Not Enough: Part 3
By Arianwen P.F. Everett
Upon returning to her home, Regina collapsed onto her couch and pulled out her tablet, pleasantly surprised to discover that her attorney had already located four candidates to adopt the baby. Just as she started sifting through all the information, a sudden knocking at the front door startled her. Sighing, she put down the tablet, ready to do battle with whoever was on the other side.
"Regina! Boy, am I glad to have found you? After you left the hospital without telling anyone, well, everyone's been worried sick trying to find you!" Archie puffed, trying to express his relief.
"Why, did Jake's hands fall off rendering him unable to hold a bottle?" Regina asked, sarcasm dripping from lips like bitter honey.
Archie sighed at the defensive posture his sometime patient held and decided to try another approach. "Regina… I know these last few days have been quite a shock.."
"I wish they had been, but no, deep down I knew something would eventually come along and ruin everything I've been working for these past few years. The birth was a shock. The outcome was expected," Regina explained wearily. She was tired, so tired. All she wanted was to take a nap, to rest before heading back to the hospital and all the accusations.
"And you think by putting the baby up for adoption everything will return to what it was before you went into labor?" Archie questioned, trying to get her to talk to him. While this wasn't a session, he knew he couldn't force her back to the hospital. Even Whale's concerns about the slight elevation in her blood pressure and the danger that could present would likely be ineffective. The woman was stubborn. It was a trait that had imbued her with the strength to survive her nightmare of a life before the curse and the pain of her son's abandonment of her afterwards, but it also possessed an equal downside as well.
"Unfortunately the damage is already done and irreversible. The adoption will merely limit the chaos and give me room to pick up the pieces moving forward. Tomorrow is another day and all that," Regina replied dryly.
"Regina, how do you feel about the baby… not the birth or Jacob or anything that followed, just the baby himself?" Archie asked gently and precisely, knowing he had to tread with care. Her resentment of the child's intrusion was very clear, but Archie was worried that she wasn't looking clearly at the situation and would end up regretting her decision.
"He's a baby. He's cute. He's loud. There's nothing wrong with him per se. He just doesn't strike me as anything special, certainly nothing that I'd be willing to invest the next two decades of my life protecting and raising. But the thing is, I know in my gut that there's somebody out there who will find him more than worthy, somebody who will see him as the best thing that ever happened to her, and I want the two of them to be together! I don't see why that's so wrong," Regina defended, her face lightening as she thought about how Henry made her feel every time he hugged her or called her mom.
"Wanting the happiness of others is never wrong, Regina. But did it ever occur to you that perhaps Jake is the person you've just described, the somebody who will love that baby as you want him loved?" Archie offered, looking at Regina earnestly.
"Look, I don't doubt that Jake could love the baby enough. He's a wonderful man and he'd make a great father. If it were possible for Jake to leave Storybrooke, I'd offer him a generous child support package and maybe even buy him and the baby a home of their own if I could manage it without cutting too deeply into Henry's inheritance. But Jake's brothers and sister are here and they need him whole, so he won't leave. Growing up in this town would cause that child nothing but pain; that I can't allow," Regina insisted, her eyes darkening with determination.
"You raised Henry in Storybrooke and he turned out fine," Archie argued, not understanding how raising the baby in Storybrooke would damage him.
"The curse allowed Henry to grow up free from magic. And as much as Henry reveres his fairytale-heroes-come-to-life, my boy's smart enough to have already figured out that magic ruins everything. That's why he wanted to blow up the well a few years back. He wanted the magic gone, begged me to end it, but I couldn't. Once magic saturates a place, it can't be taken back," Regina sighed, her ever present worry over Henry's future temporarily displacing her more recent troubles for a moment.
"So you fear that magic will corrupt the baby as he grows up?" Archie asked, believing he now understood his patient's plight.
"Yes. My magic is inherently strong, as was my mothers. I've already sensed his magic when I tried to feed him last night and again this morning. At the moment he has less control over it than he does his fingers and toes, but in time I'm sure Rumple will be happy to instruct him just like he taught my mother and myself," Regina chuckled at the look of dread on the therapist's face. At least he was starting to understand.
"You don't think you could help him be better even with magic?" Archie queried, confused by the woman's confidence that Rumplestiltskin would turn her child into a monster and the lack of concern the idea engendered.
"If I cared to do so, of course I could, but I don't. I'm merely explaining why allowing Jake to raise the baby by himself, or at least with his siblings, would make everyone feel good at the moment but ultimately be a bad idea. They can't protect him from magic the way I can and I have no desire to take on that responsibility for a child I don't even love. Raising a child, particularly in the first two years, is really hard! Everyone forgets that I've been through it before and I'm not willing to do it again, at least not for Jake's child. Anyway, I have to return to the hospital. I promised to do so in the note I left, and the fact that you're here means that despite my missive the idiots have everyone on the look out. They've probably gotten Henry upset and I can't bear the thought of him worrying about me," Regina explained as she stood up with a slight wince, her body not yet healed from the birth the day before.
Helping her put on her coat, Archie considered his next words. He didn't know exactly what to say. He feared she was suffering from postpartum depression and if she went through with the adoption, she'd end up regretting it. But he couldn't force her to take the baby home. If there was one thing he knew about Regina she would not suffer anyone who tried to control her. "As a favor, I'd like to ask you to speak with Dr. Whale and endure one more exam before you leave the hospital."
"Why? I already told…"
"I know. I know. But I think you might be suffering from postpartum depression and I'd like to ensure that's not the case. Whale can do the test from your hospital bed. It's just a survey and a few questions…"
"Oh for god's sake, I'm not depressed! If anything, I'm numb. All the pain I usually feel from day to day is gone and without having to resort to magic! I haven't felt this proactive and in control since that blonde tramp came to town, stole my son, and broke my curse!" Regina shouted, rolling her eyes at the way the redheaded therapist hedged his accusations.
"Regina, listen to me; feeling 'numb' is a sign of postpartum depression. So is wanting to avoid the responsibility of motherhood by giving the baby away. So is resentment towards the baby's father. So is having trouble bonding with the infant. Regina, I know you'd prefer to be numb, considering all the pain you've dealt with in your life, but if this is postpartum depression, the numbness won't last. Your brain chemistry will eventually go back to normal and you'll have the added burden of having given away your baby. You're showing far too many symptoms to merely write it off without an examination," Archie Hopper insisted, standing up with the weight of his profession behind him.
Regina ran a hand through her hair and took a deep breath. "Just hypothetically, if I were to have postpartum depression, what would treatment look like?"
"We usually start with anti-anxiety medication and antidepressants, followed up with both weekly therapy sessions and monitoring at well baby check ups. In short, Whale and I would have to coordinate treatment," Archie detailed, wanting to be completely upfront with his patient, unlike so many trusted advisors before him.
"Whoa, wait a minute! There are not going to be any well baby visits, at least not with me. I have an old family retainer from our land who's still willing to work for me from time to time and I've already arranged for her to move into my guest room and keep the baby out of my way while I search for the right adoptive family. I need to sleep well and put all my energy into the search and to be honest, I don't want to risk getting too attached," Regina explained, keeping her voice firm.
"One of the goals of this therapy is to get you attached, to get you to connect to the baby. Regina, you gave birth to another human being! You can't just run from that! Even if you do choose to give him up in the end, you have to make peace with him and your decision or else it will haunt you for the rest of your life!" Archie implored, needing his patient to see the hard work ahead.
Regina opened her front door and led the two outside into the dwindling sunlight. "You know as well as I do, I'm already haunted for the rest of my life. I tried letting go of Daniel but it didn't take. I may no longer have hope that we'll be reunited in this life, but he's still the only man I could ever love. There's no room for in my heart for this baby because he isn't Daniel's and will never be. The only peace I can make with him is in giving him a loving home away from the perversion of magic. That's what Daniel would want me to do."
As he climbed into the passenger's seat of Regina's Mercedes, Archibald Hopper sat stunned, not at her final words but at the hopelessness in her voice. While he knew that if Whale concurred with his diagnosis she'd be in treatment soon, all his hopes for a positive resolution for everyone vanished.
He'd spoken with Jake and Henry at the hospital when they and Emma had asked his help in searching for Regina and from the body language of the man as clung to his newborn son, Archie had no doubt he was bonding strongly, as was Henry from the way his index finger stroked the infant's tiny feet in an attempt to calm his own nerves by projecting his distress onto his 'brother' who merely slept peacefully in his father's arms. While she might acquiesce to treatment for the sake of her own health, there was no way she was going to break down and keep the baby. Her reasoning didn't stem from recent hormones but long term pain. That couldn't be dealt with quickly enough to effect the outcome. Either Jacob was going to be talked into breaking his own heart, or a battle of wills was brewing, one that would indeed rip Regina's life apart.