But I Don’t Want A Child

PART 1

I was ten when I had a baby brother. He was tiny and not adorable,just different. I didn’t understand the ncoooohs and awwwwwws daily of the people who came by. My mother told me what being pregnant meant and it had terrified me. Only was I not going to give up my only child status, but I was going to have to share my toys and attention from my parents with this person.

The day my mother came back home from hospital my grandmother,her mother, was already planted in my dad’s favorite chair and would occupy it for another year. Why wasn’t she going back to her house? She was also mean. My dad’s aunt and my favorite grandmother (my father’s mother I was told died many years ago),was my favourite but she came very briefly. She should have stayed longer. She was easier to live with. This grandmother that stayed longer talked about my ‘big boned’ body,my flat nose,my early breasts (when is the right time,and can one control these things),and she was lazy. She plopped on my father’s chair and slave drove everyone from there. Turned out to be the longest year of my life.

My brother? A month and few days later he stopped looking like a new born puppy. The crying also subsided,oh he could cry! One day in the middle of the night I walked into my mother’s room and asked her if the baby won’t die from all of the crying. She laughed and told me all will be okay and that I should go back to bed,but she looked really tired and I wished  grandmother would get up and help her,but I was the child you see.

I didn’t dislike my brother but I also couldn’t be like everyone who came by and lost their mind around this little thing. I did understand any of it. As he went by growing and tripping and hurting himself and crying I was there as big sister,but it was a ‘job’ I had rather someone else do,but I did it all the same.

I knew with certainty what it was when I was in second year of university and  my cousin was getting married. She was my father’s aunt’s grandchild and a year older than me. One of the days in the week of the big day preparation I was sitting with my father’s aunt (favorite grandmother) in the kitchen and she was asking me when I was going to get married myself.

I answered “ma,it might be hard because marriage has expectations,and the one thing I know is that I don’t want children” 

She looked up from the cotton serviettes she was tasked to count,but it wasn’t a eyebrows raised look. She looked up to see the truth in my eyes. There was no judgement. No shock. No reprimand. Nothing.  Instead she said “I wish for you to meet the one who understands this of you and can live with it. I wish you  a partner of the same choices and especially in these societal pressures abound it could be hard. One thing though my child, don’t ever not mention from day one what you want and don’t want,it makes life easier all round” I sighed in my heart. She had always been the liberal one,outspoken too and that had garnered her enough enemies in the family but she never paid attention to any of it. I loved her for it and that made me the person I was, unafraid to say what I truly felt. It was all her. Of the few people I told she was the first genuine and understanding reaction from all of them.

She didn’t try to change me.

She didn’t try to see if there had been trauma that must have made me feel this way.

She didn’t dismiss me as crazy. That hurt the most when people just dismissed me as crazy.

My college closest friend said to me on the same “you’ll change your mind when you meet the one”. I didn’t even try to explain beyond that. She didn’t get it. I was tolerable of children. I coo’d over my cousin’s and friend’s children,but I knew with unmatched certainty that I was not birthing any of my own.

“What about your husband when you get married?” Surely I couldn’t be the only one that felt like this in the whole world so I would meet a like minded person,no?

What about your wealth? Who will inherit it? Why are we talking about a wealth I haven’t even ammased yet? Isn’t there a law around those things? Plus also why are we skipping the life part and going to talk about when I die. I could spend all of my money travelling and finish it and not have to worry about who inherits what,and can I please not worry about it now? Why was it all about everything but what I felt?

I really did not want to birth a child or adopt one or live with one. Does that make me polar opposite of Mother Theresa,with a cold stone heart? I don’t think so.

 I walked on my parents once and my father was saying to mother “but Mogopo has always been different” and I wish I hadn’t walked in but stayed outside the door to hear what they were talking about,but I suspected it was about my not wanting children. My mother is getting it slower than the people who matter to me. I am 42 and if she could she would be having night vigil and fasting on my behalf. Her thirst for grandchildren is consuming. She lives with my brother’s two year old, my niece who she collected from the grandparents and mother at six month old. I thought this would soothe her yearn but it must be mine she wants badly,but I do not want children.

Hopes and Dreams Turn Into Goals When We Decide To Take Action And Set A Deadline!!!!!      “CARPE DIEM- SEIZE THE DAY”