#also my annoying nephew lie agenda stays strong

[milkyberryjsk]

i made so many of these (more in rb!)

[stars-forever-dwell-blog1]

The Questions of Procreation and Continual Self-Creation

When I was seventeen and I thought about my future, I always would breezily reply to the question of children that yes, I definitely wanted them one day. I considered myself a very nurturing person, and I was at the time. The trouble was, I didn’t know how to channel my nurturing instincts in healthy ways, so instead I drew in a string of lost boys looking for their Wendy, and I was only too happy to play the part. Until, of course, true to their natures, they cast me aside with nary a backwards glance when I proved to be less magical, less perfect, than they initially imagined. “And thus it will go on, so long as children are gay and innocent and heartless.” And I, being a self proclaimed Wendy, a total Manic Pixie Dream Girl, couldn’t admit how much it hurt, or how draining it was. Until I couldn’t handle it anymore, and was forced to actually think about my own health and balance. And believe me, I refused to for as long as I could hold out. Because one of the gifts of womanhood is mothering, and mothers are selfless, yet are powerful and filled with joy and love at the same time. Uh huh. So me being me, I ran with this idea until I ran myself into the ground. I really had no idea what being a mother actually meant in the first place.

So after this highly dramatic and nauseating stage of my life, when I was around twenty two, I decided on just a grandiose scale that I did not, in fact, ever want kids. And that was that.

I’m thirty two now, and this subject has been on my mind a lot lately. My boyfriend (as of recently fiance) wants “kids.” Not necessarily multiple tiny humans, but the idea of kids. Most likely one.

And my sister has twin boys who are two and a half, and they have definitely made me question my decision a lot. Namely because I adore them to the moon and beyond.

Now, I am not a “baby person.” When I’m at the grocery store and some kid is screaming because they want whatever crappy toy is all bright and shiny and conveniently located so as to illicit the very reaction they’re so loudly displaying, I get annoyed and go to a different aisle. When I see a kid with a snotty nose and sticky crap all over him or herself, all I feel is a mildly insane urge to giggle, because it’s not my problem. And when I see a woman walking around with a self satisfied sense of entitlement because she’s a mother and I’m not, or if she’s clearly expecting me to gush over how supposedly cute her baby, well. . .I think she need to get over herself. (I’m totally not saying that all women do this, but I’ve seen some who do). Being a woman isn’t defined by our choice to have children or not. It’s so much more than that, and my choice is just as valid as hers.

And yet, somehow, when my nephew Lumen is lying face down on the living room floor screaming at the top of his very admirable lungs because there are no more muffins for his snack, or his brother Cypress is squatting in the snow wailing because he’s cold and tired of walking because he’s getting over the flu (even though he was just wailing two minutes ago because he was tired of sitting in his stroller and wanted to walk, dammit), and my feet feel like they are slowly turning into blocks of ice, somehow my heart still manages to become, and remain, a very squishy pile of auntie-goo. Or it’s storytime / bedtime at the end of my fiance’s and my first day visiting for Christmas, and we haven’t had a chance to even look at each other all day because of Christmas and toddler insanity, and I’m about to quietly leave the nursery to go spend a few minutes talking with him before he passes out, when Lumen looks up from the book that my sister is reading to him  and his brother and says, “Auntie, stay,” I am literally powerless to do anything else. Or on the last morning of our visit when I tiptoe into the nursery to peek in on Lu and Cy before we leave, assuming they’re still asleep, and I discover that Cy is lying in his crib, just waking up and repeating my name over and over. And when he sees me all bundled up ready to leave, he demands, “Jacket off!” because he wants me to stay. . .well, I can’t even describe what this does to my heart. Like the Grinch, it grows three sizes.

So all this love and squishiness has really got me thinking. If I feel this way about my nephews. . .how would I feel about a baby of my own? And if I really, truly don’t want kids, then why is it that if you were to ask me how I would celebrate Christmas, Easter, Hallowe’en, teach my kid about spirituality and religion, what kind of schooling options I would want for them, what kind of care I would want during my pregnancy and afterward, what kind of diapers I would use, and if I would make my fiance wear one of those fake boob thingies so he could experience breastfeeding as closely as possible. . .would I have a very well thought out and researched answer for you?

Shit.

So, maybe I want a kid after all. The thought of it excites and terrifies me. Is this normal?

The terrified part is normal. I know. But maybe not for the reasons that I’m experiencing it.

I’m terrified for all the normal reasons, like wanting a safe world for my kid, but also because I just kind of always had it in the back of my head that my kid would view me the way I viewed my parents. Not good. We always had horrible relationships, and the only reason my mother and I get along now (relatively) is because I’ve chosen to just let go of waiting around for an apology, because I know I’m never going to get one. I’ve chosen to forgive her; not because what all she did is cool with me, but because walking around angry and bitter all the time was hurting me. And still, she doesn’t understand. And my dad’s passed away, so that’s somewhat irrelevant, at least for now.

So what if my kid became a teenager and just stopped respecting me, stopped giving a shit about anything I said, much in the same way I did with my parents? I guess it’s always a possibility. But there are things you can do to build a strong relationship based on trust and respect, can’t you? I think so. I never trusted my parents. They weren’t trustworthy. They didn’t really ever listen to me or understand me. They never sought to understand depression. Despite my total lack of regard for their so-called wisdom and authority, I still managed to stay in school, not have sex till I was 19, and never touch hard drugs – something that I feel very strongly about never doing. And yet somehow, my father – a trained, educated counselor – accused me once in my early twenties of being a drug addict. Because I was moody, unhappy, jumping from job to job, and “always broke.” I love how that was the conclusion he came to. I can think of ten different reasons for a twenty one year old to be experiencing all those things.

But I digress. I just would never want to be that kind of parent. So ridiculously out of touch and ignorant to what the fuck is going on with my kid. But I don’t think I would have to be. You don’t have to get old in your mind. You can stay awake, stay aware, ask questions, be humble. My parents read a million “child psychology” books before my sister and I were born, and figured they had all the answers.

Another thing this questioning as of late as thrown into perspective for me is my ridiculously cynical world-view. I realized that I basically have no hope for the human race.

I just look around and see all the bad shit going on in the world – the lack of care and respect for the earth, the animals, each other. The murders, the torture, the rape, the insanity. How people like David Suzuki have been patiently repeating themselves for decades, to no avail. And I ask myself, when will it all stop? When will people wake up? What is it going to take? How far gone does the earth have to be, how many species have to go extinct, how much war and pain does there have to be for the people “in power” to stop and say, “There has to be a better way than this.”

And so I don’t want to bring a child of mine into a world like this.

But I guess, maybe by raising children who are Good People is the way to change things? But I don’t believe in bringing a child into the world with my own agenda attached to him or her. I think parents need to let their kids be who they are – not try to mold them into whatever they want them to be. All I’ve wanted since I was two years old is to work with horses. I have a picture of myself in my aunt and uncle’s barn when I was a toddler, an oversize riding helmet on, sweeping the floor. It’s awesome. But my parents decided that “there’s no future in horses!” so they put my in piano lessons, swimming lessons, gymnastics, tap, ballet, jazz, and pretty much anything else you can think of. Like there’s a ton of money to be made in any of those professions? Not likely. So for my whole life I’ve had this burning inside me, this rock-solid determination that one day my horse dreams will come true! I don’t care if I’m fifty years old, it’s going to happen. Some people have told me it’s already too late, which seriously sucked. But I chose to ignore them and keep going. Because it’s all I’ve ever wanted. Nothing is going to stop me. (Not even a baby?)

But I digress again. Another fear is of losing myself. Because having a child is the most selfless thing you can do. As my sister says, “You’re never Number One again.” Because of my depression and sensitivity, I am high maintenance for myself. I have to spend a lot of energy every day making sure I am okay, in balance. I have to check in, have tea parties, sometimes lie down and spoon myself until I feel safe again.

And I write. Writing is what I do – even when I’m totally not doing it as much as I should be. Even when I’m playing hooky from writing, writing is what I do, who I am. And a big part of my process as a writer is sitting quietly and listening to what the stories have to tell me. If I don’t listen, if I try and force my own ideas onto the developing tapestry of the story, it doesn’t flow like it should, because it’s not true. Much like forcing a kid into ballet when they would rather be doing dressage. It doesn’t flow with the music of their soul. And if I lose my focus, my quiet time, my ability to listen. . .will I still be me?

I think some women are okay with losing themselves for their children. Or maybe they see having children and raising them as themselves. Much like I feel about riding and writing, it’s their calling, their homecoming. But I’m just not willing to give up the pieces of myself that I have worked fucking hard to have. My depression has made a lot of my life up until now suck. I have missed out on so many opportunities. I am in my early thirties and am just now starting to ride and fulfill my equestrian goals. I should be so much further than I am. But I’m not.

So. How do I balance it all, juggle it all? Is it even possible? To be a good mother and a good rider, a good writer? A happy person? A healthy person? A woman?