What Happened?

I was in a counseling session not too long ago with a young man who was going through a painful break-up with his girlfriend.  He was tearful, leaning forward in his chair, often with his face in his hands, telling me what had happened, or what he thought had happened. 

“I mean, I thought things were going really well.  We love each other.  We had just signed a lease on a place together.  I’ve never been this happy in my whole life.”

He went on to tell that she had told him that he needed to move out, and he thought she had “just needed some time, you know?”  But then she had told mutual friends that it was over, and he didn’t understand what had happened.

“I mean, I don’t know if I did something wrong, or if she just needed some space.  I don’t know if I’m supposed to try to contact her, or leave her alone.” 

He was baffled, and the uncertainty of how he had gotten to this place added to the pain of the break up. 

“At some point, how do I know what I did wrong, so that I don’t ever do that again.  Whatever it was,” he said tearfully.  “I don’t even know what happened!”

We processed it for a bit, and then focused on what he needed to do right now, and in the next couple of weeks, to move forward, at least for now.  And after he left the office my mind once again flashed on an image from years earlier.

Our son Benson was two years old at the time.  I had just had the twins, Martha and Emma.  Kathryn and Anna, ages 7 and 4, were out for the afternoon, and the babies were sleeping soundly.  I had been sitting in my rocking chair enjoying the quiet and trying to write when Benson came stumbling out from his afternoon nap.  He was sweaty, wearing only a t-shirt, one sock and a diaper.  He climbed up on my lap.  I put my computer off to the side to snuggle for a little bit. 

We rocked together.  His damp hair sticking to my neck.  His diaper feeling uncomfortably warm on my lap.  I kissed the top of his head and asked him if he’d had a good nap.

“Yeah.  Where Ka’hryn and Anni?” he asked.

I said that they were at Dad’s office and would be home in a little bit.        

“Where the EmMarta?”

I had smiled.  Ben still didn’t really get that each of our two babies had a name.  To him they existed as one.  And they had become, “the EmMarta.”

I reminded him that Emma and Martha, our two babies, and were still napping.

“Just you and me, Mom?” he looked up at me.

I said that, yes, for right now it was just the two of us.

He looked up at me again, and smiled.  Then he slid off my lap and headed for the toy box.  We spent the next half hour or so playing cars, playing catch with the football, and then setting up his little wooden train track.  

Ben’s nose had started to run.  He’d smeared it with his forearm a couple times.  I finally asked him if he would please go into the bathroom and get some toilet paper for his nose.

He was visibly surprised.  He never got to be in the bathroom alone. 

I started to explain that I thought he was old enough to get his own toilet paper when he needed to blow his nose.

He nodded, very serious about this new responsibility. 

“Just get a little piece about this long,” I said, holding my hands about a foot apart.

“Okay!” he shouted, jumping to his feet, and excitedly running to the bathroom.

After 30 seconds I called to him to hurry up. 

No response.

I waited another 10 seconds and called to him again to come on.

Still no response. 

I was just getting up off the floor to go check on him when he emerged from the bathroom, arms loaded with a huge mound of toilet paper, with more toilet paper trailing him down the hall.  He had a completely bewildered expression on his face.

“Mom,” he said, on the verge of tears, “what happen?”

It’s an image that has stuck with me over the years since.  I close my eyes and can still see Ben.  Like during the session with the young man whose girlfriend had ended things without him having an inkling that the relationship was in trouble. 

Or when someone comes into the office saying they need to go to treatment.  Often they’ll say they don’t know how they even got to this place.  They’ll shake their head, remembering back to days long ago before addiction owned every aspect of their life, and say, “I don’t even know what happened.” 

And that image of little Ben with the armload of toilet paper and a bewildered facial expression will cross my mind again.

Or when a woman comes in for counseling saying that she’s been in an abusive relationship for years.  She’ll start to explain to me that “he wasn’t always this way,” and she doesn’t really recall when things “started getting bad.”  She’ll drop her head in defeat and say, “I don’t even know what happened.” 

And again I’ll see that image of two-year-old Ben, on the verge of tears, with half a roll of toilet paper in his arms. 

The circumstances differ.  But the experience is universal. That sudden recognition that we’re in a place we shouldn’t be.  A place we never wanted to be.  We didn’t realize we were even on the road to here.  But now here we are.  Somehow we managed to ignore the signs telling us where we were heading.  Pretending otherwise.  It’ll be okay.  I got this.

And the next thing we know, we’re here.  Shaking our heads in defeat.  Not fully realizing how we got here.  Maybe beginning to see that the signs really were meant for us.  We just didn’t read them.  And now we’re here, standing with an armload of toilet paper, a bewildered facial expression, trying not to cry.  Completely taken by surprise, and unsure what to do next.    

I don’t even know.  What happened?