by Dawn French
She conceived you.
She grew you inside her.
She delivered you.
She is your origin. You lived there. Right there.
Like it or not, she is the root of you. You are made of her.
Now, that doesn’t mean you ARE her. Certainly not, God forbid, but yes, you started there. My body refused to co-operate in the baby-making department, or more accurately, our bodies refused. It’s so easy to jump to conclusions when a couple are going through the pain of infertility. I remember so many instances where friends and family assumed the problem lay solely with me. I think this is because if a man has fertility issues it is seen as somehow speaking to the very heart of his manhood, and no-one dares, whereas women are … what? Tougher? Less sensitive? It’s rot, of course. Our doc explained that in most cases both people in the couple have issues, sometimes simultaneously, sometimes not, so it’s commonly quite difficult to simplify it and know exactly which one is culpable at any given moment. It’s chemistry, biology, and fate having a row in a petri dish. They come to an agreement, but you don’t get to find out what it is until weeks later when the brawl continues into your womb.
It was a difficult, testing time, just when our marriage was at its most fresh and exciting, this nagging low-level longing crept in. It was like my belly was calling to me to be a mother, one of the most certain and powerful urges I’d ever felt. And it kept relentlessly not happening.
And I wondered why it didn’t work?
I even wondered if perhaps we weren’t supposed to have a child; if it was somehow deemed that we shouldn’t?
Then, with IVF, miraculously it DID work.
Then, within a few weeks, it didn’t.
Big grief. More scans. More injections.
We started to dilute our happiness with this giant sadness.
We kept it all quiet, private.
So, chirpy normal life was going on all around.
Unaware.
Normal life, like when your friend gets pregnant by accident.
And you go with her for her abortion.
And you don’t know if you love her or hate her.
And NONE of it is fair.
But then …
You work out that OF COURSE YOU LOVE HER.
It’s just that life is a big ugly awkward cruel bitch.
And you surrender.
And stop trying to make a baby.
And start trying to find a baby.
And that leads you to a mammoth adventure …
Oh boy, though, do I understand the ache of that longing. It consumes you.
The interesting thing about the adoption process is that the social worker urges you to explore whether you feel you have grieved your infertility sufficiently. In other words, have you accepted it and said a proper goodbye to the child you will never have? I’m not sure exactly when I felt this had definitely happened, but the moment my little baby daughter was placed in my arms, any remnant of that longing became vapour and disappeared.
All there was, was her. Beautiful, bonny brown her.
Then, bam, it hit me. The awesome responsibility of her. A foot-long wriggling baby was going to be my biggest-ever commitment. Everything I thought mattered most until then just paled in comparison. I was her MOTHER for God’s sake!
I am the one she will always rely on.
I am her protector and her advocate.
I am her role model for her own future motherhood, should she choose it.
I am called ‘Mum’. Awesome.
I very quickly understood various things that became crashing realities and still are. Things like:
I can’t always get it right. My own mum used to say, ‘We don’t do perfect’, and it really helped. I was constantly doubting if I handled things correctly or if I said the right thing at the right moment. I know I often didn’t, and it helps to know that it’s OK.
I ALWAYS LOVE HER even if sometimes I don’t like her choices or her behaviour. It’s a God-given love and I am so grateful for it; it’s seen us through some challenging moments.
She isn’t me. Not in the slightest. It’s nothing to do with biology, it’s to do with the somewhat arrogant expectation that a kid will want to be a bit like you, want to emulate the family and how it works. Of course, they WON’T necessarily. This doesn’t rule out the fact that she will no doubt enjoy family jokes or habits, but she will need to forge her own personality and that means straying from the furrow already ploughed. She seems to be a strange stranger to me, sometimes, but it’s OK.
NEVER EVER will I attempt to be her ‘friend’. I am not, and never will be and that’s right. She can make and reject as many friends good and bad as she likes, but a mother needs to parent you, guide you and love you, not befriend you.
Step back and let mistakes happen, without helicoptering in to rescue all the time. I am still learning this and it might well be my hardest lesson. The fear is that I will misjudge it and the difficult ‘tough love’ will feel like neglect or the wrong choice. This is an area I have had to learn bravery in, and one thing I know for sure is that I would love to raise a brave kid, so I absolutely have to be just that.
The way we speak to kids becomes their inner voice. I read this somewhere, I can’t remember where now, and I just know it’s true. Be mindful of how you talk to and with them, they are set to record. I have heard myself coming out of her mouth on numerous occasions and it’s fairly sobering!
Nothing is how I thought it would be. Actually, I’m not even sure I consciously thought much about how it would be, but I have somehow imagined an idea of parenting that comes from every representation I’ve seen on TV or film or in print. Why on earth I’ve been such a sucker, and bought all that aspirational crap, I don’t know. Especially when my own actual experience of being a kid, mixed with everything I witness in all the real families around me, is tons more accurate and far preferable. Duh. Why, oh why, when I became a mother, did I think that a great childhood could only happen for my kid if the following ingredients were in plenteous evidence?:
• home-made cupcakes
• professional-quality face-painting
• flowery wellingtons
• festivals
• teepees
• angel/fairy wings
• Cath Kidston everything
• glamping
• babyccinos
• fairy lights
• beds in shape of a unicorn
• hats that make you look like a frog/raccoon
• trainers that put on own light show
• learn baby Mandarin educational toy
• baby gym membership
I’m sure all of the above are perfectly lovely, but I have to shake myself and remember that the following work just fine too:
• warm coat
• park
• crisps
• beach
• baked beans
• books
• Curly Wurlys
• skipping rope
I never felt authentic trying to emulate a Boden catalogue. It’s gorgeous, but in truth I don’t really know how to do it, so I gave up trying and instead did whatever came next that looked like good fun, and that was a blessed relief. Don’t set yourself up to fail by trying to be someone else, it can NEVER work. Kids are the first to sniff out a disingenuous life. Make it real. It’s not hard. In fact, it’s miles easier than pretending.
Gilda Radner said that ‘Motherhood is the biggest gamble in the world. It is the glorious life force. It’s huge and scary – it’s an act of infinite optimism.’ When I find myself overwhelmed with the sheer size of the responsibility it often brings, those last words are the key. Optimism. That’s right. I feel optimistic about the lives and the futures of my children, more so even than my own. I fear for the challenges they will face, some of which will be new to only their generation, but I have unquestionable faith in the actual people that they are, and I trust in their ability to face those chall
enges. So in them, all my optimism lives.
When I say ‘them’, I mean I have more than one child these days, because I am a stepmum, and it’s honestly one of the biggest miracles of my life.
When I say ‘child’, they are of course adults really, but aren’t your kids always children somehow?
I suppose I could refer to them as my stepson and stepdaughter, but there’s something about the ‘step’ part that implies that I am a step away from caring as much. Of course I recognize and respect that I am not their blood mother. I wasn’t there during their tiny years, I’m not part of the mesh of their family history, but I’m here now, and I ain’t goin’ anywhere. I have never met two people that I so easily, so instantly could love. The very first thing I noted about both of them was that, however much they thought they were covering it up, I knew, from the very first moment, that they were checking out if I was a good enough option for their dad, because they adore him and couldn’t bear for him to be hurt.
She checked out if I was kind enough.
He checked out if I was funny enough.
Together they manned the drawbridge at the entrance of his heart and, however polite or gentle, I knew that none should pass unless they passed muster. Once through that test, once accepted as sufficient or better, the generosity with which they welcomed me and my girl in was heart-stopping. We very quickly realized that we were all meant to be together forever, and even though he and I hadn’t moved on to the next level yet – we were still in ‘dating’ mode – the kids, all three, started to petition fairly publicly for nuptials. It would have been bum-clenchingly embarrassing if it wasn’t so fabulously inevitable. All of a sudden, I had two new fully cooked kids in my life. Two humans full to the brim with ready-made personalities and acres of hopes and dreams.
What happened next, and has been ongoing for the last five years really, is … trust. Simple as that. Simple, yet ASTOUNDING when you consider that trust might be the last thing two different families who have been through two different divorces might be able to do.
It wasn’t just me ’n’ him getting married.
It was me ’n’ my girl marrying him ’n’ his girl and boy.
ALL of us got married, and as we stood there in the Cornish sea air and made our promises in front of all our beloveds, we wrapped that commitment around them all. In it together, bruises ’n’ all. Betrothed.
All three of my kids have come to me in an interesting way, adopted or inherited. When Good Granny was alive, she commented to me that my daughter might not have come via my actual body, but that she definitely came via my heart. It’s sentimental but true. Then later, two more arrived by the same route, and the love I feel for all three is visceral. Animal, almost. I would fight for them, I would lay my life down, I would have to, they ARE my life.
It’s true to say that if you are properly connected, you are only ever as happy as your LEAST happy kid. I know this from personal experience. I have spent many hours over-thinking and over-feeling what’s happening in their lives. I have no idea how to not do this … but I’m going to try and learn in this lifetime. I don’t want to know how to disconnect from them, just how to disconnect from the worry. It seeps into every moment. But then, remember, ‘we don’t do perfect’. Thanks, Mum.
So, as a mum, is there anything I would hope to pass on to them? Of course I would love to gift my immense knowledge of all things in nature … names of trees and hedgerow flora and stuff, but the truth is I don’t know any of that. That’s big stuff. I only know small stuff, and so that is what I will pass on with pride. Stuff like:
• every day, clean slate
• be kind
• don’t be late, value other people’s time
• know what you can afford
• don’t let anyone tell you you can’t sing
• don’t mix grape and grain
• dancing is a mood-shifter, do it every day, especially in lifts
• always poke fun at powerful people
• listen
• failure is useful
• you don’t have to set fire to yourself to keep someone else warm
• don’t contaminate chocolate with fruit
• take time for a decent poo
• be generous
• chew properly
• wrap up warm
• smile
I’d be blummin’ delighted if any of that stuck. Sometimes I think we might be so busy trying to be great mothers that we forget it’s the moments we don’t notice or see, that THEY do. Those are the little Lego life blocks that go to build their childhoods, so that’s really what we pass on, without even realizing it.
As Mother’s Day approaches, and I will spend it without mine, I know where the valuable memories are, and I know how they sustain me. I know, for instance, that the pots I will use to cook lunch were hers, as were the rolling pin, the big wooden spoon and the water jug. I use them pretty much every day, just like she did, and when I get them out of the cupboard my childhood comes with them. My safe, happy childhood where my big-hearted mum cooked for us and where I never once doubted how loved I was … I am.
I know some people fear turning into their mothers. I certainly see her creeping further forward on to my face every single day in the mirror, but, y’know what? I LOVED her face. It’s more than welcome on mine. She was here first, she was strong, and self-respecting. I should be so lucky to be a living reminder of her.
Make way for the mighty mothers!
A few of the people who have made me laugh the most.
1. Morecambe and Wise – My whole family weak with laughter.
2. Victoria Wood – Goose fat and swimming hat.
3. Jennifer Saunders – Resting on my laurels.
4. Elsie and Doris Waters – The trailblazers.
5. Sarah Silverman – Want as BF.
6. Lucille Ball – Lips and pies.
7. Laurel and Hardy – One silly, one funny.
8. Richard Pryor – Because of everything.
9. Robin Williams – Because he was Robin Williams.
10. Jessica Hynes – Have slept with her so have to include her.
Your list starts here.
1. French and Saunders (this is non-negotiable).
2. _____________________________________
3. _____________________________________
4. _____________________________________
5. _____________________________________
6. _____________________________________
7. _____________________________________
8. _____________________________________
9. _____________________________________
10. _____________________________________
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APRIL
Behold! Daffodils and tulips and all the bright confident light of April. Behold the Beauty.
Joan Collins said, ‘The problem with Beauty is that it’s like being born rich and getting poorer.’
I guess that’s true if you’re only thinking of Beauty as something on the outside of your body. And only if you regard getting older and the experience of physical change as solely deterioration. I know that scientifically we are all ageing from the moment we’re born, but when it comes to Beauty, we make tons of stops along the way, and some of them are surprising.
Of course, physical Beauty is key, it’d be preposterous to deny it. The first minute we lay eyes on a person, we make all kinds of suppositions based on an endless feed of responses to superficial questions. Are they attractive? Are they fashionable? What is their skin/hair/teeth like? How tall/short/fat/thin are they? And on and on …
I so wish our first impressions could be concluded by asking much better questions like: Is this a substantial person? Can they look me in the eye? Do I instinctively believe they are honest/kind/funny? What’s unique abou
t the way they look? Do I trust them? What’s lovely about them? Or intriguing?
I am as guilty as the next person of the superficial nonsense. Aesthetics are important. I know that. I know it matters that we are truthful about what we like when we look. BUT. Doesn’t it also matter HOW we see? I can’t bear that I have so clearly and so easily been manipulated into operating in such a narrow-minded way. The real sin of this brand of shallow, dabbly, instant judgement is that you can so easily overlook the tippest-toppest of most excellent people. I very nearly did that myself …
I was writing my second novel, Oh Dear Silvia, which had a character in it who was a cocaine addict. I realized that my knowledge was massively restricted, so I did what you do when your mum used to run a rehab before she retired, and I called her to see how I could do some proper research. She recommended that I talk to the chap who took over from her as CEO when she retired – maybe he could help? Oh yes, him. Her colleague, who I’d met many, many times over the years. Tall bloke, silver hair, soft accent … him. I called him and he offered to try and set up a meeting between me and a couple of folk who use the facility he runs. I was dead impressed by the fact that, of course, his concern was more for the well-being, safety and confidentiality of those people. My research needs were way down his list of priorities. On the appointed day, I turned up and there he was on the step, ostensibly to greet me, but really, he was guarding everything and everyone inside. As he does.
I followed him up the stairs to his office. He had set the room up in such a way that, annoyingly, the two people I was due to interview were sitting with the only window at their backs, rendering them virtual silhouettes. It didn’t really matter, I could see them well enough. They both spoke openly, generously, for over an hour, answering all my questions and giving me tons of helpful information regarding my story, and I knew by the end of my time with them that I had an authentic character, and that what I was intending to write about her was grounded in truth. This was a massive relief and when it was over and they were gone, I was happy to grab a quick cuppa with him in that same office and chew the cud a bit, but I was on a strict writing schedule, so didn’t have much time for yap.
