What Does It Mean To Be Done?
I'm at the point in my life where more and more of my friends (and myself) are done having kids, and while I know I don't want more, I'm not sure how to feel about it.
When I was a teenager, I used to count the mysteries I still had to solve - savoring them like still wrapped presents. What would it be like to be kissed? To be in love? Where would I go to college? Where would I live? What would my wedding look like? Who would I marry? What would it feel like to give birth? To be a mother? What would it feel like to die?
I realize there are untold mysteries still ahead of me, ones I can’t even imagine, but except for dying, the major ones I’ve already answered. And with each moment revealed, I felt a tiny bit of sadness for the loss of that mystery - the end of whatever morbid curiosity I had with some of the bigger questions (like giving birth, which I looked forward to like a scientist - so curious to see what my body would do), the dawn after Christmas feeling for the celebratory ones. Oh, so this is what it’s like…this is what living is like.
As my kids get older, the mom friends I’ve had and the mom friends I’m making are also getting older. We’re (mostly) at the point where we’re either “done” having kids, or pregnant with our last ones. When we see a new baby we all coo, then whisper to each other I’m SO glad to be done with THAT. I’m dying to rub my cheeks against an infant’s velvety head, then hand that infant back to her mom. I am done. Done. Done. Done. And yet!
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