Before I Let You Go(12)
“Maybe. She just has a funny way of showing it sometimes,” Annie mutters, and she picks up a piece of toast, breaks off the crust as if she’s going to eat it, but then lowers it back to the tray. “I have been speaking to her a bit more lately, but I haven’t exactly been honest about my situation. So she doesn’t know about the baby or that I’m still using, and she’s going to be upset with me for lying and . . . I just want to be able to tell her I’m on top of this before we call her, okay? I just need to be clean first.”
Thoughts of Annie’s relationship with our mother—clearly as confusing as my own—fade to the background as I focus on her other bewildering statement. Clean? Annie is staring out the window, her gaze distant. I lean toward her as I say very gently, “Annie, you can’t actually detox until the baby is delivered.”
“What? Of course I can,” Annie says stiffly. “I know I’ve messed up until now—but with the right help—”
“No, I don’t even mean ‘you can’t,’ I mean—you shouldn’t. It’s not safe. Withdrawals would probably start premature labor.”
She stares at me. Her blue eyes are clear and I have her full attention, but I can see from the twist in her eyebrows that she still doesn’t understand what I’m telling her.
“But . . . I nearly did it at home—a few times. I was just going to do it alone . . . I tried . . .”
“Probably a good thing you didn’t.” I smile at her gently, and she shakes her head. The lines on her face seem endless, and when she frowns, the hollows in her cheeks grow deeper. Annie looks too frail to be the weapon of mass destruction I’ve known her to be over the past six years. I take her hand in mine and squeeze it tightly. “There are well-established protocols for dealing with addiction in pregnancy. I’m sure Eliza will have a plan.”
“But—you said I could take the methadone just once.”
“Well, yes . . . I did but . . . I mean, you have to be taking something.”
“But I can’t stay on methadone.” Annie is visibly frightened of this possibility. She hates methadone, and she always did seem miserable on it. Then again, she always ended up using while she was on it, and I’ve never been sure how much of her “misery” was put on to preempt the inevitable relapse. I’m instantly impatient with her—assuming she’s going to resist the maintenance treatment so she can go right back to using street opiates. I’m surprised when she whispers desperately, “Lexie, methadone withdrawals are as bad as heroin—if they put me on that, won’t the baby still have to detox once it’s born?”
Now I’m confused. I’d assumed her fear and concern were all about her own dislike of methadone—it hadn’t actually occurred to me that she’d be concerned for the baby. I soften a little at her uncharacteristic display of selflessness.
“There are alternatives . . .” I say gently. “But yes, it doesn’t matter what the maintenance drug is. The baby will have to detox, no matter what happens from this point.”
“But I was . . . I was just going to stop, before it comes. I can’t let the baby . . .” She chokes up, and she’s getting wound up—this is the very last thing she needs given the situation with her blood pressure. Her na?veté is completely heartbreaking. I want to pull her into my arms and tell her that it’s all going to be just fine, but that would be a lie—it’s not. There are ugly times ahead for her and her baby . . . and as soon as that thought strikes me, I feel the pinch in my chest as I acknowledge that this means there are also ugly times ahead for me, and for Sam. I want to protect Annie, and I know we need to keep her stress levels down to help control her BP, but pretending there is anything like an easy solution available to us now is ridiculous.
Now, anger rises within me so suddenly that I’m caught off guard by it. I’m half-inclined to cut this conversation short and storm down the hallway to ask this Eliza what she was thinking by not making this clear to Annie in their very first meeting.
“There just has to be a way for me to get clean before the baby comes.” She’s thinking out loud now—digesting the implications, her voice shaky and rough—but determined, as if she could somehow negotiate with me to find a way to change the workings of human biology just for her. “Lexie, you have to make them find a way. You don’t know what detox is like—it’s not something a baby should have to feel.”
“Annie, I’ve watched you go through withdrawals. I do know what it’s like. And we know how to help infants through it. It’s going to be okay.”
Annie shakes her head, lips pursed.
“I’m not letting my baby start its life like that.”
“It’s too late to avoid that now.”
“But what if I stay in the hospital and just go cold turkey? They can monitor the baby, right?”
“With your blood pressure the way it is, the last thing you or the baby needs is severe stress like withdrawal. You could go into labor—or even worse.”
There’s a slight pause, then Annie whispers hesitantly, “Worse?”
I work to clear the lump of guilt in my throat before I can bring myself to admit, “The baby would probably go into distress—there’s a much higher chance of an emergency delivery, and a chance it might not even make it. Do you understand?”