To be, or not to be

I originally wrote this in 2019. Today I attended a pro-choice solidarity rally. Fortunately, our abortion laws in Aotearoa have been updated since I wrote this. However, the USA has regressed and the constitutional right to abortion healthcare has been revoked. This leaves individual states to make the choice, and some have immediately outlawed abortion under any circumstances. We marched to the US Consulate to send a message of solidarity to our American friends. And we were reminded to be on guard in this country as nothing is ever guaranteed and right wing politicians are already making unpleasant noises.

I also want to note that whilst I have referred to women in this post, I acknowledge that the right to access to abortion healthcare is relevant to people of all genders. 

At the moment, women in New Zealand are looking on as states in the USA enact the most restrictive laws against terminating a pregnancy we have ever seen.

What we fail to remember is that New Zealand's laws are not that liberal, either. We gasp in horror at the idea that young girls cannot have a pregnancy ended even in the case of it being the result of rape or incest, but we forget that those things by themselves are not ground for a termination in New Zealand.

The 'abortion debate' is one that throws up so many issues for me. I have come from a background of Christian belief that life starts from conception - although I don't know where that's backed up in the Scriptures. I have always had an uneasy relationship with the concept of terminating a pregnancy.

The recent resurgence in interest in the law around termination has come hot on the heels of a dear friend confirming her own pregnancy.

This is a very much wanted, and planned for, first baby. We are already starting to use the language of hope - at 6 weeks gestation we are referring to it as a 'baby' when it is nothing more than a clump of pulsating tissue.

This just emphasises to me that what we feel about something makes it what it is. Language matters, and right now, it matters more than anything.

Sitting alongside my friend's much wanted and already dearly loved first baby are the stories of women for whom this clump of cells was a danger. Danger is a strong word, but I will use it, even if it wasn't a life or death situation. Or maybe it was, just not in the ways we commonly describe it.

I know first hand the long term effect children have on your life. The 'motherhood penalty' isn't some theory that someone dreamed up. Its a real thing effecting the economic outcomes for women the world over. We cannot pretend that having a baby is just a physical manifestation and consequence of a physical act. We must acknowledge the far reaching economic and social impacts it currently has on the people who carry them - women.

I have four children whom I would not change for the world. They are delightful, clever, beautiful individuals. However, in a capitalist world, I cannot discount the economic cost I have borne for taking time out of the paid workforce to raise four children until the youngest was six years old.

As I moved away from my original religious ideology, and started to hear more of women's stories, I started to understand about the origins of life.

Life actually begins with the woman who is growing it. If she is not ready, if she hasn't met her potential yet, it is profoundly unfair to ask her for her life be usurped by someone else's.

I appreciated the meme that stated "what if that baby was going to cure cancer?" and the response that "what if the woman carrying that baby was going to cure cancer, but she didn't finish college because she got pregnant and and couldn't end the pregnancy?"

I feel profoundly uncomfortable with the idea of having a termination. Fortunately, I will not be in a position to have to make that choice, but I can appreciate what a difficult choice it is. 

I am also in a position where I believe that a woman's decision about whether or not she wishes to be pregnant trumps everything.

My dear friend is pregnant with a baby.

The baby is a wish. An idea. A dream. A future.

But they are not all like this.

Some are pregnancies that are wrong. Costly. Deadly.

They are pregnancies. Not babies.

Babies are our ideas, dreams, futures.

And pregnancies must not continue at the expense the lives of women who bear them.

Being wrong helped me be better

I have always been a rule follower and a people pleaser. When I was about five years old I nicked a lolly from LD Nathan at the local shopping centre. I hid under my bed to eat it and was consumed by the guilt about what I had done.

It was a perfectly natural part of growing up. Push against the rules society has in place, and your conscience will guide you as to what is right. I knew I had done the wrong thing, and I felt so icky about it, I didn't do it again.

In my life to date, I generally have followed the rules - there was the odd wayward moment as a teenager, but given the standards I had set for myself, I didn't do too badly. I was an earnest Christian, so at the time being felt up by a boyfriend felt like a mortal sin, so never mind doing the stuff many teenagers were up to (experimenting with alcohol, drugs, sex...)

But a couple of problems started presenting themselves. The rules around me started changing, so the world in which I had signed up to a particular life wasn't the same world I was living in now.

That was partly me - as I met new people, my world expanded. I met people of different faiths, of no faith, who were sole parents, gay parents. All super, super smart. All very kind. And good.

Wait a minute...

In the past I'd tsk tsked at the gays, the single parents, the people who had sex with people they weren't married to (or going to marry) people who weren't married..... you get the picture.

And so I started questioning everything I had signed up to to date. Marriage. Babies. Being a stay at home parent for so long. When my mother took a controversial route out of this world, it started me on a long journey of wondering where I had been, where I was heading, and what rules applied any more.

Then I fell for her.... and I was in a right mess.

I had made a promise to someone else when I was 18 but at 37 I didn't want to keep the promise any more. What kind of person did that make me?

But was anyone a particular 'kind of person?' Or were we all just in a changing world in which we needed to adapt?

If I'd seen more lesbians as a teenager, would things have been different? If every single family I had contact with hadn't been a heteronormative, nuclear family, would things have been different? If I'd seen  same sex couples, single parents, working Mums in the world around me, would things have been different? If my mother hadn't spat "You aren't queer, are you?" at me in an accusatory fashion, would things have been different?

I can take responsibility for my choices, but the broader issue is that choices are determined by social norms, social standing, circumstances. 2013 was a very different world to 1994, but I was still expected to keep a promise I made when I was little more than a child.

Everything could have been handled more sensitively. I am not sure turning the rules upside down immediately makes me a liar or a cheat. It makes me a human who found herself in a difficult situation where hurt was inevitable.

I think the answer to not making a promise you can't keep is to be realistic and careful about what you promise in the first place. Should we be placing ourselves in a position of absolutes, or is life more about ongoing negotiation and re-evaluation?

What are all the rules about? Who benefits from them? Are they kind? Are they fair? Do they really matter?

I had been in a cultural vacuum for so much of my life. That cultural vacuum was very definite about rights and wrongs. And you know what - definitive rights and wrongs have a high comfort factor. Everyone knows where they stand. If you don't fit in, you're in trouble. But you know what's what.

I have been wrong, but I am only human. Being wrong makes me more sympathetic to the people I used to judge.

Living outside the black and white box requires more energy. More negotiation. More weighing up. But I also think it has more capacity for kindness. Black and white rights and wrong often produce confused individuals who cannot see past not fitting in the box. Black and white rights and wrong produce punitive consequences that don't make anyone's life better. Black and white rights and wrongs stop dialogue and honest conversation and stifle growth. Black and white rights and wrongs reduce the capacity to see things beyond your own scope and beyond your own concept of righteousness. It stops you seeing the people behind the monochrome.

The world devoid of absolute black and white is far more scary, but it is anything but grey. It is bright in vivid colours, with love, with laughter, with tears, with challenge, with kindness.

It is a world full of life.

Sacrifice

April and a close friend's wedding. Champagne flows. Just one sip.....? No...its not allowed.

Nothing is mine any more.

On my feet. Twelve hour days. An old man looks at me and says I should be at home. But there's work to do. I stride about in my purple top that coordinates with the staff uniforms. Its tiring...carrying around another three kilograms. 

Time goes so slow. I am so tired. Then he is here. He slithers out of my body and I am stunned that he fitted IN THERE. Being stunned doesn't last long. Oh my lord, the pain. My mother looks worried, and exclaims to the midwife... please..give her something... 

Soon.Soon.

So tired. And there is no turning back. Every few hours he's awake and hungry. I love him more than anything, but I am so so tired. And I feel so very intensely that I've gotten myself onto a ride that I cannot ever get off.

Days fill with worry. Care. Research. Questions. I need to get this right. There are no second chances. 

He throws up the blood from the cracked nipple he's lacerated, but he's alright. He needs me and he tells me. Crying and crying. Up and down the hall. Pace pace pace. Sing along to the song on the TV at midnight. The Queen of my Heart. 

My heart will never be the same.

What should he eat?

What should he drink?

What should he wear?

What should he play with?

What should I read to him?

As he grows he needs more. Days are spent finding out where we should go next. 

Days of good food. Singing. Walks to kindy. Hearty dinner. A snuggle with warm milk to say goodnight. So so tired.

Five is looming. What to choose? Do we need to move? Where is best?

Reading. Looking. Talking. Reading. Writing. Growth.

There are two. And soon there are three. Bills to pay. No job means no money. No power. No food. And that won't do, so My Keepsakes and Such are sold to make sure it is warm this winter.

The job I love is too hard on everyone. So it is my job that has to go. The job I love more than any other and grieve for now, years later. But there's a new one that works better for Everyone. There is no money though. Because that is spent looking after Number Four.

Emails, interviews. Will they be the right one? What can I trust other than my heart?

Organise. Pay. Work. Collect. Soothe. Listen. Cook. Feed. Snuggle. Wash. Listen. Think.

Nights alone with everyone. Because dreams are coming true. Everything is perfect. For some of us, anyway. Its the price to pay.

Organise. Pay. Work. Collect, Soothe. Listen. Cook. Feed. Snuggle. Wash. Listen. Think.

Alone.

Years have passed and I have nothing on the outside world. The world has moved on.

My darlings are everything and I am nothing. My heart. My time. My mind. Twelve years means everything to my darlings. Nothing to the outside world.

But sorry about having to go out of your way to

Collect

him.

The sacrifices we make for our children.

Don't read the comments

Unless you've been living under a rock for the past few years, you'll know about the movie Frozen. You'll definitely know the song Let it Go, and if you have small people in your life, you'll know about the heroines of the story, Elsa and Ana, and how the twist in the plot was that true love with a handsome prince was not the happily ever after we thought we'd get.

Frozen is headed for an (inevitable) sequel, and the Twitterverse has gone nuts asking for Elsa (who seems to be the most popular of the two leads) to have a happy ever after with another woman with the hashtag #giveelsaagirlfriend.





And then it started.... The Comments.

"Oh God. Do we really need to shove that down the throats of kids?? That's far beyond the mind of a 7 year old. They're just watching the movie. That's a teen/tween concept. Let kids be kids and innocent.
I'll note that I'm not against gay or lesbian couples and have several friends who are."

"As much as the awareness is great. But I don't want my four years old seeing this kind of stuff just yet. He's to young. He thinks kissing on movies is gross so I'm guessing seeing two girls kissing even grosser."

"I have nothing against being gay but do we really need to throw it in our kids faces the world is already confusing enough for them with out making one of the biggest Disney characters of their time gay just to confuse them more."

This idea that we must protect children from normal human relationships is more indicative of 'confusion' amongst adults than children. I'm sure children are puzzled about a great many things in life. And usually they cease to be puzzled once they have some facts. So, Elsa has a girlfriend? Some women have another woman as a partner, not a man. Oh...ok.

But let's just dig a little deeper. What is everyone afraid of, really? Comments about kids keeping their 'innocence' in the face of a bit of benign Disney romance suggests people have fears about something else.

If I think back to when I was 'tsk tsk'ing about the gays in my church youth group days, what was it I was really tsk tsking about?

The sex.

Yup. 

We even had a stupid little hand signal that symbolised that two penises or two vaginas didn't belong together.

I don't remember a discussion about the evils of deep intimacy.
I don't remember a discussion about how filthy it was to wrap yourself in the arms of the person who knew you better than anyone.
I don't remember a discussion about how gross it was to share every day with your best friend.

Because everyone has fetishised the sex. 

We have to keep the innocents safe from the sex.
We can't have kids thinking that anyone has sex...let alone gay people!

I don't think kids are confused. Kids just accept things that adults accept. Two girls are the lead couple in a Disney film. Whatever. They probably will only care what colour the dress is.

When it comes to confusion, I think that comes down to the adults. Adults are confused about what constitutes a relationship. Adults are confused about how being gay isn't just about who you are having sex with. Its about relationships. Its about love. Its about boring shit like picking curtains and taking out the rubbish. Its about sharing things that nobody else knows. Its about trusting that person with that.

The more kids know that you can do that with a man or a woman, the happier everyone will be.