4.17.2007

Puzzle Pieces

People sometimes ask me what I like most about being a Mom. They ask because they know (or guess) that it wasn't easy from a biological standpoint, and that it was obviously planned and discussed well in advance. All this is true, of course. I am infertile, so my only hope of becoming a Mom rested in the hands of someone else. When LT and I met and decided to be a couple, one of the first serious conversations we had was about the children issue. LT had been through a lot with her ex, who had said she wanted children, but then changed her mind after the second unsuccessful IVF cycle. She was heartbroken at the thought that she would never be a Mom, and had decided when the relationship ended that she wouldn't get involved with someone who couldn't say honestly that she wanted to have at least one child. Lucky me! I had also left my previous relationship knowing that the next person I was going to get involved with would have to meet certain criteria that would make her suitable co-parent and life partner (for real, honest-to-goodness life) material. Just when I had given up hope, there she was! Financially secure, emotionally mature, beautiful, healthy, kind, responsible, patient, laid-back, and also looking to make a family.

LT and I talked at length about why we wanted to have children. I just knew deep in my heart that I would not feel like I had lived a complete life if it didn't include a child. It's funny to me now that I spent my twenties as a dyke feminist telling everyone that I didn't need to be a mother for my life to have meaning, all the while knowing that I didn't really feel that way. I talked the talk while quaking in my steel-toed Doc Martens that someone would see right through me. By the time I graduated from college I had ditched the boots for Birkenstocks and a slightly less militant type of feminism that allowed me to admit freely that I wanted to be a Mom. Ten years later, here I am.

Is my life complete? In many ways, yes. Would it still be complete without a child? Maybe. I'm so glad I don't have to find out, though. The thing I like most about being a Mom is that I feel like all the puzzle pieces of my life have been assembled. Living with a toddler as bright and busy as the kidlet is absolutely exhausting. I yearn for a few minutes of quiet, of alone-ness with or without LT. But then kidlet comes home from daycare in the afternoon, and no one in the world has ever been so happy to see me. Peace and quiet suddenly seem so boring...

No comments: