Deer in the Rearview

In the weeks after my (ex) husband left me, I grasped desperately for answers and comfort in between phone calls to divorce attorneys, applications for financial assistance, trips to and from daycare and the park, sporadic interviews, and cleaning sprees focused on taking down every photo and memoir in the house that we had taken and/or collected in our ten years together. But in times of despair or crisis, it always seems that distractions and answers are unsatisfyingly few and far between, and comfort is hard to come by. “It gets easier” was the standby mantra for all of the people who loved me and were as befuddled and frustrated by my situation as I was. It would get easier, but no one could tell me how, why or when, and I got to the point that I wanted to kick anyone in the teeth that patted my back and promised me that someday it wouldn’t suck so much.

Unemployed, scared, broken and lost…and no one could say anything that made an inkling of a difference. So it came as a complete surprise one day that some of the soundest advice (EVER!) came to me from a complete stranger with a Memphis drawl.

In the late morning of one of my ordinary days, I set out to tackle the next item on my Divorce To Do List: finding health insurance for myself. I was, at the time, unemployed, and though I knew that I would qualify for COBRA if my ex chose to suddenly drop me from his plan, I could not afford it. I could barely afford to feed myself. So I begrudgingly picked up the phone and called our insurance provider to see if I could quality for an individual insurance plan. The customer service rep expressed confusion as to why I was seeking a private plan when his records showed that I was presently covered on my spouse’s policy. With a sigh, I gave him the Reader’s Digest version of what was going on, and I told him that I was worried that my pending ex-husband would drop me from his insurance without telling me, leaving me in a financial pickle. The moment I finished explaining myself, I balked, deciding that I was being paranoid. My ex was not a vindictive person. He wouldn’t do that to me. I was letting people’s words and advice get to me. I apologized to the man for wasting his time and tried to segue into ending the call, but he stopped me.

“Can I give you a little bit of advice from a stranger who has walked a similar mile in similar shoes?”

I snorted. “Are you going to tell me that it’ll get easier?”

He laughed. “No, I won’t say that, although I can promise you that it will. What I will tell you to do is to think of yourself as a deer in the rearview,” he said.

“A deer in the headlights?”

“No, ma’am. A deer in the rearview.”

I was intrigued. “Go on.”

He continued, (and I will attempt to quote him as best I can from memory and my journal entries) “Say you’re driving down a rural highway to a party that you’ve been anticipating all year. You’re all dressed up and excited to meet someone and make connections that may or may not change your life or bring you happiness. You look down at your radio dial for a minute, and when you look back up, there’s a deer standing in your path, and it’s too late for you to stop. You hit that poor deer hard enough to know that there won’t be anything you can do to save her. You tap the brakes for a moment, scared and sad. But after a moment, you realize that that you’re running late for the party and all of its possibilities, so you accelerate again. You know that you’ve likely ended that deer’s life, and you know that perhaps that deer’s babies are waiting in the woods for their mommy to come home, but you keep accelerating toward your party. You keep glancing in your rearview at that lifeless deer in the road, and you feel horrible, but the further away you get, the smaller the deer appears. The closer you get to the party, the more you forget about that deer. Eventually you no longer see that dear in your rearview, you get to the party, go on with your life, and with time, you don’t even think about that deer unless someone brings it up in conversation or you drive past where you hit it, and even then you don’t think about it too hard. Miss, YOU are that deer in the rearview. Right now your husband feels guilty enough to do the right thing, but as you become smaller in his rearview mirror, it will matter less and less to him whether or not you’re hurt, let alone provided for. You’re right to look out for yourself. Divorce in itself is rooted in selfishness. Don’t ever give anyone more credit than they deserve.”

Whoa. I was stunned. It wasn’t warm or fuzzy, it wasn’t inspirational…it was raw, honest, and by gosh, it was TRUE. I WAS the deer in the rearview, struggling to stand up again, with my babies waiting in the woods for their mommy to get it together and come back to Earth. And my ex was speeding toward the party, looking at new possibilities and putting as much space between himself and his old life as possible. He hoped he hadn’t destroyed me, but he wasn’t going to slow down enough to care whether or not he had.

That, friends, is the story of so many of our lives. We are struck, and we stand up, sometimes only to be struck again. Not everyone will look into that rearview and give you a second thought. A rare few will tap the brakes or stop to assess the damage. Even fewer will stop, get out, and help you to your feet. Nearly no one will stick around to see or celebrate your recovery. So why get up? For me, it’s because of those babies waiting in the woods. Not only do they need me to come home, but they need to see that, no matter how many partygoers mow their mommy down, their mommy gets up and tries again. Then maybe one day when they’re old enough to walk in the road on their own, they’ll be able to spot and stay clear of the bad drivers, or at the very least know that they can still stand up and keep going even when they’re struck down…Figuratively, of course.

I am pleased to tell you that my initial fears were unwarranted. My ex-husband kept me on his insurance until I (thank God) got a job and insurance of my own. He never asked me for a dime in return. But I don’t regret a single second I spent on the phone with that stranger. Whether he meant to or not, he motivated me to be a stronger deer rather than someone’s roadkill.

…And if that ain’t warm and fuzzy, I don’t know what is.