So many of my friends are having babies (or have just had them) that I'm losing count. I got away with my 20s and early 30s avoiding many weddings, engagement parties, and baby showers, but it seems to have just hit me pretty late.
As of this morning, I can think of 5 friends who have either just had or are about to burst forth a new person.
It's kind of a strange feeling - I get simultaneously curious/envious while also sort of realizing that might not be for me. Or rather, I'm just not sure we're willing to give up everything for that right now.
Showing posts with label biological clock. Show all posts
Showing posts with label biological clock. Show all posts
Sunday, June 17, 2007
Wednesday, March 22, 2006
Do the Math
My grandmother was 40 when my mother had me. That's four years older than I am this year, and that means when my mother was the age I am now, I was almost 16. That's a lot to digest. I'll break it down.
By 40, my grandmother had lived in three countries (China, Cuba, Texas) in abject poverty and in ample comfort. She had three children, one of whom was in college and the other two on the way there. She and my grandfather were running a successful business, they owned a home, they were becoming US citizens.
By 40, my mother was visiting me at college, grieving the loss of her father, and still working 60 hour weeks for 30 hour pay, running a law office nonetheless.
I was a good kid, I had loving and happy parents - I had access, education, and opportunity that both sets of grandparents had provided. I had no shortage of affection, and while both my parents worked, I never felt they weren't there.
But I can hardly imagine having a 16-year old as the person I am today. Of course, I would have had 16 years to become that parent. But if I were to become a parent, what kind of parent would I be? Would I be the kind of mother that my mother was, that my grandmother was? Could I even be that kind of mother, having 16 more years of experience than they did when they first gave birth? Would that extra 16 years do me any good? Or would I be a neurotic, controlling grown-up with no business having kids, like many people I know?
In some ways I envy my mother and grandmother for having done it so early. They got to grow up - sometimes the hard way - with their daughters. When I went to prom, my mom was the age I am today. I remember shopping for the dress, the jewelry, the makeup. I remember my mother buying me my first razor (that was years before prom, but go along with me here...), my first bra, going with me to my first gyn visit. It was probably terrifying for her, but she never showed it. And our trials were nothing compared to those she and my grandmother went through. When my grandmother was pregnant with my mother, my grandfather left for Cuba, looking for a better life for all of them. My mother was 5 when he came back for them. All that time my grandmother had to find food for this tiny baby girl, sometimes giving my mother the meat from the fish while she sucked the bones. Anything to survive, anything not to starve.
Knowing that, do I have what it takes? I'd be a great girl scout leader - I can show you how to paint pottery, to make pipe cleaner crafts, to make peanut brittle. I'd probably be a pretty good older sister too, revealing the naughty little secrets every girl should know. Heck, I can even put together model cars, hit a baseball, and help with a science project. But could I be the kind of mom I'd want to be for my kids? I don't think you can ever know that before you do it - it's the kind of thing you look back on years later and say, 'yeah, I think I did okay there.' I think this weekend I'll call my mom and tell her what a great job I think she did.
But wait a second, what about my dad?
In many ways, I am the person I am because of my father. Where the women in my life gave me passion, energy, and the shape of my ass, the men showed me the quiet strength of reason. Of planning, of hard work, of patience. Lots of patience. That was the side that got me to 30. As I grow older myself, wondering about my future, I see my father more for his sense of humor, for his kindness and his gentle nature. He is strong and quiet, but never unfair.
And I know that if I'm to become the person I want to be, and maybe even the parent I think I can be, I won't be doing it alone. I don't have plan. Heck, I don't even have a clue. But I'm getting there.
By 40, my grandmother had lived in three countries (China, Cuba, Texas) in abject poverty and in ample comfort. She had three children, one of whom was in college and the other two on the way there. She and my grandfather were running a successful business, they owned a home, they were becoming US citizens.
By 40, my mother was visiting me at college, grieving the loss of her father, and still working 60 hour weeks for 30 hour pay, running a law office nonetheless.
I was a good kid, I had loving and happy parents - I had access, education, and opportunity that both sets of grandparents had provided. I had no shortage of affection, and while both my parents worked, I never felt they weren't there.
But I can hardly imagine having a 16-year old as the person I am today. Of course, I would have had 16 years to become that parent. But if I were to become a parent, what kind of parent would I be? Would I be the kind of mother that my mother was, that my grandmother was? Could I even be that kind of mother, having 16 more years of experience than they did when they first gave birth? Would that extra 16 years do me any good? Or would I be a neurotic, controlling grown-up with no business having kids, like many people I know?
In some ways I envy my mother and grandmother for having done it so early. They got to grow up - sometimes the hard way - with their daughters. When I went to prom, my mom was the age I am today. I remember shopping for the dress, the jewelry, the makeup. I remember my mother buying me my first razor (that was years before prom, but go along with me here...), my first bra, going with me to my first gyn visit. It was probably terrifying for her, but she never showed it. And our trials were nothing compared to those she and my grandmother went through. When my grandmother was pregnant with my mother, my grandfather left for Cuba, looking for a better life for all of them. My mother was 5 when he came back for them. All that time my grandmother had to find food for this tiny baby girl, sometimes giving my mother the meat from the fish while she sucked the bones. Anything to survive, anything not to starve.
Knowing that, do I have what it takes? I'd be a great girl scout leader - I can show you how to paint pottery, to make pipe cleaner crafts, to make peanut brittle. I'd probably be a pretty good older sister too, revealing the naughty little secrets every girl should know. Heck, I can even put together model cars, hit a baseball, and help with a science project. But could I be the kind of mom I'd want to be for my kids? I don't think you can ever know that before you do it - it's the kind of thing you look back on years later and say, 'yeah, I think I did okay there.' I think this weekend I'll call my mom and tell her what a great job I think she did.
But wait a second, what about my dad?
In many ways, I am the person I am because of my father. Where the women in my life gave me passion, energy, and the shape of my ass, the men showed me the quiet strength of reason. Of planning, of hard work, of patience. Lots of patience. That was the side that got me to 30. As I grow older myself, wondering about my future, I see my father more for his sense of humor, for his kindness and his gentle nature. He is strong and quiet, but never unfair.
And I know that if I'm to become the person I want to be, and maybe even the parent I think I can be, I won't be doing it alone. I don't have plan. Heck, I don't even have a clue. But I'm getting there.
Thursday, February 23, 2006
Huh, wait...did that just happen?
A few months ago on my way out of New York, my doctor said offhand, 'oh, you're 35. It's time for your baseline and I'm going to write you a script.' For the less fair sex reading this entry, that's a baseline mammogram. A pancake test. A true test that you've hit the age to start worrying. Just that casual comment threw me for a loop - for years I'd heard that women don't need a baseline until 40, but here I was getting written up that I needed to have one before my next birthday. For a moment it was sort of exciting - I got to go first, I get to tell the other younger women in my life what it's like, what to expect. But after that excitement faded, the subtext of what she'd ordered set in.
The script has been attached to my fridge for months, curling at the edges next to the Eat Me magnet from Crif Dog. My first mammogram. This is the gateway test, the one that starts it all. From here on out, it's colonoscopies, bone densities, and other miserable exams to prove you're not yet dying but you're on the way.
But when are all of the things that usually happen at this age going to start happening? I didn't freak out when I turned 30 - and given the circumstances I had every right to do so. That first (and as of now only) silver hair? I protected it feverishly, proud to finally have earned a stripe. But it fell out soon thereafter and I've not found another since. And what about the clock? The oh-my-god-please-don't-let-me-fall-victim-to-my-body alarm clock? That's my name for it, the phenomenon that takes perfectly rational women and suddenly makes them hormonal and unpredictable. This, to me, would be like Spock getting Bendii Syndrome (look it up in Wikipedia!) - after a lifetime devoted to study and reason, the ultimate curse is losing one's mind. I have never been able to comprehend how a woman could wake up one day and suddenly decide it was time.
And then I realized it's a slow process, losing one's mind. It doesn't happen overnight, it's not so easy to see. Somewhere along the way while you've been struggling against it, you realize the struggle is the change. And that all of the hallmarks are there, that somehow you've subconsciously made changes in your life that you think will make you happy, but they've been stepping stones on a path your body tricked you into taking. But as soon as you wrote that you think, 'but I don't really feel tricked, I am really happy.' And then you realize it's already happening. It may not be the same for everyone; god forbid I wake up thinking ineedababypleasenowihavetogetpregnant. But there's something, I know it's there.
So here I sit in my kitchen looking at the yellowing script. Mortality is a post-it on my fridge and the tone in my alarm that will never let me sleep again.
The script has been attached to my fridge for months, curling at the edges next to the Eat Me magnet from Crif Dog. My first mammogram. This is the gateway test, the one that starts it all. From here on out, it's colonoscopies, bone densities, and other miserable exams to prove you're not yet dying but you're on the way.
But when are all of the things that usually happen at this age going to start happening? I didn't freak out when I turned 30 - and given the circumstances I had every right to do so. That first (and as of now only) silver hair? I protected it feverishly, proud to finally have earned a stripe. But it fell out soon thereafter and I've not found another since. And what about the clock? The oh-my-god-please-don't-let-me-fall-victim-to-my-body alarm clock? That's my name for it, the phenomenon that takes perfectly rational women and suddenly makes them hormonal and unpredictable. This, to me, would be like Spock getting Bendii Syndrome (look it up in Wikipedia!) - after a lifetime devoted to study and reason, the ultimate curse is losing one's mind. I have never been able to comprehend how a woman could wake up one day and suddenly decide it was time.
And then I realized it's a slow process, losing one's mind. It doesn't happen overnight, it's not so easy to see. Somewhere along the way while you've been struggling against it, you realize the struggle is the change. And that all of the hallmarks are there, that somehow you've subconsciously made changes in your life that you think will make you happy, but they've been stepping stones on a path your body tricked you into taking. But as soon as you wrote that you think, 'but I don't really feel tricked, I am really happy.' And then you realize it's already happening. It may not be the same for everyone; god forbid I wake up thinking ineedababypleasenowihavetogetpregnant. But there's something, I know it's there.
So here I sit in my kitchen looking at the yellowing script. Mortality is a post-it on my fridge and the tone in my alarm that will never let me sleep again.
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