when anne sexton said i’m proud of you and I’m with you and you’re really here with me
...i felt that
i never really thought about getting married but my thoughts always swirled about having a kid. i never fantasized about a wedding - my wedding. the dress, the cake, the flowers, walking down the aisle - veil floating in the wind- i never really daydreamed about any of it. i imagined that maybe marriage would happen for me but if it didn’t, that was okay.
i got pregnant when i was 23 with someone i was convincing myself i was still in love with. i tried convincing myself i was still in love with him for 2 of the 3 years we were together - i tried telling myself that i had to make this work because what was left if i didn’t? the thought of packing my belongings and asking my mom for help to come back home seemed too humiliating and i had too much pride. but none of it would have mattered because heartbreak was already looming over me like a huge raincloud and there was nowhere to really escape it. heartbreak is seeing the two stark lines on the test that is screaming you are pregnant! you are pregnant! heartbreak is walking out of the bathroom to find your boyfriend sitting on the edge of the bed, white as a sheet. heartbreak is crying your eyes out of horror and a twisted sense of happiness. you wonder if there is a ingrained biological reason you feel a tinge of happiness when you should not be happy at all. you can barely speak but you manage to say, ‘pregnant. me!’. heartbreak is texting ethan out of panic, telling him you are pregnant. he tells you he cannot believe it. heartbreak is your boyfriend refusing to touch you when you need to be touched. i needed to be hugged, to be reassured because i was fucking terrified. i needed to hear a generic line that could be out of a stupid movie, 'it will be okay, we will figure it out’ even if neither of us are sure of what to do, neither of us are sure it will be okay.
i knew i wasn’t ready to be the mom that this child would deserve. i was 23 years old but i still felt like a child. i was trying to convince myself to be with someone i was no longer in love with, i didn’t get my oil changed on time, none of my bills were set to auto-pay, i was still getting to know who i was. i believed this was the only way to show love for future me and this child that didn’t even exist yet. two weeks later, i drive to the clinic. there are protestors standing outside. i cannot believe it but i am not surprised. the nurse draws my blood and says out loud, 'you are pregnant.’ she smiled weakly at me. heartbreak is signing papers saying if they fuck up your uterus, it isn’t their fault. my hand shakes as i sign these papers, wondering how i will ever explain this to my mom if they tear a hole through my fallopian tubes.
the doctor enters the room and tells you to scoot down. he takes an ultra sound and the way he presses onto your uterus, you get protective of the little clump of cells. i squirm. he presses down harder. “10 weeks, maybe 11 weeks”. you hear him say, 'we’re gonna get started’. heartbreak is when the nurse slips the needle into your arm, and as the room fades to black, the last thing you remember thinking is, 'my love for you was already infinite. you were a dream.’
jeremy and i used to talk about having kids. one date night, early in our relationship, we sat at a bar in the mission and i looped him into a daydream of what our future kids would be like. i remember him saying we would have to have dinner as a family every night - there would be no exceptions. i remember how my heart swelled at hearing this and in my mind, i could picture it. the daydream that used to just be me and my imaginary child living in a small flat now included jeremy. eventually these conversations happened less and less and we came to the understanding that children wouldn’t be in our future. sometimes i would ask jeremy when he becomes an old man, would he would regret not having kids, if he would get bored of just a life of us and a couple dogs. he always seemed so sure of his answer, never a twinge of hesitancy in his response. it was always a resounding: no. i wondered why i couldn’t be as confident. now i understand why.
when we move into the house in berkeley, the neighbors introduce themselves to us and they ask if we have children. when we shake our heads - they ask if and when there will be children. there is a smug part of me that answers with: no, we don’t and no, there won’t be! i wonder why i answer with an air of smugness when i am asked these questions by women that are older than me.
“there is something threatening about a woman who is not occupied with children. there is something at-loose-ends feeling about such a woman. what is she going to do instead? what sort of trouble will she make?” - sheila heti
but the truth is, sometimes i think about what would have happened if i kept on with the pregnancy when i was 23 years old. what kind of mom would i be? i’ve been thinking a lot about motherhood lately. i’ve been thinking a lot about who will remember me when i no longer exist in this world and there’s a part of me that is selfishly sad no one will take care in remembering me and how i looked like when i was young and no one will look in the mirror and feel proud we have similar widow’s peaks or remember how i only keep my hair up with a single chopstick. i’ve been thinking about who will look at photos of younger me and think i was beautiful and wonder about me - to really wonder about me and make up stories in their head about what i was like when i was young. because i think about my mom and how i love looking at photos of younger her. i look at these photos and think about how much magic she held in her smile and i wonder what her favorite food was at that age, what she thought about, what made her sad, who she was in love with, what music she listened to.
and i know that when i’m an old lady with age spots and wrinkly hands, i’ll remember her and all her little things- the good and bad- forever- like her freckles, how she used to make us pancakes and try to shape them into mickey mouse ears, how she used to pack us food to take back to our own homes, how she liked carnations, how orange-red lipstick looked the best on her and how she would cry any time she retold a story about love. i’ll always remember.
lately, i’ve been thinking about if i were to have a daughter- what I would tell her. the things i would want her to know. what I would teach her, how I could ever possibly express how much her existence means to me. if there are enough words i could say for her to know how much i love her. i know i would hurt her, i know i will hurt her - no matter how hard i try my best not to. i know i will hurt her unintentionally. i know i will hurt her with the lessons i want her to learn, i will stress the lessons i learned too late so she doesn't have to learn them the hard way. i know i will pretend to know things i’m not quite sure of. i’ll ask myself, 'why are you pretending?' as her face stares blankly at me. i know i will embarrass myself and more so, her. i know i will say something about her hair. maybe her make up. an off-handed remark not meant to do harm. and maybe i’ll catch it too late while she caught it too early. maybe she will shout at me out of hurt and embarrassment, curse and lock herself in the bathroom or whichever room has a lock. i'll knock on the door. coaxing her out with apologies and the promise of a bowl of ice cream. maybe a homemade slice of chocolate cake as a sorry, as an i love you, as a forgive me- i made this with love. maybe she will accept. maybe she won't.
for years, i told myself i no longer wanted a child but the truth is: i still dream of it and i wonder. i wonder and i wonder and i wonder.
it could be a dream.