You Knew.
The Conversation I Didn’t Have With My “Mother-In-Law”
The Paphos sun was slowly descending into the Mediterranean when this lithe willow of a woman with the fiercest, watchful eyes, alight with intensity, announced her unremitting disinterest in infants. Not her own; but the squat, mute, potato-headed goblins that were thrust upon her in passing. She was utterly bemused as to why any person should derive pleasure from the babble and squeak of some pre-ambulatory gremlin that was not birthed from their own passion and toil. She was also an educator; a successful and respected teacher.
The subject of children had arisen between my then-partner and I only twice before. Once, during idolization, where we lavished in a hot bath together and he assured me that I would be a wonderful mother should I find the right person to support my needs. Another, mid-discard, when he accused me pointedly of desperately attempting to tie him down to domesticity. Much like a soap opera Christmas special, there seemed to be some underhanded scheme where I was systematically endearing him to me in order to steal his seed and spring forth a sprogglet!
…I couldn’t contemplate bringing a child into the world, and that riding off into the sunset with him was something I couldn’t imagine because I had no idea what that would look like.
The thought had occurred to me in a prior relationship that this was the path I should be striving towards. In fact, it was the driving force behind my mental health recovery when I turned 23; white picket fence, round belly, stable brain.
Interestingly enough, the bath scene had me blaming my well managed Borderline Personality Disorder and resulting Chronic Fatigue Syndrome for my lack of enthusiasm for a family. In truth, I was aware that having a baby was unlikely. At the time I understood that, that which could go wrong with the female reproductive system, was already going wrong. I was diagnosed with polycystic ovary syndrome, undersized ovaries (a sign of Primary Ovarian Insufficiency) and endometriosis. Come the mid-discard escapade, I was in the process of undergoing hormone tests to see if my body could muster the effort to even release an egg down the barbed wire that was my fallopian tubes.
I distinctly remember prostrating myself to my ex during the first of the two times he soberly broke up with me that I couldn’t contemplate bringing a child into the world, and that riding off into the sunset with him was something I couldn’t imagine because I had no idea what that would look like or even when that could possibly be. But that I needed him, wanted him, and that I loved him. That I wished he would listen to me. But to no avail as the war sirens were blaring and, clearly, he had found himself with one of “those women” whom would stop at nothing to reproduce and settle with this warrior, this specimen of human engineering, and that he did not love me and never had. This was not the time to bare my bare womb to him. There never would be a time.
I was tumbling head long into my early 30’s with little integrity left; being an ineffectual baby-making factory was just too much of an additional embarrassment.
I now regard the fleeting conversation I had with this woman concerning my reproducing with her abusive son, taking place a few months after his first discard, with a higher level of scrutiny on my part than ever before.
“We don’t want children.”
We both said it. As though she had accused us of something abhorrent. Reassuring her that between my stressful work experience that effectively ended my interest in a child-facing role in the education sector, my unbiquitous mental health excuse, and his disputed admission that he was lacking in paternal instinct, we were in no way wishing to bring a child into the world together.
I had little idea of a continuing career, and my carefully curated sanity was on the brink of destruction at the hands of the person who shared the same words that had just come out of my own mouth. I was tumbling head long into my early 30’s with little integrity left; being an ineffectual baby-making machine was just too much of an additional embarrassment.
We had just regained stable ground, he was in love with me again, we were enjoying a veritable honeymoon period; who was I to tarnish it by announcing that I had spent a portion of our break-up (between suicidal ideations staring at the curtain, veritable homelessness, psychologist offices for presumed PTSD, the gym, and a questionable hook-up) popping in and out of the fertility clinic to determine exactly how sterile I really was.
By the time this midsummer baby-banter reared it’s head it was becoming increasingly clear that I was pretty damn spartan in the ways of sprogglet production. I had already contemplated and veto’d IVF (pointless due to the risk to myself and the disastrously low success rate rendering it financial suicide), and surrogacy (high risk of triggering an ongoing BPD episode and major depression rendering it actual suicide). I was now in the process of balancing the pro’s and con’s of adoption (Veto’d. Objectively, if I am going to risk screwing any child up profoundly for the rest of their life, that child will come from my own blood, sweat and tears). I am a pro-choice kinda gal; this was a situation with many choices. And they were all mine regardless of whether it was with a man with more anger issues than hairs on his head. And none of them were a substitute for carrying my own child.
So I was not lying when I said it:
Do not want a child. Out of all the options available, including your son, I do not want a child.
A year later, the relationship was ended. During the final discard, the same accusation that I was, somehow, going to trap my ex-partner through pregnancy came down on me like a hammer. The final nail in coffin that was my womb came regardless of how measured that blow was; There was only a 2% chance that I would ever naturally conceive. The likelihood of implantation was even less and that was with IVF and hormone injections. Two months later, I learned that carrying to term would be a near medical marvel due to my progesterone levels. All other options still remaining indefinitely veto’d. I felt the blow with all it’s force; squashing whatever sense of purpose I had built throughout learning to manage my mental health, what ever sense of “god-given” womanhood I had held onto throughout the idolization and disguard of my ex-partner. I grieved for my lack of choice in the matter. Because I too, did not really take much joy in children anymore. I too had lost the interest in the babble and cooing of a passing pre-ambulatory gremlin beyond acknowledging that “yes…that’s a big eyed baby, that is”.
I think back to the conversation with this woman; This woman whom blithely commented on a dislike for a circumstance that I would never transpire by my doing. This woman whom, I honestly believe, may have delivered a cutting but never a careless word in anyones memory.
This woman whom almost brought a small measure of volume to my own suffering across the two-point-five years I spent with her son. This woman dedicating her life to steadfast motherhood, womanhood, learning, and teaching. When I see her as this woman, who produced and taught a man so complex, there is a realm of possibility and, perhaps, another modicum of hope in one aspect of my future.
Whether by product or design, she is the proud mother of four remarkable people. And I do include my ex-partner in that number. Though, like myself, now resolutely aloof at the though of dribbley and titchy toes of infants, she unabashedly strives, and succeeds in, changing the lives of others through her own particular application of maternal instinct that is resolutely impartial, driven to do that which any parent should strive to do; To see. To do. To teach. However. Wherever. Whomever.
It is the measure of a mother. But, also, the measure of a woman.
If all I have is that skill, with none of the equipment, I surely still measure up.
