My first Halloween as a mother was in 2011. My son, James, was three months old. As a plump stout baby, he fit perfectly in his football costume. I pulled him around in a cart to the one other row of townhomes, and the few single family homes in the new Kent Island neighborhood where we lived. In two years of existence, the neighborhood had hardly grown, but we had gone from renters to owners, engaged to married, from two to three. My first pregnancy went surprisingly well, considering that I have Type 1 diabetes. Diagnosed in 1985, four years before a fictional Shelby died after complications from her diabetes in “Steel Magnolias,” I was told often that it would be extremely difficult for me to have children. In 2009, I had vitrectomies on both of my eyes, not to be confused with a vasectomy, which I have accidentally added to “list of prior surgeries.” These surgeries were necessary due to diabetes complications that threatened my vision. I was able to bring my baby home to our first home.
By Halloween 2013 I was already a mom of two boys. In that same cart, I now pulled an Eagles player with his favorite accessory – his baby brother Charlie who was dressed in the same football costume he had worn two years prior. Housing prices had dropped, mortgage companies were more stringent in their loans, and despite the challenges, the housing development grew. So did my little family. Unlike my first, I had some complications in my second pregnancy. With Charlie, I was hospitalized several times. I got norovirus while pregnant and was unable to keep anything down while my blood sugars plummeted dangerously. James babbled in his crib while I retched nearby, we were the only ones home. Eventually I was able to drive myself to the hospital. I was admitted and stayed for a week. Charlie was born a few months – and one more hospitalization – later. His blood sugar was dangerously low when they checked him, so low that they gave him an IV with glucose. Reassured that this was normal for babies born to Type 1 diabetic mothers, I pushed my anxiety down. Life went on. I forgot about the drama of the hospitalizations in the chaos of having two under two, a job, my disease to manage, life in general. By Halloween that year I felt that my marriage was in a good place. We were a family after all. Pulling the boys around, we collected a small amount of candy that year, socialized with the other new parents, and got the kids to sleep all before the sunset.
For Halloween 2014, I actually dressed up again – and by dressed up I mean I put on a black sweatshirt, cat ears and added some whiskers to my face. I was beginning to emerge again as an actual human being, but still very much consumed by the responsibilities of a mom of two young boys. By one and three, both of my kids had their own personalities. James, three, was the boss of everything. His rules were firm, and yet always very fluid so that he would always get his way. He looked just like his dad. Charlie, one, was easy-going, yet fiercely independent, charming and never showed any fears. He looked just like me. We had all been pirates two months earlier, attending the Pirates and Wenches celebration in Rockhall. I had signed up for a 5k race. The morning of the race it was only the three of us at home. I ended up pushing them in a stroller as we ran through the town, and they gleefully waved their Jake and the Never Ending Pirates swords and waved to all the other runners who passed us. Running with a stroller had not been part of the plan, and bitterly I abandoned our pirate costumes and dressed the boys as superheroes. By 2014 the neighborhood had expanded further. Now there were about six rows of townhomes, and a row of single family units all lined up at the very back of the planned community. Although I had that double-wide stroller with us, Charlie was determined to walk the length of the neighborhood. “He is like a drunk,” I said watching him teeter with his wobbly, unbalanced way of walking down the road, his red cape swinging behind him. “God, I hope he never gets diabetes, this kid loves sweets and Halloween.”
Halloween fell on a Saturday in 2015. Back then my boys were still into Matchbox cars and superheroes, not video games and girls. The houses and townhome rows continued to pop up intermittently. That Halloween the boys dressed up in Harley Davidson sweatshirts, baggy jeans, handkerchiefs on their heads and fake beards and staches drawn on their face with cheap eyeliner. I loved watching their personalities evolve and strengthen, yet still had a say in what they wore for Halloween. It didn’t last past 2015. Sometime in that year, Charlie began to critique me, once telling me in horror to “put my boobs back on,” after I had taken off my bra. Today this neighborhood is a behemoth of houses and townhomes, a sweet spot for the most devoted of candy collectors. Back then, there were far fewer homes but the group still made out well. The parents walked around after the gang with beers and wine in hand.
In 6 weeks my family would move into a new home.
In 7 weeks Charlie would be hospitalized, being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at the delicate age of 2, same age as I had been.
In 4 years I would tell my husband that I no longer wanted to be married to him.
In 5 years my ex would move back into our first home.
In 8 years James would be diagnosed with type 1 diabetes.
2015 was our last Halloween with our neighborhood friends, the group who all had kids around the same time. Watching the little “biker gang” as they were known as, since they all cruised around in their balance bikes, trikes, and bikes with training wheels, was poignant, knowing we were leaving soon. It was the last Halloween before I had to manage a toddler’s diabetes. It was the last Halloween I pretended everything was ok. A decade later the memories are bittersweet, with hindsight of the struggles but then the triumphs that ensued.
Since then my life has changed drastically, and all for the better. From a new partner to starting a bookstore, the gratitude for what I have now is only amplified when I reflect on where I have come from.
-Liz