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The next week passed slowly, primarily because we were all waiting for John’s mom to pass away. It took three days, but on Tuesday, John called Luke and said that she had passed quietly in the morning while both John and his uncle were in the room with her. She simply stopped breathing and there was no trauma -- only peace.
I felt so bad for John, and couldn't imagine losing my own mom or dad. He was lucky he had his uncle and Felicia to offer support as well as Luke. Luke spent as much time as he could with John, popping in to spell them off. I didn't mind. It showed to me even more clearly what a good heart Luke had and how loyal and supportive he was as a friend.
I already knew he was a great boyfriend and husband, and I knew based on the way he was there for John that he would be there for me and our children when the time came.
I felt so lucky.
What I didn't feel lucky about was being beset by persistent nausea and fatigue of early pregnancy. My mother tried to say that it meant I would have a healthy baby, but I wondered if I kept losing weight whether that would be good for the baby. When I mentioned it to Luke, he did some quick googling and assured me that the baby was so tiny at this early stage that I didn't have to worry about it not getting enough nutrition. It would take what it needed from my body, and I had enough fat stored in my body to keep it healthy until morning sickness passed.
"Even if you stay sick, as long as there are times when you can eat and maintain your weight, the baby will get what it needs," Luke told me. "If it comes to that, there are medications they can give you to stop the morning sickness."
I tried to relax and be patient for my ordeal of morning sickness and fatigue to pass, but it was starting to affect my studies and my ability to do the weekly international relations seminar. For the past five weeks, I had to trade with other grad students, and my professor requested my attendance at a meeting to discuss my continued status as a seminar leader.
To my surprise, he called me one afternoon and asked me to attend a meeting in his office at nine o'clock the next morning. He had to know that I was sick in the morning. I had rearranged my schedule because of it. So, I had to swallow back my fear and ask him to reschedule the meeting until later in the afternoon, because of morning sickness.
"I'm busy all afternoon for the next week," he said. "It has to be in the morning."
"Can I do it over Skype instead? It's hard for me to come on campus when I'm sick."
"It has to be in person," he said. "I need you to sign some documents."
"Can't you send them to me in an email attachment and I'll scan them and send them back?" I asked, a feeling of frustration building inside of me that he just couldn't -- or wouldn't -- understand.
"Look, Ms. Dixon, if you can't carry out your duties as a seminar instructor, you should resign and let someone else take your place who can offer students the continuity they deserve. Every week since you became, sick," he said, pausing to emphasize the word, "they have a different seminar instructor and that's got to be really confusing for them."
"I should be getting better soon and will be able to return to my duties then," I said. "Morning sickness is usually better after week twelve and I'm getting close to that."
"Maybe you should have thought of that before you accepted the seminar."
"I didn't know I was pregnant until after the seminar started," I said, unable to keep anger out of my voice.
"Let me rephrase that. Maybe you should not have become pregnant."
There -- it hung in the air -- the assertion that I shouldn't have become pregnant if I wanted to be a grad student and a seminar instructor. My cheeks heated as did my blood and I had to hold back a nasty retort.
Of course, in addition to feeling angry, I felt incredibly guilty and a smidgen of doubt crept in. Maybe he was right. We should have been more careful. We should have used protection. I should have known that I was at risk.
It wasn't that I didn't want a baby. I did. I just didn't think it would happen so soon after we married.
Luke assured me that if I had to quit the seminar that it wouldn't matter. He was rich enough to support me totally. I didn't need to teach. For that matter, I didn't need to ever work again but of course, I wanted my own career. I wanted to do my PhD. I wanted to work in International Relations.
If I quit, it would mean I wouldn't get the experience that my fellow grad students would. I'd be behind the 8-Ball when the time came to get a plum teaching assignment as a post-doc student.
"Okay, I'll give up my seminar," I said, barely able to hold it together but I refused to cry on the phone. "I'm sorry this had to happen, and I hope you can find someone to take the rest of the seminar sessions. Please give my apologies to my students and offer them my best wishes."
"Thank you," he said. "I think that's the best for everyone involved. It's unfair to students to have different instructors each week. If you can't do the job, you should resign. When you're a PhD student, you have to focus totally on your studies and your responsibilities as a seminar instructor. Having a baby is going to hurt your performance and take away from your ability to be a good mother. It's really better to do this when you can focus totally on one or the other."
"So, you're saying that a mother can't be a good grad student?" I asked, feeling anger that he was rubbing my nose in it.
"Not in my experience," he replied.
"What about young fathers? Can they be good grad students and good fathers?"
"Well, obviously, they don't get pregnant and give birth and they don't nurse their babies. It doesn't interfere with their ability to do the job."
I hung up on him.
I just couldn't listen any longer. What he said hurt me and made me feel incredibly guilty and angry.
