Helen Gallagher
It was Christmas Eve and the decision had been made for me to meet his 3 adult children. Words cannot express the nerves which consumed me. I am well known for my paranoia and meeting 3 adult children at one time was a recipe for paranoia indulgence.
It actually passed without too much angst. Being an extrovert and fully versed with meeting strangers and filling voids in conversation together with their outgoing, vivacious personalities the night didn’t just pass but it was thoroughly enjoyable.
Since that never to be forgotten night, I have enjoyed holidays, meals, days out, evenings in and many fun times with all of them. I am incredibly grateful to be accepted by them and even more so that I actually consider myself their friend. I do not relate to being a “step parent”. I am too young for that and given that I am more their age than their dad’s this was never going to be on the agenda. I am their friend. I do feel an air of protection towards them. Maybe some of my maternal instinct to want to be there for them and make sure they are ok. I guess in a similar way to my closest friends.
Life was good. Me and my partner were living our best lives, learning to deal with each others nuances and life was starting to feel sane again…
It was on a Sunday afternoon and as was customary, my partner’s daughter and boyfriend were around for a Sunday dinner. She had a glowing look when she arrived and something just told me what was about to come. I just knew and it wasn’t long before she handed a card over to her dad which contained the announcement.
She was going to become a mother, my partner was going to become a grandparent and I just felt like I had been tossed into space and was looking down at the scene unfolding. As I parachuted myself down to “safety” the tears welled in my eyes. Tears of absolute joy as this had been all she had wanted and waited for for so long. There had been times of real sadness for her that her time hadn’t come and a part of me wondered whether I was going to be the only one childless not by choice. I truly hoped that was not going to be the case.
Whilst I had endless tears of joy they were interrupted with floods of tears which felt like they rose from the depths of my stomach, from the wrenching which I felt inside that a baby was going to be so entrenched in our lives when I had taken 4 years learning how to cope with childlessness.
My world, for a short while was thrown into disarray and I had no idea how it would pan out or even if it would settle any where near to being a tenable situation for me. How could it? The one thing I wanted but now could not have was going to be thrust before me and the man who I adored was about to love and nurture his daughter’s child and feel a love he will never share with myself. The visceral grief had returned and I felt floored.
The mixture of feelings was something I could never really articulate. I felt immense happiness for his daughter and for him and in the same moment I felt alone, misunderstood, wounded and confused. I think that so many of these feelings were feelings I had been conditioned to believe I should feel and I shall go on to explain why..
My partner was amazing and I can be honest that in previous times he did not understand how somebody who had not ended up with children (in his eyes I had chosen this or at least accepted it) could still yearn to love and nurture a child of their own. Surely I should be happy and grateful for all I had but I will be eternally grateful to him for seeing into my eyes and recognising my pain. He put his arm around me and just sat with me, completely unsure of what to say or do but just him acknowledging that I was feeling something other than what had naturally filled his heart with joy.
The months passed and the pregnancy evolved. I was close to it and what I had envisaged as being an amazing few months of magic were just not all I had once thought of them to be. I looked on at the changes, the body challenges, the intimate complications which arose and I would often find myself refilling my Sauvignon glass and feeling a sense of calm and “ok”ness.
I remember thinking to myself “I think I am ok with this”, “I think I can cope” but hey who knows. How could I ever know until the day that little baby enters our world and becomes an integral part of our family.
The weeks running up to the birth were mixed with anticipation, excitement and trepidation. This was such a huge thing for my partner and his family and I truly wanted to embrace it, to be part of it and to enjoy it. My head and heart were in conflict, my stomach was in knots. I was afraid as if the future hung on my reaction and ability to be ok yet I felt I had no control over what I would feel or how things would transpire. It was at this time that I discovered the true power of meditation.
I refused to meditate at school, being quiet and alone with my thoughts had always scared me but until I had been introduced to the true nature of meditation and that it is actually when you are not in your own thoughts that true peace and calm can be achieved. I had a 1 : 1 meditation focused on self care and protection and a true calm transcended me. For the first time in 9 months I felt in control, I did not need to believe the pre conditioned rhetoric that without my own child I was unable to love and cherish any other. I opened my eyes up to the realisation that I could experience something truly special with this new little life if I chose this. I could be their friend, just like I was their mum’s. I could bestow all the love I was holding inside onto this new member of “our” family.
I say “our” as this too is an area of perplexion, an avenue of doubt which I have often been down. Was this my family? I am not married to my partner although we now live together. They were not my children and as previously explained we were not in the child/ step parent arena. I felt like an outsider. Now I am in no way saying this was imposed on me by anybody but myself but not having the biological role of mother or now grandmother, I questioned my own credibility in being a member of their family with no entitlement to be part of that babies life. My eyes welled whenever I felt this.
Well the day came and the beautiful bundle of joy came into our lives. Wait for it…. I was ok. Yes I felt nothing but joy, excitement and love. I was ok! I was ok ! I was ok and I couldn’t have been more relieved.
My partner and I are Grandpops and Grandmops (don’t ask how we arrived at this). I guess it is still my acceptance that I am not truly deserving of the title grandma or nanny and to be honest I don’t have any desire to be that. I am Grandmops, mops, Grandmoppy (send in a high pitched, playful voice).
My heart is full still. I am enjoying being a part of her life and my role is friend first grandmops second. This is a little person who I can be there for and guide in life. I can play my own unique role which has not been predefined and my only goal is to be a hugely compassionate, influential and nurturing presence.
I wonder now how much of the fear and trepidation I felt was born from societal pressure that without being a biological mother life lacked meaning and without having my own children I was devoid of immense love for another.
Photo by Joshua Earle on Unsplash