Couvade syndrome

Even though scientists proved a few outliers had skewed the data, I’m attached to the myth that people who have been struck by lightning

are more likely to get struck again, and since it’s a good conversation starter, I share it matter-of-factly, similar to when my husband announced at

my baby shower that he was suffering from Couvade syndrome, and phones came flying out to google Couvade syndrome, and within minutes men

were nodding at each other now that they had a name for their ordeal, and once all the games were played and gifts unwrapped, my uncle presented

my husband with a slab of chocolate cake and a bow, and my husband kicked back in his chair and forked a piece into his mouth with gusto as my

toes swelled and deviled egg refluxed into my throat every time the baby kicked, but many years later I understand that my husband owning

his Couvade’s was a fine thing, a good thing, similar to my nighttime mantra, repeating You’re invincible, as if my stitched-up heart throbs like

Popeye’s bicep jacked on cans of spinach, but when a wicked wind comes through the window like a train, it’s time to kill the belief that once you’re

struck, your doomed to be struck again, doomed to run barefoot across a field of ozone, arms out like antennae, because the stories we tell ourselves

are not the stories we tell others, the stories we tell ourselves are forked and hot, turning the night sky violet, and when that wicked wind snaps

saplings at the neck, it’s easy to believe there is shelter beneath the biggest tree, but that’s a lie, similar to the tale that to resuscitate with your soft

mouth a heart struck into stopping will stop yours too, as if standing by dumbly watching lips blanch blue is an act of self-preservation rather than

a senseless tragedy, that what’s true is to drop to your knees and play god.