Smart Aleck Persin

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I am writing this post the only way I know how; from my perspective, from my heart, and with a stiff glass of whiskey in my hand.

I am writing this post because we’ve built this beautiful community around the love we share for our family, especially our commitment to Aleck. When we lost our baby girl 12 years ago, when I had to labor and deliver her five-pound dead body into this world only days after posting a photo of my pregnant stomach decorated in a White Sox logo, when I had to announce then our great loss to the world, we knew we had no choice but to live out loud, to share our struggles with our community. And when our son, Aleck, was born with a rare disease we were once again spilling our story to our world and we were rewarded greatly with your messages, your words of encouragement, home-cooked meals, gift cards, resources, an adaptive bike, and during the darkest hour a large donation to keep our lights on.

I am writing this post because I feel a responsibility to share the latest and maybe the greatest struggle our family has been facing. It’s outside of hospitals, it doesn’t involve doctors, but the pain has been real.

In 2019 I hit a point in my life where everything seemed like it was exactly where I wanted it to be. Aleck was back on his feet and fully recovered from his 2018 surgery. My photo business was going strong and I even hired an intern to help take me to the next level. I was finally able to focus on myself for the first time since 2009 and to celebrate I brought myself back to the gym, back to the physically active person I had been before going through the exhausting process of starting, failing, and then finally building my family. I looked around at my friends who surrounded me with their encouragement and love. I looked at Aleck who was, and still is, thriving in school and with his friends. I had made as much peace as I could that he would be an only child. I looked in the mirror and I finally saw the reflection of myself as I wanted it to be, as it had been so many years before, staring back at me. But with all of that, when I looked in that mirror I saw a woman who wasn’t happy.

That’s when I knew a major change had to happen in my life. That’s when I knew that this future that was laid out for me at that moment wasn’t going to sustain me. That’s when I knew that something big had to change and it was going to be one of the hardest decisions I’d ever make in my life. That’s when I knew that my marriage was ending.

So we did everything a couple does when they know the end is near. Weekend getaways, couples counseling, date nights, more intimacy, but with each step we took to bring us closer I only felt farther and farther apart. Each attempt to save our relationship, save our marriage, felt like another step toward the end. In February 2020, I knew it was over.

But then March of 2020 hit and before we knew it there was a bigger crisis and my own crisis of faith would have to wait. At first, I felt lucky that Craig and I were still together. Remote learning was the WORST FRIED CHICKEN any parent has ever had to deal with, and I couldn’t do it on my own. I wouldn’t want to have been stuck inside, scared of the world, of the germs, of people dying, without a partner. I wouldn’t have wanted to cook three meals a day for over a year without someone’s help. My heart truly felt for my single friends, who had previously filled their lives with travel, friends, fun, and careers, to now be stuck inside all by themselves. At least, that’s how I felt for the first 6 months.

In February of 2021, Craig and I decided to separate. He would be moving out that June. This would give him time to find a job, to pack his stuff, to secure an apartment. Thankfully, I had also taken a job working for my friend Debbie’s family as a nanny, since Deb had passed away from cancer that December, and her husband needed someone to take her seven-year-old daughter through remote learning, give her lunch, and play with her during the long months while he prepared to move them back to his home country of Australia. I can’t imagine what life would have been like if Craig and I had been stuck in our apartment together seven days a week after having made this life-altering decision.

In June of 2021, Craig moved out just as the world opened up again and I started working full-time again after over a year. It was a total shock to the system for all of us. I spent that first year trying to figure out how to simply live in this new life, how to keep up with my jobs, how to be a single mom, and then how to be alone when Aleck and our dog Sox, left for Craig’s apartment. Craig moved about 8 blocks east of me, so the logistics of handing off have been easy but the feelings that go with it haven’t. My heart breaks and my soul feels empty every time Aleck leaves my home. He’s been my compass since the day he was born, and every direction I’ve taken up until this point has been because of him.

It has now been a year and four months since Craig and I started living separate lives. Our divorce isn’t final yet, but we’ve managed to struggle through a lot of paperwork so far. We didn’t have much to begin with so there really isn’t much to argue about, and we don’t have tremendous animosity towards each other, just working through the new boundaries this next chapter in our relationship brings. After all, we are still Aleck’s parents and are still as committed as ever to co-parenting Aleck the way we’ve always done, with his best interests at the top of our list. But now the rings have been put away, we are exploring life as single people, and trying to redefine ourselves through all of this change. Someone who knows me recently met Craig for the first time and commented on how we have the same mannerisms. She asked me how long we had been married, I answered it had been 17 years before our separation. With a knowing look, she sighed and said, “two became one.” And with my own deep sigh, I agreed. We had become one, we had quite a run, we had a long and successful marriage, and now I can only hope that we both find the happiness we seek.

Through all of this Aleck is a champ. While we experimented with schedules and handoff policies, as we tried to set up our boundaries for one another or figure out where to show up as a family and where to go our separate ways, he’s put up with it all. We had him in with a school counselor he trusted after we made the decision to separate, though we didn’t tell him until the end of May 2021, and she stayed with him through that June, until school ended. Then we transitioned to a child psychologist to continue to give him a safe space to express his feelings and any frustrations he might have with this new way of life. But if we know one thing about Aleck it’s how resilient he is, how much he’s gone through over the years, how many times we’ve rocked his world, ruined his summer, and has had to roll back into a classroom instead of walking back. He’s made of tough stuff and his psychologist discharged him last spring, he had made the adjustment to this new life without any obvious complications. Of course, these things can come in waves and who knows how he might act out as he gets older. I’m sure he’ll be in therapy as an adult, hell, we all should be if we aren’t.