Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 68583 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68583 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Meanwhile, I also worked, though in the evenings.
And I had to leave the house because Joey was so damn loud when he gamed.
So I had to take my sleeping child to a coffee shop while I caught up on work for hours and hours.
And I was just…done.
I needed help, and that was why I was going to the doctor’s office today.
“I’m fucking busy, Baker.”
The way he said “Baker” made me want to scream.
Like a curse word, but worse.
“I know you are, but it’ll only be ten minutes, max. And I need to wash up because the doctor will be checking out my downstairs area,” I replied, hoping that for just once, he’d give in without making this a fight.
Which, of course, he didn’t.
So I had to take Holt into the bathroom with me and stick him in the bouncer right outside of the shower door.
I had to stop my shower every two minutes to put his pacifier back in, and even worse, I got shampoo in my eyes.
Needless to say, by the time I got out, I was a frazzled mess.
Which was, of course, when Holt had a blowout.
I stuck him and his entire bouncer into the shower and washed it off while standing there naked, trying to find it in me to feel something other than resentment.
I loved Holt.
I really did.
But I hadn’t wanted a baby at the time I’d gotten pregnant.
When the accident happened, Joey had been overjoyed.
And it was hard not to feel the same when he smothered me in love and adoration.
Now, I was struggling to hold my head above water, and I just needed help.
I wished I hadn’t closed my family out.
I loved them.
Adored them, really.
But I hadn’t wanted to listen to them telling me how stupid I was for going back.
When I got done cleaning everything up, I was running ten minutes late, and I had to leave without drying my hair.
It meant that it would dry in a curly, likely frizzy mess.
Joey hated me with curly hair, and I’d been straightening it since I was a young teen because of him.
As I walked out of the bedroom with Holt, Joey’s nose lifted in a partial snarl when he saw my hair.
“You’re leaving the house like that?”
“I don’t have a choice, since you wouldn’t help me,” I pointed out, feeling the tears start to well up in my throat.
“Well, it’s a good thing that you’re already taken, because if you left like that and you were single, I can guarantee you that no one would look at you twice.”
With that final parting comment, he moved from his work computer to his gaming computer.
I don’t know why I did it, but I walked to the hall closet where the modem was kept and roughly snatched it out, breaking wires and prongs as I did.
Only after I put it back the way it was, though broken wires making it useless, did I leave the house and not look back.
I took my car to the doctor’s office and sat through an hour of waiting before I was finally able to be seen by my doctor.
I broke down when she asked how I was doing.
I told her everything.
How I was feeling.
How I was being treated.
How I was struggling hard and finding it difficult to bond with Holt.
By the time I was done, she was hugging me and telling me everything would be okay.
Only after she was sure that I would be fine did she tell me what I knew.
“You have postpartum depression,” she murmured gently.
I swallowed past a hiccup.
“I figured that.”
“It’s not abnormal,” she admitted. “It’s actually a lot more common than you’d think. Lots of women get it after having their children, and it’s something that you can control with medication. And you don’t have to be on that medication forever. It’s usually just a short time thing, so you can get your body back under control hormonally.”
I nodded, still choked up.
She patted my arm and said, “I’ll call this into the pharmacy in town now. But if you need anything, I truly mean anything, you call us. We’ll be available to you.”
My shoulders deflated, and I nodded my head.
She patted my shoulder and said, “You should call your family.”
I probably should.
It wasn’t like this was going to turn into something that was fixable.
In fact, there was only one possible way out of this, and it was breaking up for real.
Fifteen years down the drain.
Fifteen years as a couple.
A child. A shared life. All gone in one morning appointment.
“When you leave here, go get the prescription picked up. Take it. Then I want to have a follow-up with you in one week. I want to hear how it’s going. We may need to adjust the dose.” She stood and squeezed my hand. “There are good men out there. Men that’ll be everything that you could ever want. Trust me when I say, you don’t have to settle for trash.”