of what was happening sunk in, I felt sick and dizzy and instinctively cupped my belly with my hand and rubbed, thought in my head - "it's okay baby, Mommy is okay, I am reeling, I can't breathe, I may faint - but it's okay" - regulate breaths, slow heart rate - remember the doctor said the baby feels everything.....
She looked at my hand on my belly - she could see that I was pregnant...
Her face changed and she took her hand from my arm, put it to her own mouth. She looked at me as the shock on my face told her she had just put her foot in her mouth, 'don't shoot the messenger'
"Oh honey" she said as she tried to back peddle - "I am mistaken, you're pregnant"
She glanced at the wedding band on my hand.
"I was wrong forget I said a thing"
Um yeah NO.
And so she went on to tell me that she had seen my husband with another woman back in April at the Blues and Brews festival. I was at the DMB concert at Scott stadium that night - perfect night for a real date on the town with his girlfriend...
No chance my wife will see me, horses can't drag her away from Dave.
I prodded - they looked "intimate" had been holding hands.
I walked away and resolved that for the time being, I would not say a word. I would die inside alone... My best friend, my HUSBAND, the Father of my damaged baby was screwing around with a woman he worked with.
I knew who it was immediately, crazy how a wife picks up on co-worker flirtation and catalogs it away for future use.
I went home and silently did my research, gathering information slow and steady, all the while growing apart from the man I needed the most, at a time when I really needed him the most.
He had cheated, he had lied and he worked with her.
Every day as he buttoned his shirt and sprayed his cologne and left the house for work - I died a little more...
I wasn't sure that there would be anything left of me, wasn't sure that I wanted there to be, but I held on for the kids - held on for the baby inside of me.
I made the choice and now the choice I have to make every day - Don't give up. Don't give in. Don't lay down and die.
I listened to Ben Harper's CD 'live from Mars' constantly - I am waiting on an Angel, a resting place in my angel's arms...
I wept slow and quiet and I waited....