A story about my mom
This is one of those days when I write about something that's not the San Diego Padres.
Hi, everyone. The San Diego Padres had an off day yesterday, and made no roster moves that I am aware of, so nothing has changed since I wrote about the team yesterday. Go read that if you want to see me criticize my favorite player on his birthday or are interested in potential trade targets for the Padres.
Also, click here to submit a question for me to answer in tomorrow’s mailbag! Seriously, I want to hear from you.
I thought about skipping a post today, without much to talk about. Then I thought about just picking a topic and going at it (“The bullpen sucks!”) but everything seemed like me repeating something I had written in the last couple of months and I am not really looking to force it.
At the end of the day, without constant stimuli from the Padres actually playing baseball on my TV screen or right in front of me, it’s hard for me to stay focused on baseball amidst everything else going on in 2022.
So, instead, I want to tell you a short story about my mother. There will be no more Padres discussion today, if that’s what you’re here for.
Back before addiction ruined their marriage, my parents really did love each other. They also weren’t big on contraception, but they weren’t looking to build a giant family.
My mom had two kids before meeting my dad, and then they had one together. That one is me. A family of five, always with an animal or two running around the house, felt right to them. They made the decision to get my mom’s tubes tied.
It was a blessed but humble childhood for me. A townhouse in a middle-class neighborhood filled with other kids in similar situations. There was a lot of stickball played in empty lots, adventures through the forest, and occasionally breaking into the silo of the nearby farm to see who could climb the highest (and jump down onto a pile of hay). I had, and have, zero complaints about that part of my life.
There was always a flurry of activity in the morning. My sister and brother fighting over the bathroom as they got ready for school. My dad flying out the door while yelling his day’s schedule at my mom so she would know when to expect him home. My mom trying to get everyone to eat a bite of something before they left her all alone for the day, to cook and clean and keep house (although she quickly got bored of that and started picking up odd jobs to do during the day).
One specific morning, I was the last one left in the house with my mom. My brother and sister had left to get to the bus stop early, my dad was already on his way to some sort of meeting, and I was finishing getting dressed and brushing my teeth before heading to school.
That’s when I heard her fall. My mom is about 5 feet tall, so it’s not like she weighs a ton, but I remember the whole house shaking when she hit the dining room floor.
I came to see what the noise was and found my mom curled into a ball on the floor, crying in pain. I asked what was wrong and she didn’t immediately have the strength to reply.
“It’s okay,” she eventually said, “Go to school.”
I tried arguing with her. I wasn’t going to leave my mom to…die? Was she dying?
“Go to school or you’re grounded,” she barely squeaked out, “You’re going to miss the bus if you don’t go now.”
I don’t care. I’m not leaving. And, in her state, I knew there was nothing she could do to make me. I sat down next to her and rubbed her back, a pretty weird feeling when you’re that young. I asked what I could do to help. I think I got her a cold washcloth to put on her head.
“Something is very wrong. I need to go to the hospital.”
This was before the days of cell phones. Reaching my dad was not really an option, nor was getting my brother or sister to come back from the bus stop without a lot of time and running.
“Call 911. Or give me the phone and I’ll call 911. And then, please, go to school. There’s nothing more you can do here.”
I’ve since asked my mom what she was thinking during this moment. Why was she so insistent I go to school? Was she worried that she was going to die and didn’t want me to be there?
“I just needed you in the care of someone else, someone I trusted, before I could allow myself to focus on whatever was going on with me.”
That’s how moms think. That’s why they’re awesome.
Anyway, I grabbed the phone and called 911. They eventually asked me to hand the phone to my mom, which I did. Her pain wasn’t subsiding but she was getting numb enough to it that she could talk above a whisper. The ambulance was on the way, we were told.
At that point, my mom put her foot down (figuratively, she was still in the fetal position on the floor next to the dining table) and told me it was time for me to go, and I did.
I remember going down to the ground so that I could give her a kiss on her forehead. I remember leaving the house wondering if it was the last time I’d ever see her. I made myself stop crying before I got to the bus stop.
She spent the next day or two in the hospital. I didn’t get much an explanation about what happened to her until years later, mostly because I don’t think I would’ve understood.
My mom had an ectopic pregnancy even though her tubes were tied. Her body was trying to figure out what to do with this fetus(?) because it had nowhere to go and no way to get nutrients. Eventually, it just kinda freaked out and caused her excruciating pain.
The solution to my mom’s pain, and health issues that would’ve very quickly snowballed and could’ve killed her (so I was told), was an abortion. It was done at the local hospital, the one near the lake that my friends and I would ride our bikes by most summer days.
A week later, you would’ve never known anything happened. It was just another busy morning of siblings fighting over the bathroom and dad flying out the door on his way to work. I made it a point to stay behind and check on my mom every day for a long time after that. It became hard to leave her for fear of what could happen when nobody was around to help her, but it became easier with time.
My mom called me a couple of weeks ago. I could hear the tears in her eyes and the lump in her throat. She didn’t even say hello, she went right into what she was thinking and feeling.
“I’ve been alive for 68 years in this country, and I can’t remember anyone losing rights over that time. Rights for women, rights for people of color, rights for people of different sexualities and genders…they were slowly getting better over time. If we now have to worry about rights, earned and fought for rights, being taken away…I’m not sure I recognize this country anymore.”
She was, understandably and justifiably, upset. Angry in a way that I haven’t heard her very often in my life. My guess is she was thinking about that morning that I found her on the floor.
My guess is that she never really thought about the idea of not having the option for medical intervention. Because, in the right state, that same story in 2022 would have a very different ending. She would have no choice but to be in agony while she waited to see if this clearly unwanted pregnancy was going to kill her.
This wasn’t a teenager playing fast and loose with condoms or birth control, this was a mother of three who loved her husband and took precautions. She needed a medical procedure to save her from horrible pain and maybe death. She was lucky that, at the time she needed it, the country was not in the position it is in now.
And I just keep thinking about the context she put it in. This wasn’t just any Supreme Court ruling. This wasn’t even really about abortion itself. The country took away an “earned and fought for” right from half of the population, and that right was for a medical procedure that has been (for many people in many different situations) life-saving.
How can you not be angry?
Thanks for reading. I’ll be back with some more Padres stuff tomorrow.
Change: Through important voices, that tell simple, honest stories.
Thanks for your heart-felt story!