Now Honeys Play Me Close Like Butter Plays Toast*
I grew up listening to Free To Be You And Me on my Fisher Price record player and following along in the book, which still resides on the bottom shelf of my bookcase. No one displayed much concern when I laid out my career plans—actress, lawyer, teacher, evil Russian spy. No one questioned the advisability of taking out $40,000 a year in loans to finance my attendance at a small liberal arts college (we’ll call it Sarah Mawr), and when I went to work in the arts and non-profits and tried my hand at freelancing, no one turned pale and whispered things about wasting my potential. No one did anything to make me think I couldn’t make my own decisions about how to live my life. Until I wanted to have children at the tender age of 27, before I was even legally an adult…oh, wait.
With astounding suddenness, asshats chimed in as with one voice:
“But you’re so YOUNG!” they cried. They reminded me of all of the things I hadn’t done yet—gone to grad school, seen The World, flown a plane. Because, as everyone knows, mothers live and breathe (and in some cultures, eat!) their children, and certainly couldn’t do anything so taxing as look up from their precious charges long enough to write a sentence or (heaven forfend!) go to work. Mommies are people. People with children. Period.
No one went all trembly when my brother decided to be a chef rather than go to college. No one required smelling salts upon being told that a friend was going to travel around Europe for “awhile” until she decided what to do with herself. But dare to have a dream so…prosaic as having children, and suddenly it’s “Why can’t you be a lawyer like a nice, normal girl?”
I am aware that this may be a rather rarefied complaint, and many would say I should thank my lucky stars people aren’t saying “What are you doing out of the kitchen and are those shoes on your feet?” and I realize that yes, we have come a long way, baby, and I am glad that I have so many avenues open to me, but why is it that people in the circles in which I move still act like there is something perverse about wanting children before you are 35? Like you are some deranged child-bride, or one of those girls you see occasionally on message boards and the suchlike saying “I am ttc and want a baby sooo bad, I am only 16 but ready to be a mom 4 ever, u know? BABYDUST!!!!”
I mean honestly. If I hear “But you’re so YOUNG!” one more time I’m going to pretend to spit tobacco out of the side of my mouth and drawl,
“I seen younger.”
I‘ve had worsening endometriosis since I was 14, the pain only manageable by being on continuous birth control pills—which are no longer an option because of my migraines. I ovulate, oh…every once in a while, have had two miscarriages already, and my doctors seem to be itching to take a melon baller and scoop my abdominal cavity clean. So excuse me for not wanting to wait around for 5 years to assure people that I am not a weak 1950s throwback. I’m ready to spray some Charlie perfume around the shoulder pads of my power suit and stride mannishly into the fertility clinic.
A boyfriend once told me he was glad I was so committed to my writing because he could never be with someone who only wanted to have kids. I am so tired of people saying things like this, because isn’t comparing women’s choices against some invisible standard what we were all so riled up against in the first place? And, really, if I have to explain to one more person that infertility is not something that happens “because you’re old,” I may devour my own head.
*R.I.P. Biggie Smalls
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Devouring your own head, eh? That reminds me of an exchange in “Team America”:
Character 1: “I’m not afraid. I’ve seen everything.”
Character 2: “Have you ever seen a man eat his own head?”
Character 1: “Uh, no.”
Character 2: “Well, then you haven’t seen everything.”
Anyway…As a newly 27 year old, I get the same crap from my friends. Most of them do not anticipate starting families until they are at least in their early thirties. I, on the other hand, as a woman with PCOS, have no such luxury. Being such a jaded IFer as well, I secretly want to warn them that if they wait too long, it might not be as easy as they seem to think it will be.
So go and get your “so young” self pregnant. Screw ‘em.
P.S. Thanks for mentioning Charlie as well. Now I have that dumbass Cindy Crawford/Ray Charles early 90s commercial repeating in my head
So glad I found your blog (via your comment over at the Barren Mare’s place). I have a feeling you’re editing all those handy internet-ready cases and articles that make it possible for me to work from home as a legal researcher/writer/editor. So maybe I’ve actually been reading your work for years.
I also started trying to conceive the first time around when I was pretty young, still in law school. Like you, I wanted to get an early start because my medical history did not foretell great fecundity. So I’ve dealt with some of those questions. It is a little weird sometimes that none of my friends from college or law school have kids. But hey, I figure I’ll be a great resource for those of them who end up dealing with IF. I can show them how to set up a blog and everything.
Yeah, it’s like we can’t win no matter what. Either it’s the “you’re young, you have plenty of time” people, or it’s the “well that’s what you get for putting your career first” people. I’m trying to figure out what the magical middle is where neither group would object, but so far I haven’t found it.
BTW, been reading for a few days now and am loving your writing.
Hah! And if you start when you’re 35 you get told of course it’s going to be hard because you “waited” so you could “pursue your career goals” and didn’t anyone tell you that your fertility starts declining at 27.
Bastards.