Things my mother taught me before she left me, vol. 3

A series on the surprise wins of an ambivalent mother

This week I joined Keltie Maguire on her podcast, Kids or Childfree. Keltie is a motherhood clarity coach, helping people who are on the fence about having children come to a confident decision. I was very happy to talk to Keltie about my choice to not have kids, how my mother’s neglect affected me, and the research I’ve done on maternal ambivalence. We also discuss all the ways our culture insists women do have kids — from television and movies to books and politics. I hope you’ll listen, and if you don’t already, follow her podcast.

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This is a series on the surprise wins of an ambivalent mother. Vol. 1 is here, Vol. 2 is here.

We tend to think bravery means the absence of fear — that some people feel fear, and others don’t. But the only difference between “brave” people and everyone else is that they decide to push through and do the scary thing anyway.

There are a million more eloquent versions of this idea. I most recently heard it on an episode of Modern Family of all places. The point is, I think everyone has been brave at some point.

I learned this lesson in 2016, when I moved to London again. I had already spent a year in London to complete an MA, and upon returning to the U.S., found I just liked England better.

I gave my notice at work and on my lease, sold all my furniture, dishes and glassware to a young guy who had just moved into my apartment building, and rounded up my siblings to take all the clothes I didn’t plan to bring with me. In the final week before I moved, I stayed in the guest room of my dad and stepmom’s house, where I spent at least half my time sobbing, wondering, what the hell am I doing?

I share this story with anyone I meet who confides in me that they are feeling afraid of doing that thing. Because when you know in your gut that something is the right thing to do, even though it feels terrifying and maybe idiotic, you just have to find a way to see it through.

It was a good two or three years before I stopped sobbing every time I left the US, following a visit with my family.

Each time I left I wondered, again, why I lived so far away. But the minute I touched down in London, I felt exuberant. And now, I don’t cry — not usually, at least. I know I’m in the right place.

My grandmother often goes on about how proud she is that I was “brave” enough to move abroad. She compares it to her move in the 1950s, from Arequipa, Peru to the United States. But to me there is no comparison. She was barely twenty, a new wife, a new mother, and she didn’t speak English. She didn’t know how to cook or run a household — all that was done for her in Peru, and so she traded leisure for a modest family life in America. She joined clubs and met new people and invented jobs for herself: translator, language teacher. She was brave. But she never told me about how scary it was for her until very recently.

It’s easy to dismiss my grandmother’s praise because her praise is always in excess. She tells me all the time that I’m the greatest thing that ever happened in her life (she probably tells all her grandkids this; she does wonders for our self-esteem). But it’s more difficult to dismiss others — strangers, even — who insist it was brave to move abroad. I forget that it was, in fact, terrifying. I didn’t know anyone. I didn’t have a job. I lived in an attic bedroom in an older couple’s house. I wasn’t sure how or if I would ever get to extend my visa. I had no good reason for moving, except that I wanted to.

Where did I get the nerve?

My mother?

By the time I moved, my mother and I hadn’t had any kind of relationship for about ten years. There were spells where she sent occasional text messages, and I responded, but after a couple of weeks she would invent a reason to end our contact. If we had been in touch when I decided to leave, it’s hard to know what she would have said.

When I was twenty, I joined a study abroad program that took me to Cambridge for six weeks. She was incredibly supportive: she threw me a surprise going away party; found money from who-knows-where to help cover some of the fees; and then, upon my return, remarked (proudly? resignedly?) that I’d one day move to England for good.

On the other hand, up until she cut off contact with me, she was angry about anything that distracted me from her and my sisters. My first boyfriend, band practice, college, my friends…It’s hard for me to believe she would ever support me moving away from her, because it would be undeniable evidence she was not the center of my world.

Still, she preached independence for as long as I can remember, and in some respects she was living proof of bravery and resilience: she left home as a teenager, joined the military, moved across the country. She had me at 21. When I look at pictures of her holding me as an infant, I am at once astonished and terrified on her behalf. Her face is flushed with a calm satisfaction, but I’m sure I can see a tinge of bewilderment. Or maybe it’s fear.

My mother is the first feminist I ever met, before I knew what it meant. I’m not sure she would consider herself one, but she told me constantly to never rely on a man for anything. I know this isn’t the only requirement for being a feminist, and she may not meet expectations on other elements of feminism, but still…She told me to learn to take care of myself; in fact, she forced me to take care of myself. On repeat, she played “I Am Woman” and “You Don’t Own Me” and “Strong Enough” and belted out every word like a diva. I did, too.

She also played “You and Me Against the World” — something I find myself pondering time and again. The record version ends with a very cheesy I love you mommy/I love you, too, baby that I loved to recite with her.

When I interviewed my sister for the first Bad Mothers podcast episode, we discussed the fact that my sisters and I have coped relatively well, compared to other people who have the same kind of (literal) traumatic relationship and experiences we’ve had with our mother. My reasoning for this is that I wasn’t aware of how unusual and difficult life was with my mom until I was well past it. At that point, all I could do was look back and appreciate that I had gotten through it relatively unscathed.

So, I started to think: If I could do that, what else could I do?

I left my hometown and found a job in D.C. I felt way in over my head, but told myself I could learn what I needed to know. Within seven or eight years, I could afford to live by myself, and even house my little sister who just graduated from college.

I traveled abroad with my friends, and then alone. I’d memorize the walking directions from my hotel to the cathedral or bookstore or restaurant I wanted to visit, then try to wander there without looking at my phone.

And if I could travel alone, why not move again to someplace I really loved? And if I could do that job I used to think I couldn’t do, why not pursue my one lifelong dream? I started an advanced degree in my thirties, and then proudly put Dr. in front of my name just days after my 40th birthday.

Probably the scariest thing I’ve ever done is live without a mom, but the salve was learning why I had to live without her. By learning to see her as a whole human, with private fears and aspirations that were entirely separate from being a mother, I took her abandonment less personally. Instead of feeling angry and sad, I began to see the entire experience as a lesson in prioritizing myself. Maybe if she had done that sooner, life would have been easier on all of us. It’s too painful to stifle what we really want; too often it results in some kind of explosion or lifelong regret. I want neither of those things for myself.

I don’t think I could have had any of most joyful or fulfilling experiences of my life if I hadn’t learned I could live without her, first.

And when one of us is gone
And one of us is left to carry on
Then remembering will have to do
Our memories alone will get us through
Think about the days of me and you
You and me against the world