“I spent the first fifteen years of my adult life exploring the world. Traveled a lot, lived and worked abroad. Loves I knew too, men and women, but never for more than a year or so. I dated free birds just as I did, and appreciated the love of the moment as fully as a love that was possible for life I didn’t look so far ahead.
Until, in my – in itself fine – relationship with Jay, I was attacked by clattering ovaries, as Jochem Myjer so amusingly calls it. An undeniable desire to have children forced itself upon me, but Jay would have nothing to do with it. He wanted a free life, and I understand that. Anyway, I was now 39 and knew I had little time. In an almost matter-of-fact way, I made my desire to have children a top-priority project and started looking for a donor.”
“I found a match through a Danish sperm bank. I kept Jay informed of my steps and plans, and in the meantime we still saw each other. We also had sex, but always with a condom. I also didn’t want to tempt myself to exaggerate my wish and his refusal.
The moment I inseminated myself, with a syringe and a straw right on my own bed, I felt stronger than ever. I was just going to make a kid. That turned out to be the moment when my relationship with Jay finally came to an end. It was no different, this was my path.”
House-tree-beast-happiness
“The first attempt was an instant hit. You see, I thought, this must be so. I felt fantastic during my pregnancy and thoroughly enjoyed life. A new love presented itself and the first year of Nena’s life she was with me. A beautiful time when I tasted the house-tree-animal happiness. But she took a job in San Francisco, and didn’t ask if Nena and I wanted to come along. Since then I’ve been doing it 100 percent alone.”
Six-year-old drama queen
“My girl and I are the basis. With three babysitters, four days after school care and occasionally staying with my parents, it all fits exactly in terms of work and social obligations. Yet I am alone with her almost every evening and every weekend. And that is heavy. Nena is a sweetheart, but at six years old sometimes also a drama queen. When I come home tired from work, have to cook and wash, read and wash her hair, then my fuse is sometimes too short to stay cozy.
In those moments I miss the shared parenting. A partner who offers to take over for a while, or who holds a mirror up to me and tells me what I should do differently. The school recently suggested an ADHD study because Nena is so easily distracted in class. Then I can’t consult with that donor, no.”
Pretty lonely
“To be honest, I thought it too easy when I decided to get pregnant. I always do and decide everything alone and sometimes it feels quite lonely. Even with three babysitters I don’t have much room to move, because they all just have to be able to and hardly anyone wants to commit themselves on Saturday. And if I have a babysitter, then I have to go home early myself to relieve her. That’s okay, but it’s tough and nobody seems to understand that.”
“Recently, a colleague was without a husband for a week and a half, and asked another colleague if she could manage on her own. With a fourteen-year-old son, of all things. When I laughed and said that I always manage alone with Nena, they both shouted that that was different, because I had chosen it myself. As if I shouldn’t find it difficult for that reason. Or that it suddenly goes by itself because of my own choice. Of course not.”
On three dating apps
“I would like a partner, for myself and also for Nena. She has enough girlfriends, but she is also stuck with me every weekend. A new relationship would improve the dynamic between us, I am convinced. I am now on dating apps Tinder, Bumble and Inner Circle and I’m convinced that one way or another someone will cross our path. Until then I’m enjoying Nena to the fullest, because she’s the only one I really wouldn’t want to miss.”
Wanted: Love Lessons
For the Love Lesson section on RTL News Lifestyle we are looking for beautiful, vulnerable, funny, inspiring and honest love lessons. An insight, a moment of reflection. Preferably with a hand in your own bosom. Did you eventually turn out to be the one with a fear of commitment? Should you never have emigrated for love or did a composite family turn out to be an illusion after all? Journalist Hanneke Mijnster would like to ask you all about it. Telling is allowed anonymously. Mail to: hanneke.mijnster@rtl.nl.
2023-07-12 20:53:52
#Marlon #shouldnt #find #motherhood #difficult
