Although the constant fear that someone was going to hurt her son did not feel normal for Joan, she could justify it to herself.

Transcript

Interviewer: Was it always present? Like was it a constant thing for you?

Yeah, the fear of like that someone was going to take him, the fear that somebody was going to try and take him and hurt him was the entire time. Like I’d go to the mall and I was paranoid. Like, I was constantly looking over my shoulder. I’d go outside to the park, and if it was just two of us in the park, if somebody would come into the park I would pack up and leave. Like, I started even thinking that my husband – like I thought that everybody was going to do something horrible to my kid. If it wasn’t me watching him, someone was going to do something horrible to my son.

And I knew, like I knew that it wasn’t normal, but again, I could justify it to myself. I worked in a hostile environment. I worked with people who I’m sure have done fucked up shit to kids. Like, I worked with criminals. Like, so I don’t know if that is also what made it worse, because I know that not everybody in society is good, but it was bad.

And then one of the girls that I became really good friends with, she’s another mom and she actually was my only mom friend at that time that had a baby the same age as me. I remember in passing, we were in the mall and I kind of said “Yeah, like I’m so terrified that someone’s going to take him. Like I’m really terrified that someone’s going to hurt him or do something, and I put a bat in our room.” And she’s like “Yeah you know like…” And she said it very casually. She’s so sweet, like “You know like that can be kind of like postpartum.” And I’m like “Really?” And so at that point I was like ‘Oh shit. Okay, if somebody else is saying that this is not normal then it’s definitely not normal.’ But at that time I had not told my husband anything still.

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