There's Nothing Better

There’s Nothing Better

I stand and watch my 15 month old daughter walk into the room at the childcare centre she attends and give her a wave. “Bye Samantha, I’ll see you later”. She doesn’t even look back at me. While I’m glad that she’s adjusted so well to the new environment, it still makes me a little sad that she doesn’t cry when I leave anymore. It’s almost like she doesn’t love me anymore. Thankfully, when I pick her up she runs to me as soon as she see’s me and gives me a big sloppy kiss. I think that would have to be the best part of my day, the time I pick her up. All the times that she gives me hugs or kisses or cries when she can’t see me remind me of how lucky I am to have her. It was not too long ago that I came very close to losing her.

It’s funny really. I never really wanted to have children. I was more interested in making money. That was until I met Victor. I’ll never forget the first day we met. It was my first day on the field working as a door to door salesperson. It was the end of the day and we were just waiting for one of our fellow agents to finish up. Victor must have been in a very energetic mood because he bounded over to me, picked me clean up off the ground and started spinning me around. After work, we went for a walk and talked the night away. We’ve been nearly inseparable ever since. A year later we were engaged and it wasn’t long until he had convinced me that having kids was a nice idea. I started to look forward to being a mum. About a year after that I fell pregnant. I was so scared! Victor and I were only 19 and I was worried about what my family would think. Luckily they were all very supportive, especially my father which was surprising. He was the one that I had been the most terrified of telling, we hadn’t always gotten along very well, but he turned out to be one of the most supportive.

The pregnancy was pretty normal. Basically it sucked. Morning sickness, cravings, and crazy hormones… by three months I had had enough. I was starting to get a baby bump and I was starting to get scared. What if I was a terrible mum? So wrapped up was I in my own fears and insecurities that it didn’t occur to me that Victor must have been scared too. I found out pretty quickly though when he started having an affair with a girl he worked with. Now, I’m a pretty understanding person and I get that whole got to do all the stuff you can’t do when you’re a dad mentality but that was just too much for me when I was six months pregnant, already big as a house, out of work and feeling useless and unattractive. So I left him. I moved into a one bedroom unit close to where my sister lived and waited out the rest of my pregnancy alone.

During those three months victor realised what an ass he’d been and did everything in his power to get me back. Unfortunately broken hearts take a long time to heal. It wasn’t until three months after Samantha was born, six months after we’d separated, that I finally consented to let him come back. We were on thin ice. He was out of work and all three of us were living in my one bedroom apartment, living of my fortnightly parenting payment. Oh yes, it was very thin ice. It didn’t help that I was bored out of my brain. I hadn’t not worked since I got my first job as a checkout operator at 15. I had not kept in contact with any of my old friends from school and although I love my daughter and I love looking after her, if I spent one more day doing nothing but changing nappies and making bottles I was going to scream.

I admit alcohol probably wasn’t the best way to diffuse my boredom. It started off just being a couple of drinks on the weekend. Then it drifted into drinks every evening. Before I knew it I was having my first drink before midday. In the end I would wake up to Samantha at eight in the morning, get her settled then sit and have a shot of bourbon. There had been a few fights and tears between Victor and I due to my drinking. He knew I was heading into trouble but he didn’t really know how much I was actually drinking, nor what to do about it. One day I knew I had gone too far. I was so drunk I couldn’t look after my daughter. I rang my sister in tears asking her to come and help me. We all knew then that I was out of control, but none of us knew just how bad it was. I got myself an appointment with a phycologist and my doctor put me on anti-depressants but they didn’t seem to be helping. I felt like such a failure. My own mother was a depressed alcoholic and my whole life I had vowed never to be like her yet here I was. I knew I had to stop but I had to have my morning shot. It was all that got me through the day.

Then it all fell apart. I don’t even really know what happened. I was drunk as usual, I found out later that I was actually three time over the legal limit. One minute I was talking to Victor and the next if felt so miserable that I just couldn’t contemplate spending another minute in this joyless existence. So I went into the kitchen, got a steak knife out of the drawer, sat on the floor and started cutting my wrists. Aside from the obvious reason why this wasn’t a good idea, I soon realised that it might have been smarter to choose a different knife. Steak knives have serrated edges which tear skin instead of clean cutting. I still have the scars. I spent the next seven hours in hospital, sobering up and realising how very stupid I was. It was kind of a blessing in disguise that it happened though. If I had continued drinking victor would have taken Samantha away from me.

If that had happened then I might as well have been dead. I can’t imagine my life with out my beautiful baby girl. The way she laughs, the look she gives me when she knows she’s been caught doing something that she should be doing. The way she runs into my arms when she’s scared or hurt. I finally realised that it wasn’t alcohol I needed to get me through the day. It was my family. I’ve now been off the alcohol for four months and am much happier. My relationship with Victor seems to have been revitalised. It’s almost like it was back when we first met, we actually talk to each other again! Samantha keeps getting bigger. Everyday she learns something new or gets a new tooth or sometimes I look at her and realise her hairs longer or that she must be taller because she can now pull things off the kitchen bench.

I didn’t die that day, but I did learn a very strong lesson. I learnt how important it is to love and be loved and that nothing, not money, not power and certainly not alcohol, is worth more than the smile of someone who loves you.