a hard left

... or is it a sharp 180?

a note on content: this is about my personal uncertainty about whether to have children, so if that topic is not right for you to read right now, please skip this one! This one has been in draft mode for a long time & it feels vulnerable to share. I’m trying to be brave & send it even though I am scared.

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I grew up loving children - positively obsessed with babies - I started babysitting probably much younger than people should have trusted me to watch their children, but I was eager and “mature for her age”.

In college, my friends made fun of me for the “baby watching” I did at the farmers’ market, literally incapable of holding a conversation with an adult when confronted with a rosy-cheeked baby in a puffer snowsuit. I babysat a 3-year-old while his mother completed her PhD & his father worked in the Berkeley Labs - he was the highlight of my weeks. I’d chase him around Live Oak Park while he giggled and screeched “Want Ani!” (which I understood to mean, “I want Ani to chase me, then I will pretend to fall to the ground at which time you should pick me up and tickle me”). Throughout college and in the years following, I held various jobs watching and teaching children aged 0-12 and found them all very rewarding, supremely exhausting, and woefully under-appreciated/under-compensated. “Of course, I’ll become a mom”, I always thought. I love kids!

I held this belief as a truth about myself, that I wanted to have children (or a child) and that I wanted to do so before 30. The pre-30 notion was truthfully shaped by a single conversation with my first college roommate, who mentioned wanting to have kids at 28 so that her parents would (likely) be around to meet their grandchildren. That one sunk into my gut - my own parents having had me at 34 and 39, respectively.

Now, I am 32, my parents are 66 and 71. We are all alive, and (knock on wood), reasonably well (and I count myself in the “reasonably well” category). But something has changed for me. When the pandemic hit, my bodily intuition gave me a clear “no” when I considered the idea of parenthood. Everything about parenthood that appealed to me was stripped away during the pandemic- it seemed like every life raft of support that I would cling to as a new parent vanished. I did not want to become pregnant or raise a child in that environment, my intuition was very clear with me on this.

I (personally and logically) know that people birthed throughout the pandemic and are raising children- very successfully! And I love them and I love the people they’ve created. I am so fortunate to have been made an auntie during the pandemic. But for me, there was just a very sharp change in my own bodily knowing about whether parenthood was right for me. My ovaries stopped aching the way they did when I looked at babies (was it ever literal? I don’t know, but that was always how I described it “my ovaries exploding”). I stopped feeling the bodily sense that this path would be for me.

And it’s a bit strange, right? To go from having baby fever to not- every story I’ve ever heard, read, or seen depicts the opposite. That people’s “biological clocks” tick away until they hit their 30s and they have sudden clarity that they want children, ASAP. Or others, who have always known they do not want to be mothers. I envy and applaud their clarity! What a gift to feel sure (despite, I’m sure, the barrage of well-meaning folks who insist they “might regret that choice”. oof!).

For now, I’m sitting with it all. I’ve been sitting with it for over 3 years, quietly seeking allies in conversation about this, doing my best not to yuck anyone’s yum, or cause a major fracture in my friendships with parents by admitting the fullness of my uncertainty. Doing my best to keep holding space for friends to take diverging paths while I hold my own questions with tenderness and care. Doing my best to take information in from many sources. Doing my best to develop the discernment to know what belongs to me, and what is a societal expectation (or even just an expectation held by my younger self).

What I do know is this: I love children. I love being around them and I love witnessing them learning about the world. I want to be a reliable, warm, goofy auntie, to my nibblings¹ of origin, and chosen nibblings. And, despite my uncertainty, I trust my intuition to deliver signals about what is right for me, and though it may not happen on the timeline I envisioned, I trust it will be right on time.

related reading

Women Without Kids by Ruby Warrington. I’ve just started this, but it’s great so far.

See also: this podcast episode from We Can Do Hard Things where Ruby is interviewed (thanks to my SiL Amanda for this rec!).

There a several great

Culture Study

pieces that deal with this topic, but I particularly appreciated “How to Kid-Proof Your Friendship”

unrelated reading

The Force of Such Beauty by Barbara Bourland - what an interesting premise! if you’ve ever been a competitive athlete (esp if you are woman-identified), I think you might like this.

True Biz by Sara Novic - only a few chapters deep, but loving this so far. Particularly enjoying the refreshers on ASL (I took a semester of ASL in college, but I have forgotten a lot!) and learning more history of the Deaf community.

Are you subscribed to

Gumshoe

yet? Run, don’t walk.

working on

Making a simple database that may be of interest to Greenfield residents. I’ve been coming across so many interesting listings (job opps, funding/grant opps, community forums for having a say in how town funds are spent) & I wanted a simplistic interface that explained what the thing is, what the action item is, and when it’s due. I intend to keep it updated & I’ve been sharing it with friends, but please share if it’s relevant to someone you know, and reply if you have any feedback!

Sewing this little bear, which while cute was annoying enough that I don’t think I’ll be doing any more of that for a while.

Practicing sewing french seams on silk organza. this. shit. is. tricky!

thinking I might make a simple curtain out of pieces patchworked together

Picking up a hand-stitching project I’ve let languish for too long (no pics, it’s a surprise)

Thinking about what this linen tartan fabric I got at Stone Mountain is for. When I bought it, I pictured big, billowy drawstring shorts (paired with a white ribbed tank & black boots or fisherman sandals + a red sock). I have 1.5yds - what would you make?

winter updates

I had my first experience skating on a frozen lake! 10/10, loved and would do again!

Josh on the ice on a spontaneous day trip 1.5 hrs north in Vermont to Lake Morey

The Winter Carnival has been happening in my town for 100+ years - the Parade of Lights was exactly the kind of small-town winter magic my heart needed in early Feb.

sorry about the blurry screengrab - is it blurry because it’s from a video or because I was crying? unclear

SNOW DAY IN NYC!

chatting with Sasha, probably about rocks, or maybe the birds

meeting the sweetest little one, Esme

There is a group of people who caretake the trail to one of my beloved dip spots, and they move these little figurines around on the trail (daily? weekly? often)

have you spotted the little green frog statue? :)

The co-op has tulips! This is not a drill! Spring is near :)

1. gender-neutral term for nieces/nephews