Just Look at the Mess You've Made

Mikey was chewing his nails and shooting glares at the woman opposite us. It was obvious that he didn't like her and I knew that since we first met with her on our second day here.

"It's been five days since I last saw you two. Seemed like you were avoiding coming to these appointments. Why is that Mikey?" she asked.

I looked at him and he just shrugged but didn't look up from his feet.

"Bob?"

I looked at her.

"Um, Mikey, he...he just doesn't really like talking about it and I won't try and make him do what he doesn't want to do."

She nodded and changed her gaze to him.

"It's completely normal to not like talking about it. I have one couple who are only six weeks away from becoming parents who still don't like talking about the pregnancy. Sometimes it doesn't feel real until the pregnancy is over, and that is completely fine, Mikey. No one is going to force you to talk about it. The main reason I'm here is for you to talk about anything to, mostly concerning yourself, your relationship, your feelings and anything else that is on your mind."

Mikey just sighed and brought his hands down from his mouth.

Our previous appointments were all just about her getting us – mostly Mikey – used to being here. She said that the first month after finding out about being pregnant, and the first month of being here were the hardest ones to deal with. I don't disbelieve her. The woman in question was our baby therapist woman – or at least, that's what she was explained to us as being. Her name's Suzie and she's meant to be the main person who helps us (though mostly Mikey) through the whole pregnancy. However Mikey doesn't like her so he tends not to want to go to the daily appointments, and that's only so far. I don't know whether he'll improve with how often he wants to show up to classes and appointments during the next few months, I can only but hope.

"So, have your eating habits improved a single bit?"

Mikey shifted in his seat.

"I tried."

"And it didn't work? Not even with Bob eating at the same time?"

He shook his head and brought his fingers back up to his mouth.

It's not that Mikey doesn't eat enough, he just doesn't eat proper meals. He never did before and neither do I, but now he's pregnant so it's best for him to eat proper meals. He hasn't had any craving so far – at least none that I know of – but he doesn't eat three meals a day, which is something that she's trying to help him improve. It doesn't help that I don't either, but she did say that sometimes if we both ate at the same time it might enough Mikey to eat more. It doesn't really work because we're not always hungry at the same time so it's hard to eat together.

Suzie has a few other couples who are further along than us who have strange eating habits. She told us that she only has one couple from each stage of the pregnancy (meaning Mikey and I are the only ones she has who are at the beginning stage), and that eating is sometimes a difficult aspect at the start, mostly because adapting to the move into the school is the first thing they have to deal with and then the second is the actual reality that they're going to be parents.

She spoke again.

"Okay, that's fine, Mikey. Some things don't work for some, but it's completely fine. What about your classes?

Mikey sighed.

"Urm..."

"Not well, I'm guessing? Have you figured out why you dislike going to the classes? They're only there to help you, and you might not think they're of any use now but a few months down the line you'll find out just how useful they actually were."

"I guess."

She looked between the two of us before standing up, the two of us following suit.

"I want you to do something for me today. I want you to go to each of the classes you're supposed to today, no excuses. And then I want you to come back here at the end of the day and tell me how it went."

I rubbed the back of my neck and spoke.

"We're supposed to be meeting some...urm, people today, though."

"It's one day, Bob. All I ask is that you attend each class today and come back here after them. Everything I ask you to do is to help you both."

Mikey let out a small huff.

"Okay, we'll attend all our classes today. All of them without leaving halfway through."

She smiled at his tone before walking to the door and holding it open for us to leave. I left the door first and waited outside for Mikey to follow. He told me to wait a minute before asking to talk to Suzie alone, to which she closed the door for privacy. I stood by the walk the whole time, just waiting for them to be finished with their talk. Mikey seemed to be doing okay today, what with agreeing to go to our classes and for talking with her alone, not to mention actually coming to this appointment now. Neither Gerard or Frank were awake when we left the room.

A few moments later Mikey left the room and closed the door behind him. He grabbed my hand tightly and we began to walking, heading to our room first so that we could the others that we were going to our classes today. We didn't talk the whole journey and he didn't let up with the grip on my hand. When we reached the room it was empty. They were probably in the canteen for breakfast so I wrote a quick note telling them what we were doing today before letting Mikey grab my hand again and heading to our first class.

It was going to be a long day.