Letters to Max - You're here for real and I can't sleep

Dear Max,

You’re finally with us. We survived a night with you, and we’re all still alive. I’m not in great shape unfortunately. Something is preventing me from getting enough sleep. Is it guilt? Guilt that I can’t help your momma? Is it post partum male depression? Is it anxiety? Anxiety that you will die?

I write this in an effort to put these thoughts to rest for myself and for your momma’s sake, because the reality of this situation is twofold. One is I can’t support her the way and to the level I would like. Two is it just creates a negative spiral because the less sleep I get, the less my cognitive capabilities are (and I can totally feel them going down), and the less confidence I have in my ability as a partner and father and the more anxious I get, and it repeats.

Logically it’s fairly obvious that all the things I’m thinking about just don’t make sense. If sleeping makes me guilty because I can’t help your momma, not sleeping should make me feel even more guilty. If I am anxious about your death, well, not sleeping is just going to make it more likely that I will actually miss something.

So the more likely case is that I am just anxious, anxious that I can’t sleep right now on command and that anxiety is causing a negative spiral that makes me more unable to sleep. Already between the two of us, I take a longer time to doze off, which is probably one of the reasons why I feel like I’m not holding up my end of the bargain.

Stemming from something deeper? An insecurity that I have always had of not being good enough for anything? Something I hope I can get over and bring you up in a way that you never have to feel not good enough.

The last day or so has been so like vipasanna. Trying something, not working out and wanting to run away halfway. In fact I remember speaking to the assistant teacher, telling him how I felt I was so far from where I ought to be. I was living in the future, projecting a foregone conclusion rather than concentrating on the present. How we approach a vipasanna retreat is probably a great first order approximation of how we approach life. And how I’m approaching you.

Rather than focusing on you right here now, I seem to be caught up in thinking about all the things and perils and dangers to both you and me that may totally not happen. The reality is yet to be.

I hope your momma finds what she’s looking for, and the price is worth it. I hope I can learn to love you in the same way I love your momma, and maybe in the process, learn to love myself a little bit more too.