Sometimes the brain takes a holiday

My little Austin made it into the world and now its my job to care for him. He was just so tiny in my eyes. He was a good size baby at seven pounds ten ounces but looking at him he was just so helpless. Being a teen mom I was woefully unprepared for what was to come. The sleep deprivation alone is enough to kill you. Thank God I was living at home with my parents but even so, he was not their baby and I had to be responsible. Middle of the night feedings, diaper changes, baths and comfort holds. Babies are a lot more work than they look like on TV, its not like the soap opera where they put the baby to bed and a few weeks later, he or she comes down stairs as a five yr old. They require all of your attention and at this time you realize that your needs now come second to this little person who depends on you for everything. Never in my life did I think I would fall for a fat little bald man but looking at my new son, I was in love.

Mom was so helpful to me in getting Austin on a schedule. After all she was the ultimate mommy and I didn't realize how good she was until I had one of my own. With her help, Austin was sleeping through the night at 11 days and I was no longer going through my day looking like the head zombie from Dawn of the Dead. Every night they had a ritual too, at 7pm she would sit and rock him for 2hrs. She called it "granny time" and treasured every minute of it. Boy would that come back to haunt me later.

Robby was great. He came by everyday to spend time with us. He would even hold Austin and rock him so I could take a nap. He did all the things that a daddy was supposed to do with his son, all the things Stu didn't want to do. Robby didn't have money, but he did have the thing I thought I needed most at the time...he was there.

Robby's own father was not there when he was growing up. He also knew what it was like to have a chemically dependent father who couldn't be asked to be there when he needed him and didn't want the same fate for Austin. His step father came in later so he knew that being the biological father was not near as important to a child as being a "Daddy". When he wanted to take me out, he wanted the baby to come too. We were like a little family. This is how it was supposed to be right? A mommy, a daddy and baby makes three? This was foreign territory for me being that my parents were still married. I never had step parents, didn't have to split the holidays, never had to remember two addresses. Robby had been through this so I figured he was the expert and I needed to trust that it would all work out.

Stu and I were divorced but the arguments didn't really end. He fought the child support tooth and nail and even quit his job so he wouldn't have to pay as much. He didn't want to see Austin unless I was there and seeing him was too hard for me. I was still breastfeeding him so I couldn't leave Austin with Stu's parents for too long or he would be fussy after a couple hours. I couldn't trust him to take Austin alone so he was only allowed to see him at his moms. He wouldn't accept this, it wasn't the way he wanted it so he decided to end this completely. I got papers in the mail from his lawyer and ordered to come to court. Stu was relinquishing all parental rights so he wouldn't have to pay child support anymore. Happy Birthday to me. Yes, that's right, court was on the Friday before my birthday.

I was devastated again. My parents were supporting us financially and that was not fair to them. I needed to get a job and start taking care of us myself. I got a job as a secretary for a plumber. It didn't pay the best but I could take Austin to work with me and had his play pen next to my desk. This was horrible for me. I was a mom now and to me, that meant staying home and raising my son. That's how my mom did it so I thought that's the way it was supposed to be. How could this have gone so wrong?

Robby was there through all of this too. He tried to show me the silver lining and that if Stu didn't want us, he surely did. Robby liked playing the role of night in shining armor, it suited him well at the time. He was used to taking care of women. His mom was sick most of his life with Polycystic Kidney Disease so he took care of her and even helped raise his little sister. If he could do all that, taking care of us was surly going to be a walk in the park. I was a train wreck and he was the clean up crew. Shortly after the court papers were finalized Robby proposed. I was thrilled, I wasn't going to be a single mom, if Prince Charming didn't exist, at least a Knight was coming to save me.

Robby had never been married before so he wanted a wedding. This was fine with me, but mom was about ready to crawl under a rock and die. My divorce was in January, Austin was born in April and now I was planning an October wedding? I'm sure she was wondering where my mind had gone and what she had done in a past life to deserve this. It was happy I wasn't going to be alone but once again, mom was worrying I was jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire...you have to just hate it when some people are never wrong.