Chapter 1
The Meditation of Conception
My daughter’s name is Raffaella-Bianca.
No middle name, but considering her first name that is absolutely ok, don’t you think?
I also have no middle name, but if I were to give myself one, my self-chosen middle name would be Phoenix. Yes, it means exactly what you think it means. I am happy to see you get the message. At the time of my childhood, at the location of my birth, it was not fashionable to give babies a middle name. It was hardly fashionable to be, let alone have anything, much less something like a middle name.
My own lack of a middle name does not imply anything about my daughter having or not having one. There is another explanation why she has none: The angels communicated to me only “Raffaella-Bianca”. Oh yes, by the time I became old enough to think about having children, my inborn psychic abilities were in full blow.
Very early on I already knew I would be a mom, sooner or later. I felt motherhood was part of my human experience for my present incarnation. I guess I went about thinking of motherhood in linear terms. I felt I was something of a born expert due to the fact that all my life I loved children and children loved me. Little did I know that there is also a non-linear aspect to motherhood that governs mothers’ and children’s lives independent of affection and other positive relational ingredients such as mutual trust and respect.
While linearity gives us a certain sense of control, it is non-linearity that destroys every little bit of control, real or imaginary. At no point in time are we completely in control or completely out of control, but at all points in time we experience a combination of linearity and non-linearity. Each one of us is located somewhere between “less in control” and “more in control”. We have something of a habit or a comfort zone regarding our position on the continuum.
Just a note on the side: I do not truly believe we are talking about a genuine continuum, but I decide to use the word as a representation of what I mean. If it is true the universe and Life are holographic, then I need to admit that I have no idea how to represent holography. I am open to learning though. So, in case you should happen to know how it goes, let me know!
Returning to linearity, non-linearity, our sense of control and lack thereof, it should be clear that different aspects of our life can differ significantly in their degrees of sense of control and our subjective perception of it. At any given time, we can differ in our perceptions depending if we talk about our personal life, our work, our relationships be they close or professional, our health, our finances, our spiritual growth, our identity in the different roles we play and functions we fulfill, our achievements, accomplishments and successes. Feel free to add more of your own categories, if you so desire. Individuality and uniqueness coupled with their expression are very important to me. Freedom is our highest value as humans. Thus, feel free and be free!
Regarding my wish to have a baby, I need to mention that I was ready to get pregnant because all pertinent factors felt so right to me: Above all I was in a happy relationship with a very loving man who was a gentle soul and enjoyed togetherness and harmony, was committed to our relationship and who had been part of my life for more than four years of continuous stability, trust, joy and fun. And aside from this wonderful foundation for our strong wish for parenthood, I was towards the end of my studies and had already found a way of making money by working with children which I was planning to continue doing after my graduation and parallel to motherhood, all this by choice and not by necessity on my part, which was never questioned, criticized or hindered by my boyfriend.
So far, so good! That’s what I think, that’s what you think, that’s what we all think! And we are right… from the perspective of linearity! Boom! Not caused by linearity, but by (what else?) non-linearity!! Boom! Booom!! Non-linearity was mean enough to veto my wish for motherhood! I did not get pregnant! No matter what, I did not get pregnant! And non-linearity could not care less!
Month after month my entity in all totality and complexity were challenged! Not getting pregnant took me places… I had not even known existed. My boyfriend was a bit disappointed each time it was clear we were not yet pregnant, but he was as always patient, calm, understanding, willing to wait as long as it took. I don’t know how he managed that. All I know is that I did not. My dedication to motherhood slowly, but surely, mutated to obsession. Our parents never caused me to feel pressured. They were neutral and waited to see what would happen when. I even felt more accepted by my boyfriend’s mom who started to refer to me as “daughter-in-law” which was quite a jump from her original complaint against me at the beginning of our relationship for not being “the housewife-type”! In the 80’s?! Could it be that one of us was born too late and the other one too early?
I always felt that I was born a bit ahead of my time, but that had nothing to do with not being “the housewife-type”. It was nice to see that she became more open as we felt ready for a baby. All prospective grandparents were in favor of our plans and they all gave us the space to have things evolve. Friends, on the other hand, were so excited for us that they used every opportunity to ask about our progress, especially the ones who already had children. Their interest and care made me feel like a failure. With the passing of time, one more feeling associated itself to all the others: A sense of loss! Why “failure”, why “sense of loss”? No idea. Best not to rationalize. After months and months of not getting pregnant, a mindset I did not like at all, it was time for me to make one step back and sit down and ponder on some of the deeper levels of Life. I asked myself if any of the things I had been interested in before deciding to get pregnant still interested me. My answer was a resounding “Yes!”, as always accompanied by my typical enthusiasm, commitment, motivation and all my other drivers. That already sounded great to me, pregnant or not!
Pondering more on it all, I helped myself get out of my mess by remembering Algebra. I hear you ask “Algebra? Of all things?” Yes. Algebra teaches us that “x is equal to 8” (or any other solution from a theoretical pool of infinite solutions). I defined my solution as “pregnant is now”. That definition was emotionally inadequate. Just as Algebra changes “x is equal to 8” to “x is equal to or greater than 8”, I changed “pregnant is now” to “pregnant is now or later”. That made all the difference! The pressure was instantly all gone and with it all the negativity of my experience of not getting pregnant “now”! I was so relieved, so very relieved!
On top of using the algebraic analogy, I also used an energetic technique: I connected to my future little girl who was to be named Raffaella-Bianca and let her know that I would stop planning, but that I would expect her anytime and she was most welcome to come whenever she was ready! In her freedom, I found my freedom and regained my inner peace.
The minute I clarified my position with myself, my baby, Life and the universe, linearity and non-linearity were on speaking terms again and everything returned to a wonderful flow of events just as I had known from before. I shifted gears and changed the short-term order of my priorities. My first wish was to go to graduate school in the US. Said and done. Getting organized took about a year of preparation. My boyfriend was as always very supportive of my plans.
As soon as it became clear that I was going to attend my first choice academic program, however, his attitude started changing, at the beginning only in subtle ways, but as my departure approached his resistance became more overt. He appeared somehow angry, never saying anything in front of anyone who congratulated me to the upcoming event, but turning into a stubborn little boy as soon as we were alone. I found him… childish, in the unpleasant way.
There was something new in his behavior that had not surfaced before, not because it had not been there – I am convinced of that – but simply due to “lack of opportunity”. I continued being as positive as always about our relationship. I was willing to help my boyfriend through, what I regarded as, this difficult “transition phase”. To me there was no contradiction whatsoever between advancing my education and as a result my professional development and harnessing my relationship. To my boyfriend there seemed to be an “either/or” situation: Either my Master in Psychology in the US or our relationship.
No matter how optimistic I was, things were not the same anymore. Especially after leaving Europe, his resistance grew and grew. He was worried about how his life far away from me would be. Since I had encouraged him a few years earlier to work for an American company which he started doing and enjoyed thoroughly, I suggested to him to talk to his company both in Vienna and in the US and find a solution after explaining to them our situation. I knew a solution could have been found. Not only that he never tried, but one day he exclaimed in no uncertain terms that I should stop getting on his nerves with my ideas. This style of communication had never characterized our relationship.
Not even the fact that I sent home the cutest baby girl clothes, above all dresses, seemed to help. I knew, that one-day sooner or later in this incarnation Raffaella-Bianca would look divine in them all. And she did. But my boyfriend did not believe it.
Each time we spoke on the phone I shared with him how thrilled I was to be in the States! He planned a vacation of a few weeks to come and visit me. I told him how happy I was to have him fly over. I also told him that I knew he would also love my new surroundings as much as I did! “If you say how much you love it all, I have to say I won’t!”
I was in such a shock about this completely unexpected statement and absolutely unusual dynamic in my boyfriend’s reaction that instantly I stopped all my previous efforts to neutralize his “transition phase” by answering, “If you already know that then it would be wisest not to come over!” I meant it and he felt it. After so many months of tensions and the straw that broke the camel’s back in the shape of his most childish comment ever “if you say this then I say that”, the escalation came to an abrupt end when I suggested that we could always make the decision to break up. He insisted on coming “because it was planned”. I know in his place I would have changed my plans.
My boyfriend came, we talked and together we decided to break up. We spent more time crying than sightseeing, but after a few days of intense relationship mourning we started to relax. In spite of the big change and the emotional pain associated with it, we enjoyed each other’s company and our surroundings. My boyfriend’s, now ex-boyfriend’s, anger and all that came with it disappeared. Our communication and interactions once again made us both feel comfortable and at peace as we had already felt even in the months before starting our relationship.
This was the one relationship of my life in which without being officially married, I felt married, actually I felt v-e-r-y married, if such a thing exists. At no time did I think of us as a perfect couple, but in spite of all our imperfections we had a high quality relationship. I’ve treasured it to this day. In the course of time I realized that relationships for me have two dimensions: Loved or not loved and understood or not understood. My feeling-very-married-relationship was of the loved-but-not-understood type. I had noticed very early on that we were different on some scales regarding our Life philosophy, above all concerning life aspirations, ambitions and professional identity. Although we always enjoyed each other’s company, I was at all times less symbiotic than him. As long as the symbiosis as defined by his needs did not get threatened, we did well in all respects. Beyond that came the breaking point. I surprised myself the most by the fact that the emotional harmony between us made me feel v-e-r-y married, in spite of the differences in our Life philosophy. The main thing for me seemed to be feeling loved, everything else was of secondary relevance, and no overlap was necessary as long as no major contradictions became apparent between us. For the person I was then, the relationship was a very good one.
It shocked me years later when I was officially married that I felt not-at-all-married!! A piece of paper might create the legal basis, but never an emotional bond. Needless to say, my marriage belongs into the not-loved-and-not-understood category. Maybe I will live to see the day – still in this incarnation – when I a-m married and f-e-e-l married too! It’s always great to have something special to look forward to in life! Don’t you agree? Wanna hear my vision about the man of my dreams? But I warn you! By the end of the paragraph you will wonder why they have not yet invented the armchair/couch/bed with a built-in safety belt for such funny moments in which you dangerously roll with laughter!
We all know about the women who dream of living rock stars who are all too unavailable. I am not into that at all! We also know about the women who dream of movie stars from classical masterpieces who are all too dead. I admit I might be tempted, but not that tempted! I take it all to the next level and dream of someone who is neither dead nor alive! I step into the fictional! I dream of Mr. Knightley, Mr. George Knightley! My Mr. Knightley! Who could ever be more of a dream guy than a fictional character? But because I am not of the romantic type, you need to hear my reasons. I am of the pragmatic type, you’ll see! My priority? A high-quality relationship… for as long as it lasts! First, Mr. Knightley is intelligent. Second, Mr. Knightley is a man of noble principles, impeccable manners and pleasant disposition who knows about the workings of the world! Third, Mr. Knightley has a great sense of humor. He knows how to handle situations and people, no matter how sensitive or ridiculous. He knows that everything in life has a beginning, a middle and an end, potentially even our relationship! And he knows what to do at all times. He is a great problem-solver, always finding the most elegant, mature solution! Who can dream more? And of more? Yes, we should not leave Mr. Darcy unmentioned: He has similarly excellent qualities except his inclination for the introvert causing so much ambiguity that he needs someone not afflicted by false modesty to set him straight! Mr. Knightley does not! He does not need me, but he does want me! Definitely a surreal dream guy! With him we can all be full of pride and free of prejudice all in one! Emma or not! Emma!! Or not?
Sorry to shock you back into the non-fictional, but it is unavoidable that we get grounded! Take a deep breath…Without it coping with some aspects of the non-fictional might prove challenging, if not unbearable! And know that at the time of letting go of my boyfriend and our relationship, I felt that from a linear point of view motherhood moved very far away for me. Although being free again felt good – strange, but good – being out of a high quality relationship made me wonder about so many things, past and future things! I was curious about and open to what Life would hold in store for me. While graduate school and my single life took center stage for the time being, I never forgot my agreement with my unplanned, but happily expected and immensely desired little baby girl!
At the writing of these lines, Raffaella-Bianca is days away from her 18th birthday! I suppose the end of her childhood in the “legal” sense calls in me a deep need for closure. I can well imagine this need is nourished by the effect of Life’s non-linearity on me especially as connected to motherhood. When I refer to memories from my daughter’s childhood, it should be clear that at all times these are my memories from my daughter’s childhood. They might correlate significantly with hers, but this is not the point here. My personal assumption is that correlation is quite high for instances that are unimportant, harmless, unchallenging, uncontroversial or so while all the others might differ significantly sometimes more and sometimes less. But this is also not the point here.
I regard motherhood as a significant life event. Such events carry with them my need for closure. I have a habit of looking for closure. It is a form of taking an event full circle and bringing an information loop to an end and evaluating it emotionally-spiritually with the goal of gaining new insights.
I already know that more remains unsaid than what gets said about my daughter’s childhood. It is all due to the complexities of human life. No matter how many pages we write, we could fill still more. That though has little to do with creativity and more with bureaucracy. My story has nothing to do with bureaucracy and creativity applies only to my writing style since the content is a given, albeit filtered by my subjective perceptions and even more subjective interpretations.
You might ask yourself at this point how come I dare write down my memories. How dare I risk to bore the world with a topic practically everyone knows virtually everything about? We are overpopulated, are we not? One more mother, one more child…! Who cares? But the question remains: How dare I? Well, I have a consolation for myself and for all of us. We are all children of our time! So? There will come a time when readers will have every good reason to smile at these lines, later even laugh at them, comment condescendingly “Back then they didn’t know any better than this! They couldn’t have!” and pity us wholeheartedly as “f-u-l-l-y unaware earlier generations”! This is such a consolation to me, maybe even to you, if you allow me to pass it on to you! It is exactly the fact that nothing, absolutely nothing, is set in stone that allows me to dare! Otherwise, I wouldn’t dare finish one sentence! Really, not one! Ooh, how liberating! N-o-w I am free to move on! Ready for my next thought?
The primary focus of the story will be my little girl’s process of growing up, her development on all levels, her self-discovery and her discovery of the world around her, her actions, reactions, needs and wants. But no one exists in a vacuum, not even Robinson Crusoe. Even he interacted with others and the world around him, at the beginning be it only the elements that kept him company and determined his raw existence, later be it the aborigines to whom he chose to say “no”, still later his new friend Friday to whom he chose to say “yes” on the island and beyond, and finally his return to what he had always known as home. Plenty of decisions on the part of a man in most dramatic circumstances who could have chosen to give up in the first place. And since no little girl grows up as Robinson on the island, there are always so many other people touching her life. All these people need to be mentioned as they pertain to her process, but they will all remain secondary in focus and completeness. No matter what, at all times it will all feel and be incomplete. If you might think that you already know what to expect then know that your linearity is talking to you while your non-linearity is taking a deep breath and getting ready for action. May we all have fun, linearly and non-linearly!
So, how does someone like me get ready for motherhood? I only know one way: Mine. Oh no, this does not mean at all what you think it means. If you were right, my need for closure would not be so intense and it would take care of itself! Instead… What am I doing? Let me tell you that I am utterly convinced that my way is not t-h-e way or the b-e-s-t way, but it is simply mine and truly the only one I know! Let me explain a bit: My way is the way I identify with 100%, beyond all or any doubts, my own or somebody else’s. The foundation of my motherhood and all principles I adhered to are deeply internalized by me.
The methods I embraced to apply and these that I did not embrace to apply are… me, simply so Cristi-Ana. I truly recognize myself in them. I hold on to them all to this day and I would not know what other foundation/principles/methods to apply and still like myself and be at peace with myself and my motherhood, and as a consequence with my own child. I do not know how else to be, mother or otherwise. In the course of time, I discovered about Life in general that beyond all else the greatest luxury is the choice to be myself. This choice also applies to my motherhood and I feel most fortunate to have given myself this freedom!
How can I best describe the foundation of my motherhood? What can I present as the main characteristics?
Life is a journey and a learning process of temporary duration.
Behind every human personality there is a soul.
The universe endows each human being with certain talents and it is a privilege and an obligation to put them to best use for one’s own individual benefit with the higher goal to contribute to society and the world in general.
Motherhood addresses also the child’s soul, facilitates the discovery and reinforcement of the specific individual talents and facilitates the development of inner peace for the new human being and outer peace with the world around.
Now, I hear you describe my foundation of motherhood as at least “naïve”, at most “utopic”. We can all agree you are right. But… Well, what can I say? Just like everybody else, I also need something to aspire to, may it even be called naïve and/or utopic. Is that a reason for me to get discouraged?
Let’s see what’s next in line.
Principles! That’s what!
Sense of worth:
Above all, motherhood conveys a healthy sense of self-worth and value by all thoughts, feelings and actions.
We all know the sayings about the specialness of each human being and all that goes with it.
If we have moved beyond just paying lip service to fancy concepts, why is our world in such a bad shape? Why are there still human beings who due to their own lack of self-worth are at least disharmonious, if not even destructive? Why are there still more than enough human beings unfortunate as not to have had people around them to convey to them a wonderful sense of value in their childhood?
How can human society help everybody develop self-worth and experience value? Can human society achieve such goals? Or does it all happen within the closest circle of human interaction? Does it happen in both contexts for most humans and in neither for some?
Over-protectiveness:
Over-protectiveness is a lot of work (for the mother) and only the child is in the position to reduce or reject it or even eliminate it. As a mother, a woman can never be too involved in her child’s life and again it is the child regulating the intensity. As long as the child feels safe, neither neglected nor haunted by the mother, the dosage of over-protectiveness is right. Adjusted to the needs and wants of the child, over-protectiveness happens to a meaningful degree. The child may need the mother, but does not have to need her.
Clear boundaries:
Considering how contradictory human nature can be, creating clear boundaries needs a lot of internal consistency (on the part of the mother) otherwise the child might be confused or disoriented. Minimizing ambiguities is necessary but not easy. What we say “yes” or “no” to, what we define as “right” or “wrong” is very complex. If we get lost in too many details, we might miss the point. If we are too abstract, the child might not understand.
Being just like everybody else, I asked myself what would become my personal guiding light, be it in life in general or for clear boundaries of motherhood? The solution might surprise you: It’s Law. Aside from studying Psychology, I also started studying Law. In high school I discovered my interest for both and while advancing faster with Psychology, in the same interval of time I completed half of Law. I know half a lawyer is no lawyer at all, the label does not even exist (how could it?), but half of the curriculum introduced me to all legal principles and I held on to them in the most appreciative way. Actually, the truth is I love Psychology and I love Law. These are two different qualities of love. I sometimes wonder if there is any analogy between my two loves and humans quarrelling over the possibility of loving two partners simultaneously. Although my human experience does not include parallel relationships with two men, I am sure I could love two of them at the same time. What could ever stand in the way? I suppose it is similar to my dual academic loves. Love is love, or not? But I am aware, in my case at least, of the different qualities of love. I only know different qualities of love, come to think of it. Talking about clear boundaries…
Honest feedback:
The child needs to hear again and again the honest opinion of the mother. Sometimes “honest” gets interpreted as either reproachful or punishing or brutal. Honest feedback has nothing to do with the last judgment and some subsequent damnation of some form. Honest is also not related to sadistic comments on the part of the speaker and masochistic reactions on the part of the listener. Why perversion sneaked in even in the most innocent of human interactions, I do not know.
Honest feedback creates clarity, nothing more and nothing else. It helps the child understand what is adequate in different contexts and offers certainty in a variety of situations.
Freedom/joy/pleasure:
What wonderful words! For most people that’s all they are. Words. Wonderful, but words only. Life being about wonderful states, the wonderful states of freedom/joy/pleasure, it can only be motherhood that can start a child on this exciting journey. Motherhood as the initial physical beginning of Life is both a privilege and a responsibility.
I suppose what I’m trying to say – against all odds – is that a child needs exposure to freedom/joy/pleasure in the little things of childhood in order to develop them later also in the big things of adulthood.
Personally I know a relatively small number of people who flow on the wave of freedom/joy/pleasure. Independent of the small percentage, it is always wonderful to interact with these people who know about these magical flavors of Life, the more the better!
Motherhood can help increase that percentage – or am I again on the verge of “naïve and utopic”? If not motherhood, then who can?
Let me put it another way: If not even motherhood can, then… I am not sure the world started with a BANG! If it did, it must have been the BANG! of Innocence and Happiness, but I am sure the world will end with a BANG! The BANG! of Bitterness and Cynicism!
Methods:
Explanation:
By the simple virtue of children’s natural inquisitiveness and their many “whys”, explaining is automatically an ingredient of motherhood, of course, only to the degree that the mother identifies with the task of offering explanations.
My childhood also contained explanations. My mom had two favorites: “Because things are done this way!” and “because you are a girl!”
Don’t get me wrong! We all know situations in which we do certain things in certain ways because things are done this way and we also know the situations in which we do certain things in certain ways because we are girls. It is more realistic to assume you as the reader are female, not because I can’t imagine seeing a man read about motherhood, but I guess most men won’t. Should you though by any chance be male, then know that I’d like to mention this to you: First, welcome to these lines! Second, I truly hope you do not read this simply because you have to, maybe because your profession forces you to read everything, also this. Very sorry in case you are not on this page by choice. Third, if you are on this page by choice even if you are male and even if your profession would never force you to read something like this, then know you are a creature from the future – not only of the future, but from the future – and you are a rare example of what manhood was always meant to be. Bravo! I salute you from the future! I wish there were more like you around!!!
But for now, we return to the explanations of my childhood. Two explanations for Life sounds more like the philosophy of simplistic motherhood on a permanent diet, no sugar, not even pine honey, no spices, not even Himalaya salt, no fats, not even Argan oil! Yes, a very gustatory metaphor! And a motherhood void of the taste of multiple explanations and profound experiences of Life!
Explaining can start on a superficial level and depending on the personality and developmental stage of the child the mother can add deeper levels of explanations.
I can imagine that superficial or profound explaining in childhood has a formative effect on a child’s experience of formal schooling. The quality of explaining either opens or closes doors to knowledge, information processing and levels of perception of the world around us.
No mother can offer too many explanations as long as the child still displays a certain thirst of knowledge. When the questions stop, the explaining work is done.
Yes, if this sounds like work, it does so because it is. It is a way of Life, putting special effort into a specific aspect of our human experience. Many people do this and some of us put motherhood on our list.
Grounded and alive in the here and now:
Even though our human experience is temporary, time is a truly fundamental factor for all of us. The esoteric saying that “time does not exist” I regard as purely nonsensical. Making an ally out of time is a real challenge, but also of great advantage once understood and mastered.
Handling time wisely determines our ability to act and react in Life. We are truly alive only if we understand the concept of time and respond adequately to the demands of any given context. Aliveness enables us to be grounded. A life defined by grounded actions leads to meaning and self-fulfillment. Some people find more meaning and are more self-fulfilled than others. I prefer to find myself on the side of more. As a consequence, my motherhood is also geared towards more for my child. Seeing a little being grow-up into a self-fulfilled individual who finds Life meaningful is a profound joy.
How to best teach a child about time, aliveness and groundedness when a relatively small number of people feel comfortable with their own flow of time? How to best help a child experience time quality in a world that thinks it is in full control of time, feels completely out of control of time, and acts in denial of the tension between thinking and feeling?
Humans have a highly borderline relationship with time either frantically trying to jam so many activities into a certain interval of time that they cannot possibly benefit from their own doing and are unable to integrate any of their many activities (how self-defeating due to too much!) or they make no plans and think of themselves as spontaneous doing everything as it happens, usually in an unexpected or unpredictable manner, soon experiencing Life as an endless chain of ugly emergencies that mercilessly haunt them day and night without any routine to fall back on, never discovering their own talents or interests (how self-defeating due to too little!).
Once we find our own rhythm with the flow of time, there is harmony waiting for us. I can imagine that during childhood we are all in harmony with the flow of time, but as we grow older most of us lose the rhythm of harmony and instead experience more and more resistance. I suppose this negative shift starts for some of us already as early as kindergarten, for more of us when we go to school and for most of us at the latest by the time we finish our formal schooling.
Our habits of how we handle time are questionable, to say the least. Our priorities are quite detrimental because the tension between short-term and long-term goals is enormous, too often not only bending us, but sometimes also breaking us. Being at peace with one’s own flow of time is essential. A child who manages to experience time as an ally travels into a completely different future than the child who does not. Talking about past/present/future: Past is past, present is present, future is future. Ever since NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) convinced us that “the future is now”, we are collectively somehow confused. And then we want to teach children about time…
But beyond esoteric and NLP, humanity is most familiar with the third way of dealing with time: Hanging on to the past, defending it and repeating it, without noticing being “stuck in time”. Fatal, truly fatal! If “time does not exist” leads to personal misery, if “the future is now” leads to societal disorientation, then “stuck in time” leads to planetary disaster! “Stuck in time” has different nuances, one of the common ones represented by the moralists. Moralism has nothing to do with standards of excellence in inter-human relations which I hold in high regard. Moralists know how to make everyone feel bad without contributing anything constructive to Life. They are in complete denial of human nature and place their entire philosophy on “how things should be”. Their arguments are rooted in some idealized version of the past mixed with misinterpretations and misunderstandings. Moralists are a nuisance because they lack pragmatism. On top of that because they suffer from a double-bind, it is impossible to please the moralists – best not to even try! I regard moralism as one of the subtlest forms of social perversion of human society. While the common moralists are a nuisance, once the moralists enter the political arena, we have good reason to be seriously worried, especially when picking up a gun and killing others is the order of the day or when people, especially women, are told what they may or may not do with their bodies! “Stuck in time” is a dangerous state to be in. Teaching a child about time and harmony and how to best avoid the traps of the misconceptions concerning time is essential.
Learning playfully and effortlessly:
Playful does not equate silly and effortless does not imply without input. Why some people regress into the fairytale age only to associate learning to hard-work-torture-of-surreal-meaninglessness has many reasons. Some of the most relevant ones reflect deficits: A lack of differentiation, depth, and holism.
Learning in its traditional form is fragmented, superficial and forgettable. We invest resources, but the effect does not enrich us. People of all ages run away from learning and look back in fear and shudder. What a waste! Truly sad for how many people learning is nothing less than traumatizing.
Motherhood provides the very first learning experiences and if they are thoughtful, adequate interactions they ignite within the child the eternal spark of curiosity and ceaselessly fuel the engine of openness, creativity, dedication and all other components of genuine learning.
So many ideas in place! We all could easily think I got it all figured out! But now doesn’t anybody yell? “So much motherhood in place for so little baby on the horizon!”
Let me do it too: So m-u-c-h motherhood in place for so l-i-t-t-l-e baby on the horizon!
Yes, that’s right!
I wonder though had someone handed me the text about foundations/principles/methods, although I identify 100% with them all, what would I have thought and felt about motherhood? I would have been happy to have taken the time to put it all in writing even then. But since my experience is about closure, writing couldn’t have already come at that time.
Motherhood and all the pressure points of motherhood experienced from the perspective of a style that is neither authoritarian nor laissez-faire, what does that mean for both mother and child? Especially for the child? And even though the foundations/principles/methods had worked so well with other people’s children, does it also work just as well when placed under the umbrella of motherhood?
We may all keep in mind that this is the story of one specific mother and one specific child. And a human being is always much more than foundations/principles/methods. This is even truer of two human beings in such a unique dyad as defined by motherhood!
We can only proceed meaningfully if we start at the beginning! Ready?
Really?
As I started to relax at the beginning of my energy session, I wondered what experience my soul had ready for me that morning. Life is a-l-l about the process of the soul…for me. I felt a bit distracted because I had been out the night before, had slept little for my own standard, had not yet integrated the events of the night and my aura was still in transformation, had not come to the session from my own home and with my sense of orientation I got more disoriented than anything else and honestly, on top of everything else, I caught myself concentrating on the one question that had been constantly on my mind the previous months – was a good idea to start a relationship with someone who for a significant number of years had been a neutral, dear friend? Or was humanity right about the difference between friendship and relationship and the detrimental effect of changing from the one to the other? I value friendship and I would never do anything on purpose to risk losing it. And if changing from the one to the other felt so good, and if it all felt as the most natural development in the world, and if…
My energy session demands that I relax in order to learn about the processes of my soul…
And I drift into a different state of consciousness and find myself surrounded by brilliant light and cozy warmth…
And I find myself in front of a male entity of incredible presence, larger than Life, full of peace and clarity and wisdom, making a few steps towards me while I stand in awe not knowing what to expect while he draws my attention to the little girl he holds in one of his arms…
I look at the little girl and identify her as an angel…
He puts her into my arms without saying a word, but giving me a knowing look…
He turns around and leaves me standing there with her in my arms…
While I yell after him on the astral plane “Aren’t you going to tell me what to do…” – and before I can finish – “with her?”
He telepathically communicates to me while he lifts up his left arm in the air “You will know… You will know…”
I scream back “Will I r-e-a-l-l-y?”
Too late…
He vanishes into the brilliant light.
All the while the angel in my arms makes herself comfortable and looks at me with a sweet, serene and serious complexion. Aren’t angels supposed to smile?
I recognize her energy; it is so familiar to me…
She takes me completely for granted…
I know she knows me too…
She feels safe with me…
I look at her and cannot feel more surprised…
Even after opening my eyes, I feel her presence in my arms.
I am speechless.
Chapter 2
The Pregnancy
We have all heard the saying that the babies are bundles of joy and a heavenly present. I am not sure if that is true of every baby, but mine definitely felt that she was entrusted to me directly from heaven.
My experience during the energy session was completely unexpected and very touching. So, that was the message of my soul just hours after getting pregnant! My mind would have never been able to tell. There is nothing to be expected from the mind in this regard, but the soul is always ready to communicate if we are in tune with the language of our soul. I wondered why I had not already had one of my prophetic dreams and if one was coming. No, no prophetic dream at any time.
Let’s not overinterpret my experience during the energy session, I told myself. I felt informed, but not yet willing to act upon my new knowledge.
The energy session was an intense and significant experience. Where do you go with it though if the relationship with the baby’s dad blossomed for relatively short months only, even though you had known each other for years? The eight years felt like forever for me. We used to laugh during the many years of our friendship that nothing would ever come out of us! I was absolutely sure he was right!
In his own words he described me as “the Impossible One” and himself as “the Possible One”. Who would have thought we would parent a child of our own? Definitely not me! And I bet, definitely not him! But there was someone who could: HER! I have always felt that she made that choice. She chose me, “the Impossible One” as her Mommy, and she chose him, “the Possible One” as her Daddy! At no time did we choose each other! While the constellation was ok for me, I felt that for him things were different, especially at the beginning.
Even though he never knew about my inborn psychic abilities from me, he did notice my intuition all on his own. I think he did not really feel comfortable with my intuitive side and used to call me “the witch” when things hit too close to home. And now I, “the witch”, needed to tell him about… our baby!
Talking had always been easy for us. Actually, our discussions were always enjoyable and enriching. At no time before or after did I know anybody else with whom I had more fun philosophizing. Since the relationship with him was of the “not-loved-but-understood” type, our discussions were the number one thing I missed the most. There was something unique about the quality of our dialogues, at least in my experience. But having to talk about the pregnancy was different from our usual style and… topics.
To make a long story short, he was shocked to say the least! He was shocked on his behalf and I was shocked… on his behalf! Two people could not have been on two more different pages. It was a matter of Life and Death. For me it was a matter of Life! Our talk was difficult for both of us, but for each one of us for different reasons. From the human perspective, things looked… What’s the right word for that perspective? Probably a combination between helplessness and… more helplessness. To me it felt as if he did not have anything more than the human perspective to hold on to and fall back on.
…
“I am pregnant!”
(in a matter-of-fact, but serious tone)
He experiences a cataclysmic realization.
“And you are to be the dad!”
(in an even more serious tone)
What goes beyond cataclysmic?
…
What I put here in the format of a script, is not out of a script. Until the day when someone will decide to put it into a script. But for now it is out of Life.
Are these the words a woman uses to announce her pregnancy??? “You are to be the Dad!”?? Could more be added to that?…
“And that is absolutely fine with me!”
(still in a matter-of-fact, serious tone)
His facial expression betrays complete bewilderment. Poor and sensitive soul falls into petrified silence before uttering his next word.
…
He would have coped better had I been on the verge of murder and/or suicide, but being fine with his fatherhood? It only catapulted us into two different galaxies never to visit each other again. Somewhere in the universe a portal was locked forever.
But truly, there was nothing speaking against him. Ok, ok, “not against” does not yet mean “for”, I know. What was missing to move from “not against” to “for”? The mutual emotional bond between us! He had proudly exclaimed: “I k-n-o-w exactly what the difference is between sex and love!” Well, what can I say? All the ones who could have attested to m-y “knowledge” were… on another continent! But I need to admit that the 4th chakra can be dealt with beyond the connection 4th & 2nd chakras (which is meaningful under specific circumstances) by activating the connection 4th & 6th chakras (which is meaningful under general circumstances). While the former combination can lead to dependency, the latter cannot. Once you get the hang of energies and their non-linear dimension, everything is so much more… encompassing, I feel.
But you see, it is true that the whole linear scenario of the pregnancy couldn’t have been more different from his imagination and… mine! Mine would have clearly been the planned one, you know, the one with the boyfriend, years of happy and stable relationship, mutual agreement about wanting a baby together, fulfilling professional activities with all pertinent details in place and a lot more of these linear ingredients scattered pleasantly all over a delicious piece of cake taken generously from the Pie of Life! But was anybody asking?
And his? I had had no idea from before, but apparently his favorite scenario excluded fatherhood all together. “Why want to have a baby? Why bring a baby into this world?” Very relevant questions. Not that I had not asked myself the same questions. Only that my answers were the opposite of his.
I would have never thought that my agreement not to plan, but to expect my little baby girl could cause so much harm. I felt horrible! I felt “the impossible witch” in me mutated to a bad witch! I also felt that there was nothing I could have said or done to help him feel more comfortable or that would have brought him any consolation.
When we parted that evening I said to him, “Maybe one day you will be able to forgive me!” He gave me a look that clearly signaled that for him that day would never come.
Women probably find themselves in all kinds of situations in which they feel the need to ask for forgiveness, in the particular context of pregnancy asking forgiveness for having an abortion (if they ask for forgiveness at all, but let’s assume that some do). And there I was asking forgiveness for n-o-t having an abortion. Life offers us all opportunities.
It was a most difficult experience for me to go through our talk because the human plane is so… incomplete. I wish both of us could have had access to the spiritual plane, I mean conscious access. Then things would have been a lot different. Our talk would have taken a different dimension. I would have enjoyed talking about my spiritual perspective when I agreed not to plan, but to be patient and wait and be open. And, above all, I would have so much liked to share with him my experience of the energy session. He was part of something much larger than the human condition, but poor soul he had no idea. As it was, I could not mention a word of it. Not then! Not ever! Sad then, even sadder ever since! At least for him from this perspective.
I know saying anything beyond the human plane would have only made matters worse. I was very worried about him. I was so sorry. At all times I tried to be as thoughtful and respectful of his feelings as possible under the circumstances. This was far away from ideal.
You remember my question about the change from a long, neutral friendship to a relationship? Well, I still don’t have the answer to this one, but what I know is that a pregnancy has the potential to destroy all existing bonds especially fragile ones! I needed to make peace with the fact that once he directly would be out of my life, our baby somehow indirectly, by sharing some traits with him, would at least keep the memory alive. In general I think that women prefer not to remember unsuccessful relationships from their past. It was the opposite for me. Yes, on the human plane we were not successful, but on the spiritual plane I know we were. He will also know it some day some place. At least, I wish him this knowledge!
My access to the spiritual plane was fundamental to me and all aspects of my human experience. Having been born with my spiritual connection, I don’t even know what it’s like to be without it. Being limited only to the human plane must be so… I don’t know, maybe linear? Could you agree? Don’t get me wrong! I quite like linearity. But I wouldn’t want to be reduced only to linearity. That would be awful! Imagine giving up Intuition & Co. and all that it does to you and for you! Unimaginable!
In the course of time I wondered if the descriptions “me-the Impossible One” and “him-the Possible One” had anything to do with linearity versus non-linearity? I cannot tell, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that they do. Anyhow, for “me-the-Impossible-One” not only that my motherhood was absolutely fine, but the fatherhood of “him-the-Possible-One” was absolutely fine as well. Life was good to me, really good! I felt very lucky, especially considering the sad stories of women who tell about their inability to connect to their child on a deep level because the father is the wrong man whom they all of a sudden passionately dislike, a fact which makes them reject the idea of such a man’s fatherhood causing nightmarish projections spilling all over their mother and child relationship. Unfortunate mothers and unfortunate children!
Talking about “unfortunate”: I did find it unfortunate that the Possible One had such a tough experience in the opening scene of his fatherhood. When he called me a few weeks later as he had said he would, I was relieved to see that even though he was not yet back to normal, he was getting there soon enough. It was clear to me at all times that single motherhood was the only scenario available. I did not need anyone to explain it to me. What he did explain to me was his wish that I be the only one parenting our baby for the first years of life “so as not to cause confusion in the baby with the upbringing style” and that he would “get involved once the child was older”! The first part – because I did not know what else to do with it – I interpreted as complete freedom for me, the equivalent of a carte blanche of motherhood! I don’t even want to know what prompted him to make such a decision. I can easily imagine it was about his opinion regarding some deficiency on my part! About the second part of his wish I wondered a bit. Why would a highly developed soul deprive himself of the chance of creating an early bond to his child instead of waiting for the child to be older? I did not understand, I asked no questions and I truly felt it was not for me to judge. If it made him feel better, I was all for it.
It was also his wish not to be present at the baby’s birth. I understood him fully and only added: “You don’t want me to have to worry about you fainting in the delivery room!” I did not know how else to cross the bridge between us called “not-close-enough-for-comfort”. He did not get what I was after and only responded, “No, no, it is not t-h-a-t!” Of course, it was n-o-t! I was fully aware of all subtleties. Communication has so many layers! Sometimes it makes me feel that only the movie makers in Hollywood master the complexities of subtext. Without much subtext we agreed to stay in touch during the pregnancy and see how the baby would develop. For the time being he slipped into the background according to his own desire which I fully respected.
So, how did I spend the pregnancy? In complete freedom and serenity, especially after talking to the Possible One. All throughout the pregnancy there was no medical complication at any time, but of course pregnancy was different from un-pregnancy. First, just days after my energy session I started feeling strangely tired. I repeatedly needed to rest during the day which was sooo definitely n-o-t me! That stopped after a while. Then came the phase in which a-l-l foods lost a-l-l their taste! Oh no, and that to a gustatory person like me! It got hopelessly scary! As if that were not terrible enough, for my standard, I had this predictable pattern of nausea alternating between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. I know it sounds funny, but every other day I was at home ready either at 11 or at 4 having time for nothing else but my nausea which was more of a pseudo-nausea due to lack of nutrition – things were more as if the body wanted to have nausea, but did not manage to. After all symptoms disappeared, I felt again like I had always felt. Except that now the pregnancy started to show! It was soo strange to have everybody offer me their seat in the tram or the subway. I had felt the need to sit before the pregnancy started to show, but nobody knew and never offered me their seat. Now I got every opportunity, but no real need for sitting. Life!
What else was different? Oh yes, I changed my gynecologist! That was important. My first gynecologist I had had for years had already retired from her hospital work even before I became her patient in private practice. Without any specific medical need that worked well before the pregnancy. When the doctor who confirmed my pregnancy at the hospital asked me if I was interested in becoming his private patient, I fully agreed. I did all tests at the hospital and all check-ups in his private practice. It was also agreed that he would be at the delivery which meant the world to me. I had heard stories in which women never saw the same doctor twice at the hospital and at the delivery the doctors came and went according to their shifts. Horror stories! Not for me! With my new gynecologist, I really felt in very good hands. I always need a doctor who can follow the process of some development, pregnancy being top of the list for me. How could he ever make competent decisions in case of an emergency? Who wants to feel on an assembly line, especially in a delicate context like this and risk a baby’s safety? Not me, not mine! On top of that, ever since discovering alternative medicine in high school, I only went to doctors as a private patient. How could it be any different for my baby? Of course, it could not!
All medical aspects under control, it was time to define other new activities and plans. Aside from my work with children which I picked up again soon after I returned from the US and which I always enjoyed, pregnant or not, what else did I want to do during my pregnancy? Two categories: Just for fun & achievement. Just for fun included reading books I had been interested in for quite a while and had never found the time for, mostly biographies of Elizabeth I, Caterina di Medici, Mozart, Shakespeare. I would have also loved reading about Christina of Sweden, but it was out of print. Had I known that I would have bought it in the US before returning to Europe! And then there was also the novel Shoogun. Achievement referred to my next exam in Law school which meant studying Labor and Social Security Law. For fun is for fun and achievement is fun only after the achievement is complete. Poof! Poof! regarding achievement.
Now, after advancing happily with the just for fun category and mastering Labor and Social Security Law day by day in acceptable portions, I decided that I could do more. I had become interested in the Rorschach many years before and never got to it. From the US I brought along the two volumes on this marvelous projective test, went to the Psychodiagnostics Department of the Psychiatric Clinic of the General Hospital, introduced my interest in Rorschach to the supervisory psychologist, explained I was doing it all out of pure interest having completed all my internships already before my American graduate program, got accepted and started right the following day! I was s-o-o happy! The Rorschach is marvelous when you need a test beyond the level of rationalizing. “It’s all in the head” gets a completely different twist! I truly wanted to find out e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g about “all in the head” and beyond, especially “out of it”. What better way to start learning if not by taking the Rorschach myself?
“Well, my results?” I couldn’t have been more excited to find out. Don’t we all look for answers? There must an explanation, a good reason why… this and that, you know!
“Everything is fine with you.”
How could that be? In a c-r-a-z-y world, everything is fine with me? How unbearable! One should always have something in common with one’s surroundings. I gave my supervisor a highly skeptical look.
“No pathology showed up…” Was I starting to hear the whisper of a “But…”?
“Yes…?” There was hope in sight, even for me! Yes!
“You a-r-e somehow… infantile. You keep seeing these castles, thrones, crowns, princes, princesses… like in fairytales!”
“I keep seeing them because they are there!”
My supervisor couldn’t stop laughing. We both realized my comment only served to prove his point. We laughed together. “You have nothing to worry about!” and in a fatherly way put his hand on my shoulder reassuringly. Not worry? How could I not worry…? For the world, n-o-t for me! All the people who had put their trust into my hands ever since I could remember, all the people who thought of me in the most responsible, mature descriptions, all the people who took me damned seriously and took notes and taped our conversations when we just went out for fun, not to mention the ones who paid me most generously for my… Wait! For what now? “Infantilism”? World, watch out for yourself! Please watch out!
There are still millions of questions we can ask and wonder about, but is the ultimate question not about…my motherhood? Of all possible timings, why was it exactly in my pregnancy that I found out about my diagnosis? OK! Let’s assume the physical world is full of paradoxes, but what about the spiritual world? Remember my energy session? The entity who said to me “You will know!”? How do “infantilism” and “You will know!” go together? Where is the missing link? OK! I’m in the world, but not of it, but… then what? Maybe there is no link whatsoever, maybe they d-o go together! Remember non-linearity? What do we know? Do we need to know?
Let’s mix it all together and agree that I am “the infantile one who knows”. The physical world treated me damned well for my infantilism, not to forget the spiritual world. Life had been so good to me, no matter what. I had so much to show for it. And above all, I had a great feeling for Life! There was nothing negative for me in my diagnosis. It was fine to know about it simply by the virtue of its being there. The news came just in the nick of time, come to think of it.
So much for “all in the head”. I love the Rorschach! I wonder how Rorschach came up with his system. And what were his results? I just realized that I never read his biography. I hope there is one available. A fun one, I hope. My infantilism h-a-t-e-s boring! You see, that explains it all. Really! Everything that so far did not make any sense to you can now be traced back to my infantilism. And everything else still more to come too. Yuppie!
What else did I do during the pregnancy? Something which I did only during that time towards the end of my pregnancy. But first a little background story! While in high school I passed this special shop with maternity clothes every morning and every afternoon. Each time I told myself that one day once I was pregnant I would buy my maternity clothes in this special shop. Not only that many years passed between high school and pregnancy, but – and this was the true defining moment – maternity (and not only, also mainstream) fashion in Austria (yes, of a-l-l places: Austria!) at that time was again… let’s call it: Too pseudo-subdued. It did not even manage to be subdued. That’s how bad it was! And please subdued, pseudo or otherwise, and pregnant don’t go together well, if you ask me. Actually, they are a contradiction in terms. I was a bit sad to find time after time that the special shop didn’t have anything to offer that made me identify with that “look”. Life is no time, n-o time, for compromise! How could pregnancy? Never! But I had my own solution. I always do. I’m so glad to say.
I decided to sew my own maternity clothes. Lucky me, as a young teenager I had learned to sew from my maternal grandmother, Mama Ana. Mama Ana is mega-fundamental and quintessential to me that I cannot even start writing about her here! Maybe just two things as the shortest mini-introduction to the effect Mama Ana had on me: First, she was the only, I mean t-h-e o-n-l-y person of my childhood who conveyed to me a sense of value; and second, she was the only, I mean t-h-e o-n-l-y person of my childhood who taught me about standards of excellence! I think these two points offer a most adequate basis for what I’m trying to say. She is to me the combination of what the Taj Mahal is to the Indians, the pyramids to the Egyptians, the Great Wall to the Chinese, the crown jewels to the English! N-o-w I think I got it right! And yes, I have tears in my eyes! Too!
Under the circumstances, it was the most logical step to sew my own maternity clothes! Don’t you think? I don’t truly remember the number of dresses I made. I do remember there were not many, but I know they were all of the right look, they were all me! Just like all my earlier looks from all the years in which I had made my own clothes.
I feel I was great at making my own clothes. A-b-s-o-l-u-t-e-l-y! It so happens that I even have proof for it. You might need it. Wanna hear it? I participated in two contests and in both I won a prize. Proof enough? Well, maybe, but I’ve got something “more than proof”, but I don’t know what they call it in one word. My vocabulary is so limited, shame! My “more than proof” comes in the form of a fashion magazine of a popular provenience in German-speaking countries announcing this yearly contest (of the self-celebrating kind for the magazine! I was not aware of the common practice of the self-celebrating style in so many areas of human life) for which everybody could register.
And now comes the small print of the conditions – having participated in one of the magazine’s courses was no prerequisite for the registration. I need to admit I had no idea that small print comes in two versions: The visible and the invisible! Thanks to law school somewhere along the way you get a chance to find out! The magazine needed to let everybody participate in the contests, otherwise they would have discriminated against people not taking their courses and designed their small print accordingly. Now, small print protecting rights has an invisible addition to it saying “Don’t you d-a-r-e believe it!” Being a psychic, of course I have access to the invisible. But that day I simply did not click from “visible small print” to “invisible small print” mode. But, but…
And now comes my “more than proof”: Both times I participated my outfits received the most intense applause, the loudest “wows” and “ahs”. The crowd was all mine! And believe me, t-h-a-t means something in Vienna! I hope, I do not have to explain. And I won’t explain. Anyhow, the obviously approving reactions of the general public forced the judges to take that into account instead of happily ignoring me and they gave me a prize each time. Of course, when the winners got introduced that part with “participant in the magazine’s course such-and-such…” was missing in my case and only in my case! But you see, if I convinced the common people of my talents, there we have “more than proof” that I was great at sewing. Thanks to Mama Ana!
Yes, Mama Ana was not around during my pregnancy, but sewing my own maternity clothes was my way of including her energy and her legacy in my experience of motherhood. I would have loved to have had her around, but I did not have that choice!
Sewing my own maternity clothes also made me aware of the fact that for a number of years I would not be able to sew anymore. First, the baby could not pause from me for my passionate hobby and second, after babyhood no little fingers could be put at risk to get in touch with my sewing machine by curiously getting harmed by needles and electricity! After the baby’s birth sewing had to wait!
And h-o-w was the baby? Coping with the Impossible One, “the infantile one who knows”? She was thriving! After getting over the phase with tiredness, tasteless food and pseudo-nausea, we really did very well together! My doctor kept saying “the baby is so well developed now, as if two to three weeks older! Have you done anything special lately?” Special? Except from having interrupted watching Rosemary’s Baby and Sophie’s Choice due to a massive lack of coping mechanisms on my part, nothing, really nothing came to mind that was different from my usual doing, being, thinking, feeling. But I was soo happy to hear s-h-e was doing so well! The ultrasound picture showed the baby in profile. She looked very cute and very chubby. She had my nose and my mother’s cheeks. “She looks so sweet!” I said to my doctor. “We don’t reveal a baby’s gender around here!” and at no other point during the pregnancy did we address this question again. No problem! There were other ways to find a confirmation. And she was absolutely beautiful! And chubby-chubby!
She was not the only one who started to gain weight significantly. So did I. Gaining weight had always been a horror scenario for me, but since that was good for the baby, I was all for it! At the beginning of the pregnancy I had my usual 52 kg and at the end of it 72 (kg, although it felt more like tons). That is n-o-t funny! Especially not for someone who had been trained as a professional model. And I even have a diploma to show for it. How did that happen, you might ask? After completing my graduate program, I felt it was time for something non-intellectual, as an exercise of finding balance, from “all in the head” to “all in the body”. Going to modeling school was a great experience for me.
I know, some humans endure the constant tension connected to the supremacy of “inner values” (or is it the “supremacy” of inner values?)! Either way, I am n-o-t one of them! I figure if these humans were right, I would have every right to expect the world to be in a very different shape. But as long as every day the world convinces me that the supremacy of inner values is a ridiculously failed figment of some misguided imagination… best to flow with common sense! That’s why I fully understood some women’s worry about what pregnancy might do to their bodies. And I was one of them. And only hoped I would find good ways for getting back in shape f-a-s-t. By “good ways” I mean healthy ones. As a great fan of holistic medicine, I know that nature has provided us with gentle, effective, wise products and methods to deal with our body in ways that honor divinity in us. That is the beautiful face of nature and we are all entitled to it. Hurray!
Being of the kinesthetic kind, I always dreamed of carrying my baby around for ever! Touching and being touched is paramount for a kinesthetic person. But if the baby is heavy, how long can even the most kinesthetic mother carry her baby around without breaking her back? I wondered about that as the pregnancy advanced. If the baby continued to develop just as well after birth, where would I take my kinesthetic motivations?
Somewhere, after the transition phase at the beginning of the pregnancy gave way to a clearer communication with the baby. I asked, “Baby, are you a boy or a girl?” The answer was “A girl!” said in such a tone as to mean “As if you didn’t know!” “It’s always good to get a confirmation!” She couldn’t be bothered.
“Do you know when you would like to come?”
“February 5!”
I let everybody know the baby confirmed being a girl and that she planned to come on February 5. People in my surroundings were used to such things from me. I have to say I usually kept my knowing to myself. From time to time my intuition startled my parents, but since they got confronted with it only occasionally, they sometimes found it “accidental” and other times they didn’t know what to make of it. This time regarding the baby, they were all open.
During that talk about gender and birthday I also asked the baby if she was interested in learning languages which she gladly affirmed. Good to know. Baby ready, everything ready. And what a motivated baby! Even before her birth, on top of that!
The day my pregnancy got confirmed at the hospital, my mom reacted with a spontaneous “Finally, a baby for m-e!” My dad surprised me with a “Now that the baby is coming, we will all be peaceful!” In the context of our family their comments made perfect sense.
My mother referred to the fact that I would never practice emotional blackmail with her the way she had experienced from my first sister-in-law who had no mercy doing it to all of us, which was toughest on her. Grandchildren and grandparents should never be abused for such purposes. My mother knew how I thought about my sister-in-law’s immature behavior and knew I would never, ever subject my baby and her to such interactions. At no time did my mother do anything to justify the punishing behavior my sister-in-law applied according to her erratic moods. My mother knew she would be free in my motherhood to be the grandmother she wanted to be. She was right, a baby for her! Nothing wrong with that. She could now put aside the doll she bought herself when I left for my graduate program in the US and that was named Raffaella-Bianca. Anticipation! Anticipation! Buying herself the doll was her way to cope with having to wait for the baby. The baby’s name had been already communicated to me during my planned but unmanifested pregnancy. Everybody knew about it. Anticipation was about to come to a happy end.
My father referred to being peaceful as opposed to always on the edge of irritation and artificial agitation caught in a complex marriage in which their daughter played “harmony police” and “relationship fireman”. This was his way to say that he was ready for his new grandchild and he would be as grandfatherly as possible.
I found my parents’ reactions absolutely great! But there was one important thing I needed to clarify with them, a thing of vital significance. Here comes yet another little piece of background story.
„I know how happy we all are about the baby. I was thinking we should make a very important decision. You want to be involved and contribute!”
Both my parents were all ears.
“I found the p-e-r-f-e-c-t way for you!”
They couldn’t wait to hear it.
“The two of you will teach the baby Romanian!”
Yes, I know, of a-l-l languages: Romanian!
They were thrilled and speechless at the same time.
“Would you like to do that?”
Of course, they would. Romanian grandparents do everything for their grandchildren!
My parents were still thrilled and speechless just like before, but very…meaningfully, this time around.
“Let’s be honest! Romanian is the only language the two of you will ever speak! I mean: R-e-a-l-l-y speak!”
They were so relieved by this revelation/truth/prophecy. I cannot tell you how relieved I was!
“Don’t even think of teaching y-o-u-r German to the baby! Not a word!”
Employment and unemployment were clearly and strictly defined. Only a typical Prussian could have done it better. But who would ever want to be a typical Prussian? Unless it is all a completely karmic-ly unavoidable reality of Life.
“We all know that Romanian will never be a world language. That is ok! But Romanian will open her way to all Romance languages. She will be interested in French, Italian and Spanish.”
They were happy to hear.
“We will always be thankful to the two of you if you teach her Romanian and make her life so much easier, richer, brighter and more meaningful.”
I never saw my parents in a more intense mutual agreement than at this time.
“I will take care of the other two languages!”
They were so happy that t-h-i-s grandchild would learn Romanian due to their involvement and contribution.
Not that any of the other grandchildren ever learned a word of Romanian due to their parents’ either indifference or resistance. Having a trilingual grandchild is something that fills every Romanian grandparent with pride and satisfaction! None of the others are trilingual either. So, that day we decided that Raffaella-Bianca would speak Romanian as one of her three languages. That felt really good to all four of us!
Certain things of practical relevance I needed to solve all alone which is never “all alone” during the pregnancy, but that’s where I was. I could not spend time pondering too much as it regarded the baby and I did not want her to feel affected. Before getting pregnant I had not come to a final conclusion although I had spent years of tormented torn-ness to no avail and now it came to haunt me quite intensely. The name of the nightmarish issue: Santa Claus and Easter Bunny! A real nightmare! How would I solve this one? Would the haunting ever stop no matter which way I went? I felt that I would love not even to mention Santa Claus and Easter Bunny. I would have preferred to exclude these two from my motherhood. Not only that these two would make my motherhood less congruent for me, at the same time my child would not need such figures. I knew that she would find it most natural to know all presents came from me or Grandma or Grandpa, just like the presents for her birthday and other special occasions. But since the many children of many parents seem to need them… I am not sure if the figures were needed more by the parents or the children…
Either way, the decision to exclude Santa Claus and Easter Bunny implied a real danger: I would have to swear the child to secrecy to never tell the other children the truth. I could not ask that part from her. Could I? It felt too dense, especially in the morphogenetic field of my child’s social surroundings defined by homogeneity to the point of oversaturation.
When I was a child I always enjoyed Romanian Christmas and Easter in spite of communism! I know the word should be capitalized but since I don’t like the concept, I just won’t. In any case, communism ruined plenty, but not Christmas and Easter. My parents bought wonderful presents, as wonderful as the Romanian planned economy would allow, we had parties and all our guests had fun and all age groups were happy! I grew up l-o-v-i-n-g presents and parties!
Christmas and Easter as a pleasurable time ended abruptly once I moved to Austria. Because in Austria beyond the familiar, something unfamiliar and unexpected sneaked in. By observation I came to some conclusions, very painful conclusions: In Austria for the majority of people Christmas is all about an o-v-e-r-d-o-s-e of sugar and Easter about an o-v-e-r-d-o-s-e of eggs. But wait, in case that might have a slightly familiar taste to it because most people have more “intense eating habits” during holiday seasons: Discover the idiosyncratic ritual of adding to the sugar-egg Germanic Roman catholic (I don’t like this one either, so it also does not get capitalized) overdoses the sense of enormous guilt, accompanied by the confabulated fear of burning in hell for eternity, spiced by the unique lamentations over the potential inability to intensify the suffering from Christmas to Christmas and Easter to Easter! What was this m-o-s-t bizarre pattern all about?
I am not at all into loving-to-hate. I found this additional idiosyncrasy s-o-o disgusting I gave up on Christmas and Easter! Let’s summarize and bring it all together before finally deciding for the baby’s relationship to Santa Claus and Easter Bunny: I warn you that we will need translation and symbolism in order to understand. You might like both, you might like neither. This is all about the power of the human language and the powerlessness of the human body mediated by the double-bladed sword of the human mind! Sugar has the same effect on us as does… sex. So far so good! The English word “eggs” means in German “Eier” which when we go back to English means either “eggs” or “balls”! Anyway, we end up again… between the sheets! Sex for Christmas! Sex for Easter! Remember the overdose each time. There is something I haven’t figured out and I never will. Is the foreplay stage between Christmas and Easter and the orgasm stage between Easter and Christmas? Does anybody know? Anyhow, I would conclude that Christmas and Easter seem to be the only socially acceptable versions of experiencing getting-your-brains-f…-off! I suppose for those who cannot have the real thing, they have to settle for less… which might work for them… were it not for the very clear rule of self-castration! The self-castrated man having sex! The woman having sex with the self-castrated man! We will not even stand a chance to get down to the immaculate ejaculation!
Here just one thought: t-h-a-t was the greatest put-down of fatherhood in the history of humankind! Has no man ever taken notice? Not even after 2000 years?? Does it take a mother to defend fatherhood? W-h-y does it take a mother to defend fatherhood? With all that in mind, let’s move on. After 2000 years, we really have no time to lose. Compared with past and partially still present habits of the Leadership of the League of the Self-Castrated ending in crusades (poor men!/they are all dead – we lost that battle!/), witch hunting (poor women!/they are also all dead – we also lost that battle!/) and child molestation (poor children!/some are dead, but definitely not all – does that mean anything to anyone?/), the perverse overdoses start revealing their deep, d-e-e-p and very, v-e-r-y ugly roots. Please note that my these few lines are in no way, shape or form meant to offer an explanation for the reason why psychoanalysis (communicated in so many more lines than I could ever communicate) was developed in Vienna. Sigmund Freud was not brought up as a Roman catholic and neither was I.
In order to end the crippling one-dimensionality of Life, we need to remember the Germans had Luther, the Swiss had Calvin, but the rest of their Germanic speak-alikes had no one who could teach them to say “The hell with hell!” and say it with a big smile too. All of a sudden, the questionable psychology of Santa Claus and Easter Bunny appears a harmlessly superficial concern. There was my solution, the only one: of course, I would play along and pretend to the game of Santa Claus and Easter Bunny (as the lesser of two evils)! Bringing up a baby without the unnecessary lies about and around Santa Claus and Easter Bunny is a type of freedom that can only unbearably burden a child at this time in human evolution which can only start evolving when the Age of Self-Castration comes to an end. When that institution falls to pieces, I will only ask: What took humanity so long?
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(End of Free Reading Sample)
Cristi-Ana Montesanto 