Thursday 29 October 2015

A FOOTBALL PUNDETTE EXCLUSIVE






A lot of people think footballers are untouchable. Most tend to think they are ridiculously overpaid, self-absorbed and out of touch with reality. They live in a world with a fantasy lifestyle that us mere mortals just simply can’t relate to.



That was until recently, when a footballer’s cry for help struck a chord for me so deep, it evoked painful and difficult memories that I’d struggled to battle through and tried so desperately yet so impossibly to forget. It’s a curious world we live in where said footballer’s activities hitting the headlines made me realise just how lucky I am – and how unfortunate I’d been in the past.



I could never have thought I’d ever have anything in common with Jake Livermore. We are both English – and that’s where any common ground normally ends. He earns his wage playing football for Championship side Hull City. I pay my bills through an administration role and writing. He’s seven years my junior. Frankly, we couldn’t be any more different.



That was until the midfielder hit the headlines in August. After testing positive for cocaine in May and being suspended from his duties pending an FA investigation, the revelation that Livermore and his partner lost their new born baby in May last year gave the FA a moral decision to make. The 25 year old said he turned to the substance after spiralling into depression following their loss. The FA deemed the situation ‘extenuating and exceptional circumstances’ and offered the footballer a reprieve.



Most of the reaction to this has been sensitive, considered and respectful. But there is always a minority who mock and sit in judgement.



‘He was out snorting cocaine while his poor missus mourned their loss.’



‘Losing a baby is no excuse to go taking drugs as a way of coping.’



It’s the easiest thing in the world to sit behind a keyboard and pass judgement: tapping out 140 characters of bile with no respect or compassion for the feelings of the person concerned. It’s much more difficult to try and understand, to empathise and to relate. Losing a baby is one of the hardest situations anybody can go through. There are other despicable things that can happen and I don’t want to take away from that. But it takes two to make a baby, so both parties should be expected to mourn. Just because Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus doesn’t mean the woman should be the only inconsolable party, the only one grieving.



I can relate to Jake Livermore because I’ve been through it. I’ve lost a baby and I’ve grieved. I’ve searched for answers and struggled to make sense of it. When it happens, you are simply left to deal with it. There are no manuals, no after care, nothing. All your hopes, dreams and plans for parenthood are left in tatters and you are left to somehow pick up the pieces and move on with life.



It just doesn’t happen like it. I have told the story behind my miscarriage here, so I won’t go into the details of when and where it happened. But I’ve never spoke in depth about just how much an affect it had on my life and on our life as a couple. This is why the Livermore case struck such a chord with me. It was too familiar – too close to home.



My initial reaction was a feeling of complete numbness. Although it was early days at seven weeks, probably nothing compared to the pain Jake and his partner must’ve gone through after actually meeting their son, Jake Junior who passed at birth, we had discussed names and become excited at the family life that lay ahead. We had embraced the prospect of being parents – and that had suddenly been taken away from us in a matter of minutes.



Looking back, the initial aftermath was a blur. I went to the doctors and asked for help; not really knowing what the standard protocol was in these situations. Is there a typical way of coping with losing a baby? Ah yes, silly me. Of course there is. The doctor prescribed me Citilopram and sent me on my way.



It wasn’t really explained to me what the tablets were about, what the possible side effects were and the potential change they’d make to my life. I didn’t know they were anti depressants. In hindsight I was probably naïve, thinking I could rely on a doctor to turn my monochrome world back into colour again. Like a little girl, I looked at the GP as a fairy with a magic wand, who could take my pain away and bring the light back into my life. Was I depressed? I didn’t feel depressed as in having suicidal thoughts, I just felt like somebody had turned the lights out in my world. All the life had evaporated from me. Is that what depression feels like? I had no idea what to do with myself.



I wasn’t ready to discuss it with him. He had been amazing during the incident and my time in hospital in Antigua, but it wasn’t enough. I didn’t know what to say, I don’t think he did, so we couldn’t and didn’t take comfort in one another. It remained a taboo subject, one that was never to be talked about and that proved detrimental. Instead, we attempted to move on with our lives as best we could. Back to work, back to the future, minus our baby. Minus the future.



When Jake Livermore turned to cocaine, it was clearly an attempt to block out the monumental pain and loss that he had suffered. Nobody has the right to say he was selfish. Nobody has the right to act self-righteous and dictate what the right or wrong way to react in that situation is. There is no right or wrong. There is nothing. There is pain, inconsolable and isolating heartbreak and torrential devastation. A loss so severe it turns your world upside down; destroys the status quo. How do you suggest anyone copes with that?



Now tell me the death of a child is merely an ‘excuse’ to take drugs. Explain to me how best to deal with that level of pain. Of torture. People react differently to grief and should be allowed to do so free from judgement. When you’re at your lowest ebb, it’s anything to help ease the agony and anguish.



Our loss was profound to the interaction we had with each other. He also went to the doctor and, surprise surprise, was also given Citalopram. With both of us on anti depressants, skirting conversations about our loss and coming home from work to our apartment together tinged with awkwardness, my sense of loss was unbearable. I couldn’t cope. My heart had been set on our baby, a new life, an amazing blessing to anybody’s lives.



I didn’t sit and weep constantly. We just gradually started to drink more. Neither of us had read the small print on the box of tablets that warned against the consumption of alcohol with the pills, so we didn’t know the side effects. Hostility, anxiety, panic attacks, loss of sex live, mood or behaviour changes. They soon became apparent.



The arguments and fighting occurred normally after I’d had a bottle of wine and he had a few pints. Or wine. Sometimes it would turn physical (on my part), most of the time it was aggressively verbal. At first, we would kiss and make up the morning after, but as it became regular, I think we just accepted it as the new norm in our relationship. Drinking wasn’t just reserved for the weekends- it was a midweek thing now. It was a way of coping: the only way I knew how.



People would ask when we would be trying again to conceive. That was another taboo subject. Anything to do with children was. Our sex life was almost non-existent: I’m sure paranoia on his part in case I fell pregnant. The loss had started to change my personality: I became bitter, resentful and probably deeply unlikeable. Only at the time I couldn’t see the wood for the trees. I was in too deep: the mixture of alcohol and tablets proved to be my release. The two combined became my coping mechanism. My life was over as I knew it: the cocktail of drugs and wine or vodka made me feel alive again.



Certain personal relationships deteriorated beyond recognition: I’m not sure if people knew just how bad it got, if they understood what was going on or whether they just thought I’d had a personality transplant. I really tried to put on a front, a mask if you like. But it was so hard. Marriage and babies surrounded me and I felt like I was drowning. I knew nothing was right anymore. I just didn’t know what to do about it. So if I wasn’t as close to you if you had a baby during that time, don’t take it personally. Try to understand. I just lived in a zombie-esque trance. For it wasn’t life anymore, it was a mere existence.



We got engaged in June 2011. Looking back at the photographs from that night it was there for all to see: we were both drunk therefore we were both happy. Let’s put a ring on it. No plans were ever really made for a wedding. We bought pet chameleons- again an attempt to fill the drastic void left by our loss. Although they brought colour and fun into our lives, an animal can never truly be a substitute for a child. Particularly when the animal dies…



I thought about going elsewhere for sex. My high drive hadn’t been affected and I was in an impotent relationship with no sign of that improving: one night he caught me drunk texting an old flame from university. He retaliated but neither one of us would’ve actually done anything about it. As twisted as things had become, deep down we knew we still loved each other too much. I was tempted, but that’s as far as it went. We remained loyal and, as far as I’m aware, in love.



That was, until things reached breaking point for us over Christmas 2011: I’d had a deeply regrettable violent encounter with an individual whilst under the influence of my reliable drink and drug concoction and enough was enough. He told me he didn’t love me anymore- those words jolted me more than anything ever had since our loss. He was all I knew, my world: although we brought out the worst in each other, I still believed we were unbreakable. I was wrong. That was rock bottom. Dad invited me to stay with him for a couple of weeks in the Far East- and it was the best thing I ever did.



The two weeks in Hong Kong, China and Bangkok did me the world of good. It transformed my life. The break switched the light back on, illuminated my world and made my life technicolour again. I saw wonderful sights, spent precious time with my Dad and had a lot of time to myself, with myself. I think the time away brought a lot of clarity for me: I stopped taking the tablets, I didn’t think about them whatsoever. I was too distracted by my surroundings. I did have one night in Hong Kong where I drank a copious amount of vodka and met an adorable man from New York. Say no more (well, we were on a break). After 18 months of anarchy and destruction, I’d found an inner serenity I didn’t know existed. I’d finally come to terms with our loss- it was time to try and move on in earnest.



I think looking back we would both admit the relationship should’ve ended there. But it didn’t: he met me at the airport; we resolved our differences and both agreed to put the tablets and the past behind us. For a long time it worked; we even went on holiday to the Far East together for Christmas and New Year, going to the places I’d visited during my stay earlier that year, places that aided me so much in my recovery.



But it wasn’t to be. A drunken argument on his part in front of my family (and at New Year his) brought back painful memories, yet we still continued in the pursuit of happiness. I knew it wasn’t right, my friends attempted to scream sense into me, but I am a hopeless romantic who was blinded by insecurity, love and loyalty. Ultimately, it wasn’t my choice. We had spent five years together, 18 months of which before I fell pregnant were incredibly happy times, but he ended it in January 2014.



A week later I found out I was pregnant.



Fast forward almost two years and I am blessed to have a beautiful and healthy one year old son, Vincent. He makes me forever proud and there’s not a day that goes by where I don’t feel fortunate to have him in my life. I’m also privileged to have met the most selfless, wonderful man, Adam. Together, they both make me strive to be the best person I can possibly be, to live every day looking on the brightest side with nothing but gratitude. 



I could never have imagined I’d be where I am right now: I’ve never been so optimistic about the future and I can’t wait to spent my life with my two men – and add to our little family one day. I am lucky to be surrounded by love and happiness and that’s something I will never take for granted. I wish Chris nothing but contentment and good health: he was a big chapter in my life but that is over now and it’s time to look to the future in earnest.



I pinch myself daily: although I will never forget about the angel I have over my shoulder, I know that Vincent is never alone at play time. I see him smiling and giggling into thin air, I know who’s with him. It’s not just me.



I’m glad that life does go on. The memories are never forgotten, but time does work wonders as a healer. You develop coping mechanisms. Without Vincent I would feel like something is missing: I feel like my calling in life has always been to be a mother- and a wife. Most of us girls do dream of our picture perfect ending- but realise that life isn’t always how Disney portrays it. 



After being suspended pending an investigation, Jake is back playing football for Hull City- he’s had a second chance and is grasping it with both hands. There are struggles, pain and loss. There’s no harm in admitting that and you’re not defined by how you deal with that. Sometimes to have a second chance at it, another shot, is more than you can ever dream of.



Life is not a fairytale – but we are always capable of finding our Happy Ever After.

2 comments:

Charlie Lambert said...

What a deeply moving, searingly honest piece of writing Emily. So sorry to hear everything you've gone through but you have found a huge amount of courage and clarity as well as the generosity to share your tough learning experience with us all. Best of luck to your family and all good wishes.

StevieAsk said...

Opening up to the world and writing about yourself is one of the hardest things to do.
You've said on your Twitter account that you've been overwhelmed by the response to your blog. It's because so many of us have gone through difficult times and can relate to your story. Some of us go down your path and some of us stay quiet and try to cope in other ways. Ultimately, it's about leaving the past behind without bitterness and moving on with life. That's a difficult, but very rewarding, thing to achieve.
It's been worth following you on Twitter to read this alone. x