24th February 2006

Apparently we are young to adopt.

I want to take my own risk; I want to have a baby. Partly because the new child laws make it almost impossible to adopt without having the fear of god shoved at you, with all of the statistics and the worries who would. It makes having children a very harsh reality.

Everyone I know seems to be getting pregnant, older people and people at work – and even on TV.

Why me? I really don’t get why him, a choice made once. I wanted to be married, I wanted that, I wanted the dress and the day and the ring and the silly surname vain – but once upon a time he said he wanted me. It wasn’t in a chapel, church, there was no priest or rabbi there was only us and an empty house and door between us and my tears falling down a sink.
As I remember it we had to talk, after all sorts of not really talking about it we sat on the shared sofa happy that we were going to live together. We had of course been living together but hadn’t been sharing rent, we were of course deeply in a relationship but I was in Barnet and he was in Bounds Green. His flat mates had agreed and so had we, we were going to live together but we had avoided the big conversation. Children.
Not a simple conversation when one of you is a genetic defect with a 50/50 chance of passing it on made more complicated still by the almost genetic fear of eternal damnation verse atheism. If I could have a baby and then terminate, if I was capable of knowing I had a life in side me and then having it tested and knowing it was the same as me and my brother and my dad and then killing it, then the conversation would have been quite a bit easier. But I am not a simple person; I am a non-practising catholic with all the guilt that goes with it (if I was still practising the guilt would be less) There we were having the hard moment deciding if we thought we should still bury our heads in the sand and forget that we would not be able to make the easy decisions in life ‘leave the condom off baby let;s make a baby’ you know the kind. If you do know the kind then you are not me.
That only happens on the very tail of my period when we are both, ex catholic and atheist, hoping for a miracle. Funny isn’t it I spent a heavy part of my young sex life in perpetual fear of getting pregnant and now I spend my adult hood in fear that I will never be a mother, ever.
I digress, so there we are talking about our non-existent baby, our non-existent future and we are deciding on it. I cry, I get frightened and I need to make a choice. It turns out this is my decision. He is very clear about his philosophy on life and when it begins. I worry that I don’t know if I can love him as much as I should and I worry that I love him too much and I worry that if I was with a less intelligent man I might be getting pregnant there and then which I don’t think is financially a good plan.
I cry more, he doesn’t and through it all it gets very intense, I don’t remember much of it because I feel that at some point I have to black out. I do remember saying ‘ I need the toilet’ on the pretence of blowing my nose and actually have a pee. I cry, I ask god for help and I cry and I realise that I need to decide between the man I’m fairly sure I love and the baby I will not be able to have with him because either we will never have one or if he got his way I would have to terminate, abort, cut up, destroy, kill one that had a genetic defect, my, my dads and my brother genetic defect.
Nice.

I hold on to the sink with my hands as I sink down, beneath it, the light isn’t on I don’t want to see my reflection and I sob. I hear him at the door. He is telling me he loves me and I cry and I tell him I have to choose my baby. I have to do that. He asks, begs me to open the door and I say a prayer and I tell him again that I can’t do it. He sounds like he is crying and he tells me that he wants to be with me.
I wait for a sign, it doesn’t come and so I open the door.
He holds me while I tell him I can’t give up my child, he says he knows and that’s something he is willing to accept. Stupid bastard. In hindsight he really should have broken it off with me and then he would be free from this. He is too clever and although he says there is no such thing as being IN love, it feels like if there was such a thing he definitely feels it for me.
Idiot. I wouldn’t choose me.

And that was that, there it was, the moment we joined, no cake, or bridesmaids, no photographer just a moment when we became us. Since then we have been close to taking it all back and then we don’t. Love is a funny thing.

We talked today about adoption, again and we are young to adopt. I know we will be great parents but this is fucking scary, I haven’t spoken to anyone with any adoption experience who say, oh yes do it, the best thing that ever happened to us. Adoption where both of you have no genetic connection is hard. Children are hard work. I know I’m a teacher. Some of my pupils are wonderful, I love them already but some wind me up.
I love my niece, right now she is 8 but she can be a pain in the ass but I love her, can I love a child that I don’t know? Can you fall in love with a child, should you? ARRRRRRGHHHH

We could be great parents.
50/50

The tick list is numbing. You get a tick list, it’s numbing. How do you know if you can handle any of these things? Disabled, stupid, mentally disabled, HIV positive, handicapped, potential killer, parents were drug addicts, under 11, over 5. If it is of your own womb it is your own fault, if it is from someone else’s it isn’t. You aren’t thinking about a human, your thinking value for money, traits, nature verse nurture. I say all this and I don’t know because I’ve never been a mother and at this rate I never will be.

Adoption is a difficult choice, it is not an easy alternative, no wonder so many 40 something potentials go for I.V.F and that emotional angst or if they are really rich they buy a ‘foreign ‘baby. We are not even 30. ‘Young’ like the woman said.

I want to give love and help a child, or children, be wonderful people, I want them to play music, like art and enjoy my company. I want to give advice, watch them grow and help them fulfil their dreams. I want to be proud of them. Is this too much about what I want? Really, if you think about it having children is the most selfish thing to do.

I’m a teacher. I want. I’m scared.

I’m not a mother. Should I be?

It is ten to ten