In this excerpt of her forthcoming book, Splinters: Another Kind of Love Story, Leslie Jamison recounts the early months of her daughter’s life. During that period, Jamison juggled a book tour, a teaching career, and the demands of a newborn—amid the growing realization that she wanted to leave her marriage.
Because I could not hurl myself constantly into work and trips and teaching and deadlines, I had to look more closely at the life I’d built: this husband, this marriage. It was impossible to ignore my daily desire to leave—to wander the cold streets of our neighborhood with our baby, making ceaseless, ever-widening loops away from home.
Every day that fall, I asked myself some permutation of the same questions. Did honoring my vows mean figuring out how to make a home with C’s anger? What did I owe his pain? What did I owe my daughter? When I told myself she would get better versions of both her parents if we did not live together, was I simply telling myself a story that would justify the choice I already wanted to make?
During a conversation years earlier, when I was already unhappy enough to consider leaving, I told my friend Harriet that I was worried about the harm I would cause if I left. She told me I was right to worry. I would cause harm. She also told me no one moves through this world without causing harm. I’d wanted her to say, Don’t be crazy! You won’t cause any harm! Or, at least, You’re in so much pain, you deserve to cause harm!
But she hadn’t said either of those things. What she said instead was neither condemnation nor absolution. It was just this: You have to claim responsibility for the harm you cause. You have to believe it’s necessary.
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