Finding Empathy

With Tasha at the Kite Festival on the Mall, spring 2010

The summer I earned my Bachelor’s degree, someone dear to me said words that cut to the core. They hurt, and I cried. A lot.

I shared the story with my close friend Tasha that autumn, and tears fell again.

But not just my tears.

The beauty of my friend’s empathy comforted me. She left the comfort of her own skin to live in mine for a moment, to feel what I felt.

It was healing.

I’ve felt sick to my stomach for friends before or even cried for their pain on occasion; I’ve tasted empathy. But now, empathy is the staple of my emotional diet. My heart seems to have stopped worrying about me and instead centers on a new set of flesh and bones: my son’s.

Luca's second bath. He loves baths now!

Luca cries when he is hungry if I take too long to start feeding him. He cries when he’s tired or uncomfortable, and he cries when he has gas. He cries when he wants to be held but I’ve tried to set him down. He cries sometimes when he’s just cranky, though usually that means he’s tired and can’t fall asleep.

These cries—the ones I can help fix—were tough to hear at first. For a while, my new-mama heart broke when they rose above a fuss. Now that our family of three has found something of a rhythm, those cries don’t bother me as much. Let’s face it: That little face contortion and high-pitched "WAAAA! WAAA!" are heartbreakingly adorable.

(Disclaimer: Luca is not a colicky baby; he soothes relatively easily for the most part. I’m not sure how mothers emotionally survive with infants who cry hours on end, and I’m sure they don’t think cries are cute.)

The other day I bounced a sleepy Luca in my arms and let him fuss while Joe and I cleared up a previous miscommunication. Luca fell asleep amidst our conversation.

But.

When the cries are real, I shatter.

Like the time I got stuck in traffic driving our stick shift and Luca woke up hungry. He was (and still is) too young to understand why I wouldn’t respond to his hunger, so his cries grew frantic. I felt helpless, and I felt with my son.

His cries triggered something primal in me: I must respond. I must protect.

Finally, I pulled into one of the restaurant-lined alleyways of Myeongdong—Seoul’s central shopping district—parked illegally at the first open curb, and got in the back to feed and soothe Luca.

And like yesterday after he got his two-month vaccinations.

It’s better than getting the actual diseases, I kept reminding myself.

Feeling him tense in pain at the needle and listening to his cries as I comforted him afterward were bad enough, but the real pain came later. About four hours later.

He was in a good mood that evening and had napped well when he suddenly started screaming. I’d never heard cries so awful and terrifying and sad.

Joe and I did what we could—changed his diaper, gave him Infant Tylenol—but there was no other way we could help, so I just held Luca close and comforted him the best I could as he screamed and cried. His red, sore little legs shook and shuddered. I took deep, relaxing breaths to try and help him calm down.

And I felt pain.

My tears joined his.

Joe later took him from me to help, and Luca eventually fell asleep on his shoulder.

Luca at 2 months old

I know in the scheme of things that shots aren’t a big deal and he has probably already forgotten (though his legs clearly still hurt, which is why I'm typing this with one hand while Luca naps on me). But I don’t have words to describe how I felt watching this beautiful creature’s pain, feeling his pain.

I realize I’ve never loved anyone in quite this way before.

I love my family and friends, and I feel so strongly about Joe—one of my classmates at Georgetown once told me I came up in conversation and the other person said, “That Mallie really loves her husband.”—but with Luca, it’s different.

I don’t mean I’ll cry or spoil Luca whenever he skins a knee or doesn’t get the toy he wants. I mean when there’s pain he doesn’t understand, something he or Joe or I can’t make right, I imagine I’ll just hold him and feel it right along with him.

Perhaps my heart will grow little calluses to steel itself from this depth of empathy, but this is not a pain in myself I will seek to fix.

Because I think this is what it means to be a mother.

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"When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. ... Jesus wept." John 11:33, 35