[TW for this post: pregnancy/having kids.]
Earlier this week, I read this tweet đ. Have you already seen it? Itâs been making the rounds on social media, at least in my neighborhood of the algorithm.
The timing was uncanny, because I came across it right around the same time I had an appointment related to having kiddos. More specifically, it was a fertility assessment, because that seems like the most appropriate way to pre-game your 36th birthday, donât you think? (If my dad was reading this, heâd most definitely tell me that this was entirely too much information to share with people on the internet, but luckily, he is not a subscriber. đ)
If you know me well personally/offline, you may know that for a very long time, I had assumed I couldnât have kids due to some health stuff. I also havenât really been confident I even wanted kids of my own, regardless, which â as that tweet so sweetly confirms â is a sentiment not everyone agrees with, and that a lot of people have loud, unsolicited opinions about. But despite what society would like us to believe, not every woman feels an automatic pull toward motherhood. Not every person instinctively wants to be a parent. For some of us, itâs murkier than that. Not an easy or definitive decision, and I can tell you firsthand that the added layer of cultural pressure sure doesnât help.
I have spent most of my life thus far without feeling any type of siren call to be a mom. It wasnât something that I knew deep down was my calling from the time I was little, nor thatâs been a make or break element of my future. I was not (am not) the person dying to hold a newborn baby or whoâs been able to relate when friends have said that being a mom was something they were meant to do, or that they couldnât wait to have kids. I donât think I ever thought to myself that I for sure did not want kids, but rather I just didnât really know, period. Didnât have a strong leaning either way, despite loving my best friendsâ kiddos and generally liking children well enough. (Heck, I taught in an elementary school for a year â I am not anti-kids.) And again, maybe this is because pregnancy was never something that seemed possible for me due to my own health stuff, but nevertheless it instead all feltâŠ. confusing. And, eventually, like a burden â this thing that I needed to hurry up and make a concrete decision on, since everyone else around me had already seemed to.
Having a baby doesnât seem like something to be lukewarm about, nor does it seem like something to do just because youâre nervous about being alone when youâre 80. (Or hey â maybe it is! I still donât know.) I was scared to make a decision, scared to choose the wrong path, and all the while not even sure if I could have kids (biologically speaking) regardless. Instead, I let fate and time take the wheel, which for a person like me, whoâs usually driven and goal-oriented, has felt very out of character and maybe even sort of lazy. I was just swimming in the what-ifs and the uncertainties, and maybe not totally sure what the real or ârightâ reason to have kids even is (for me) â especially lately in a world that has felt challenging, at best, these last few years.
And so, I have been sitting on the fence for a very, very long time, and to be honest, itâs a lonely place to be. Maybe youâre there too, and if you are, I get it. I see you. Iâm now at an age where most of the women in my life, including many of my closest friends, have kids, and those who donât at least know for sure if they do or donât want them. Itâs black and white to them. And sitting in the same grey zone/parking lot time and again has been little olâ me.
Thereâs been a lot of conversation about the childless/child-free millennial, but theyâve mostly been aimed at the people who know for certain they donât want kids, or who are pushing the timing out when it comes to pregnancy. That tweet â and the idea of being âcavalierâ about motherhood/parenthood â seems also aimed at the people whoâve made a decision, who know which door theyâre traveling through to their next chapter, and yet it feels extra sharp for those of us who have been stuck in the mud of it all. None of itâs related to being too cavalier, or to imagining a Peter Pan life of perpetual youth. Sometimes, we donât all want the same things, and you know what? Thatâs fine. In fact, itâs one of the best parts of being an adult â the chance to decide for yourself what works best for you, in your life, in your skin. Above all, some of us just need some more damn time. Maybe, even, weâve been thinking about the various versions or future scenarios of our future selves a whole lot. Have poured a lot of energy into trying to pick that door to travel through. The notion that you seemingly have to make up your mind before youâre 40 about decisions that can define and alter the course of your life feels insane to me. (And, I donât think itâs necessarily true.)
I may or may not have had a slight meltdown yesterday about all of this (or rather, adjacent to this, and the tweet) as a result.
((Am I taking a stupid tweet too personally? Donât answer that.))
The irony here is that I am, as I write to you at this very moment, much clearer when it comes to my own potential motherhood conundrum, and dare I say even finally off the fence. Or close â maybe still hanging on with one hand. Losing my mom helped in that, as did reading this Dear Sugar column, that a dear friend shared with me a few months ago. (Itâs a great read, even if your own conundrum is something other than parenthood related.) Not that thatâs making the next steps forward any easier.
All that to say, my birthday is tomorrow and do I finally feel like I have my sh*t together? No friends, no I donât. I stand firm in the belief that aging in a privilege, but gosh⊠Iâm waiting for the birthday where I know what I want to be when I grow up, you know? (In case you all thought I had a pretty good handle on things just because I spit my emotions out onto the internet, I do notâŠ. although if youâve read more than one sentence here, youâre probably like âUm no, we know youâre a mess, girlfriend.â) The one where it feels like Iâve got more ducks in a row. Maybe thatâll never come, though â weâre all a bit of a mess, arenât we? No matter our age, or what it seems on the surface. Thatâs the beauty of humanity, and of living an honest life.
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âŠ.and thatâs that for this week! This is really not where I thought Iâd end up with this weekâs newsletter, especially right before my birthday, but here we are. Blame Virgo season.
If you want a few more things to read, I loved this article about female ambition, and thought this perspective was an interesting take on that annoying tweet. Have a wonderful weekend. đ
Thanks for reading,
Joelle