I had two people at work wish me a happy mothers' day today. It was awkward.
I live in an area which is totally family oriented. It is rare to meet another woman who does not have kids- let alone a husband. It can be lonely. It can also really make me feel like there is something wrong with me, like I am deficient, incomplete.
There was a time- the first few years after I got off of disability, when it seemed like things could only go up- when I had a good job, nice apartment, even a boyfriend- and I started to think- if only this had happened a few years earlier. I could have had a baby. A family. And I got very sad about it, but I felt like it was too late for me- even though at 40, one man told me that I was not too old to have a baby. I was. Especially with all the weight I am carrying from the Zyprexa.
But I didn't have the right man. I was still struggling just to take care of myself. And then there were all those meds- which I would have wanted to stop entirely to have a healthy baby.
So no baby. And now, I don't even regret it. I am too old, have lived alone for too long, I am too set in my ways- I couldn't do it. I just couldn't. I see what my brother and sister-in-law do for a single child, and I couldn't. It is hard enough to take care of myself.
I guess I see my childlessness now more as a sign of my inadequacy. And a symbol of my illness. If I had not spent a good portion of my adult years in and out of psych hospitals, and if I was not taking a large number of medications that are not good for developing fetuses- I might have had children. But things are what they are, and not what we want them to be.
I shouldn't care what other people think of me. That only makes it worse.
I remember once when a colleague asked me when I was going to have kids, I told her that I had a medical condition that made it inadvisable to have children. She told me that I could adopt. In her defense- she was pregnant. But it really was none of her business. And I wasn't about to tell her that I had a medical condition that would make it difficult to adopt!
In a way the hysterectomy at an early age was the ideal thing for this. People ask and if they persist I say I had a hysterectomy nad try to look sad (about something I'm so happy about) and it works wonders. I wish kids had been possible too. Dr. Brain said that if I wanted to she would support me through a non-medicated pregnancy but that it would be very difficult to re-establish needed meds after birth and that meds that worked before might not again and that the pregnancy would involve a great deal of time in the hospital. She recommended not trying this but said she never would recommend someone not do something so huge. I was really glad for her honesty years ago and repeated before the hysterectomy. It was much more awkward without that reason to throw out. If I'm lucky someone nosey will see me having a hot flash and that also seems to end the questions. Just me
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