Six weeks after my emergency C-section, my husband ignored my doctor’s orders and forced me to run every morning while he crawled behind me in his BMW, honking whenever I slowed down. I thought no one knew—until one Friday, his mother stepped into the road and changed everything.
Six weeks after my emergency C-section, my life became a nightmare.
My stitches throbbed every time I bent to lift our son.
The bathroom mirror showed me a woman I barely recognized.
I told myself that was okay.
I had just made a person.
My husband was less understanding.
My life became a nightmare.
The OB had been very specific at my follow-up that morning.
“No lifting heavier than the baby. No strenuous exercise for at least eight weeks. Your incision needs time to heal.”
“I understand,” I said.
Ryan sat beside me, nodding along.
“We hear you, Doc,” he said, flashing a smile. “Don’t worry, I’ll take good care of her.”
That smile disappeared before we even made it home.
“No strenuous exercise.”
“She’s being overly cautious,” he muttered in the car on the way home. “What you need now is to get back into shape.”
“Ryan, she said eight weeks—”
“You’ve already gained enough weight, honey. The sooner you lose it, the sooner you’ll look like yourself again.”
I laughed, because I thought it was a joke.
Ryan wouldn’t really go against the doctor’s advice, would he?
“What you need now is to get back into shape.”
He didn’t laugh back.
“I bet you don’t want our friends’ wives discussing your chubby body at the barbecue next month,” he said. “Come on, you look like you’re still pregnant.”
I stared at the side of his face.
The man I married was somewhere underneath that profile.
I waited for that man to surface, but he never did.
Instead, I met a side of Ryan I’d never seen before.
