When I turned twenty-six, my mother started a fifteen year campaign to get me pregnant. Moving to Taiwan didn’t stop her agenda–she just ramped it up every time she saw me. Some of the reasons she proffered: it was a woman’s biggest duty; it was special for a mother when her daughter had a child*; she would move back to Minnesota to help me with the child; I could compromise with my boyfriend at the time who was starting to make noises about wanting children by having one child; I could adopt a black baby to match my cats. By the way, the last was said in a joking tone, but it was only a half-joke. She even dragged my grandmother into the conversation by saying she, my grandmother, wanted to be a great-grandmother before she died. Why, I don’t know, as she never showed any interest in being a grandmother, but probably for the prestige. I said that I could do it, but would have to have sex without a husband to get it done in the time frame (grandmother was dying) and incredibly, my mother said my grandmother would be fine with that. A lifetime of Christianity thrown out the window for someone else having a child in order to bestow upon her a meaningless title.
I am not exaggerating that she mentioned this every time she came to visit and would. not. let. it. go. She could not imagine that I could be a woman and not have children. It didn’t matter that I didn’t want children; it was my duty. I have never been sure of anything in my life other than that I never wanted children. One time, she wore me down to the point where for a brief moment, I considered having a child just to shut her the fuck up. Fortunately, I came to my senses and realized that was a shitty reason to have a child and never thought about it again.
When I hit forty, my mother dropped the kid talk, but then she ratcheted up the ‘when are you getting married?’ bullshit. I realized in my late thirties that I did not want to get married. I saw it as nothing but misery, honestly. Not just because of the bad marriages I saw around me, but because I really, really, really did not like compromising with my time. I do what I want to do when I want to do it and how I want to do it. My frequently-given comment is that if I want to eat cereal at three in the morning, I damn will eat cereal at three in the morning. I have a friend who can only eat a certain cereal when her husband is on a trip by himself because he considers it a children’s cereal. Even the good marriages I’ve seen are involved and day-to-day. I mean, that’s the way it should be; I’m not dissing marriage itself. But there’s no way I want to coordinate with someone when I just run to the store or whatnot.
Back in my thirties, my BFF tried to convince me that marriage was what you made it. She said you didn’t even have to live together. You could live in separate houses or duplexes or on separate floors. She’s right, but you still have to interact with that person on a regular basis. More than just a check in with them in the morning and go about your day.
My mom pushed hard. She said who would take care of me when I was old? I should marry a strong man who–I don’t remember the rest of what she said because I blocked it out. Also, I thought about how she was in such denial. Would my father be able to take care of her if she were to become deathly old? Hell, no. He couldn’t even take care of her when she had shoulder surgery for fuck’s sake. When she had emergency gallbladder surgery in the States, he never came back to visit her. I was the one who took care of her, not him.
Here’s the truth that I don’t tell her–a big reason I never married and had children is because of her. Wait. Let me back up. The biggest reason I didn’t have children is because I did not want them–with extreme prejudice. But, I also did not have them because I did not want them around my parents and I knew I’d be too weak to put my foot down. I was fortunate in that my desire not to have children and my knowledge that I would be a bad mother were aligned because I can’t imagine how miserable I would be now if I had children–or how fucked up they would be.
But one of the biggest reasons I do not want to get married is because I see what marriage has done to her and I know that I would most likely fall into the same patterns. My mother is an intelligent, fiercely competent, strong woman who allowed my father’s abusive nature to whittle her down until she’s a mere shell of the woman she could be. This has been happening for as long as I can remember. Her centering my father in her thoughts until there is no room for anything else. His needs matter; hers don’t. If something doesn’t happen the way he wants, it’s her fault, even though he can’t do the thing without her. If she were to walk, he would die say she! Maybe, maybe not. He has plenty of family plus his mistress. Let them take care of him for once.
Everything is about face to him. He was an important man once and now he’s nothing in his own mind so he has to make sure my mother is even less than nothing. He’s got dementia, too, which he refuses to believe, so everything is worse. Plus, it gives my mom an excuse to obsess over him more. Every conversation is about this thing he did can you believe it? Which, by the way, yes, yes I can. He’s going to get mad no matter what my mother does and it’s so goddamn frustrating to have the same conversation about it every time we talk.
I know that’s on me, though. It’s also not the point of this post. The point is that I lose myself when I’m in a romantic relationship and I could easily see myself in my mother’s shoes ten years from now. Not being allowed to look at my husband’s phone because reasons (mistress). Not being able to call him except at designated times, but being yelled at if god forbid I don’t answer my phone when he calls. Being accused of hating him or trying to kill him and thinking I’m better than he is.
It’s classic abuse. I mean, textbook. Down to my mother defending him after complaining about him and saying they have good times, too. Of course they do! That’s part of the cycle. I don’t need to know this much about their marriage, but I feel so goddamn guilty any time I set boundaries with her. She doesn’t have anyone else to talk to, but that’s on her. She chooses not to find a therapist or talk to her friends in order to protect him. That’s not my fault and it shouldn’t be my burden. Her retort is that he’s my father. Well, yes, but that doesn’t mean I have to cater to his nastiness. She chose him as a partner; I had no choice of him as my father. And, the usual advice to being friends of people with abusive partners is complicated by the fact that he was also abusive to me.
My point is that many of the partners I’ve had had exhibited several of the traits he’s had. And I turn into my mother when I’m dating someone. They become the most important thing in my life to the detriment of everything else. I start anticipating what they need and want even without any demand for it on their side. I can’t breathe when I’m in a relationship and it took me until my early forties to realize that I don’t want to put in the work to be in a place where a romantic relationship is beneficial to me and not detrimental. It’s just not that important to me.
I will never tell my mother that the two things she wants most for me didn’t happen in a large part because of her. I don’t need to be that cruel and more to the point, it won’t matter. She is not going to change and nothing I can say or do will, well, change that. That’s the hard truth I have to learn once and for all.
*Note the particular narcissism of this point. It was alllll about her. Also, a bit of projection since she had a very rocky relationship with her mother and I saw my grandmother a handful of times in my life.