I fear I have failed you.
It is the nut of fear I have carried with me since that first ultrasound. Twins. Two daughters. Girls. How the hell was I going to raise girls?
My fear then was that you would be ashamed of me. Because I wasn’t girly enough, wasn’t like the other moms of the friends you were bound to have because I knew ― knew in my soul as you were growing inside me ― that you would be girly and feminine.
I worried you would look around and find me wanting. As my mother had. As my classmates had. As I had.
Not enough. And simultaneously too much.
I was afraid you would like fashion and shopping, which you did. This made Grandma very happy. This terrified me. Fashion is about gender. It is about “fitting,” in so many different ways.
And then it happened, when I sat with you at the food court at the mall near our south suburban Chicago home. One of you said I was not like your friends’ moms. And the other looked up eagerly as if this was something she had noticed and didn’t know how to say.
I swallowed. You were 6. I wasn’t prepared to lose you so soon.
“So, what do you think about that?” I asked.
“Well, the other moms don’t really talk about anything interesting,” said Baby A.
“The other moms don’t listen to their kids. I feel sorry for them,” said Baby B.
Of course, you hadn’t yet realized that the best friend one of you had in kindergarten dumped you because her mom couldn’t handle the fact that you had two moms. You were still horribly hurt. And I felt helpless.
One of the things that motherhood has taught me, though, is that perspective is everything. It didn’t matter who the world thought I was; it only mattered who you thought I was. I am your mother. And you love me unconditionally. As I do you.
Which is why I fear I’ve failed you.
I fear I haven’t prepared you for the cruelty of the world. That I thought the cruelty would bypass you, simply because you are young and pretty and smart and confident. It has. Thus far.
Oh, yeah, you’ve seen me perplexed at how to deal with a boss who told me I was an “autistic savant” when I was really just smarter than him. You understood the sexist undertones. And, to my utter pleasure, you pointed out how insulting this was to autistic people.
I have seen your resiliency in action ― moving to my hometown of Las Vegas after your other mom moved to Florida, after my newspaper had to stop publishing, after we lost our house in a financial crisis that our multiracial suburb took longer to recover from.
I thought I had lost everything. You assured me that what we had in each other was far more important than the things we had lost.
Pretty astonishing for a couple of 10-year-olds.
“It didn’t matter who the world thought I was; it only mattered who you thought I was.”
In many ways, I am still that kindergartener, cornered by a bunch of girls and “accused” of having a deep voice. Up until that moment ― which I still remember vividly ― I didn’t know my voice was supposed to be anything but my own.
Our lives have not been easy. I am too gay. And too single. And too smart. And too loud. And too broke. I don’t conform. I don’t know how.
There are times I really wish I knew how.
My mother spent the first part of my life trying to teach me how to conform. How to fit into the latest fashions. And I failed her.
And so, I have raised you in the safe space I needed, thinking it would give you the ability to move through the world with more ease.
Now, though, as you are leaving home for the first time, I am terrified that I may have protected you too much, loved you too hard, not prepared you for a world that will backhand you for being authentic. That perhaps you are too closely choosing your path based on what mine has been, or what I wished it to be.
I am scared not that you will fail ― you will fail, but you also know how to get up when you’re down ― but that you will realize how very much I have failed you. And that I will lose you.
I am terrified of the look on your faces the first time someone you admire demoralizes you.
I fear that you will not be safe, that in teaching you how to approach life with openness and vulnerability, I have left you too open and too vulnerable.
Yes, I know what you will say: “Mom, we have so much more than many of our friends have. You talk to us. You listen to us. You respect us. You trust us. We say, ‘I love you’ every time we part. Not everyone has that.”
I think that’s the root of my fear. Not everyone has that. And not everyone gives it.
You think I’m amazing. Perhaps that is what I fear most of all. The day you don’t think I’m amazing anymore.
I want you to do well in the world. I don’t know exactly what that means. I want you to love and be loved, to feel like you are contributing something every day, to be authentic. To make a living. To make a difference. I’m just not sure those things go together for women in this world.
I know you have goals. Goals that you want to achieve. Or at least paths you want to explore. I have told you over and over, “Don’t let other people define your path. Don’t believe them when they say you’re not allowed.”
Now, before you head off into the world of possibilities and dangers, let me tell you one more thing: Be open to following your path rather than controlling your journey. As you’re fighting the cruelties of the world, don’t lose the compass in your heart.
And with that, I will prepare to drop you at school, a mile from where you were born. Simultaneously leaving and coming home. Two girls. Navigating the world together. Stepping away from me, but hopefully keeping me with you. And hopefully avoiding my pitfalls. You are beautiful and strong and vulnerable and intelligent and you understand that the world changes one person at a time.
Carrie Kaufman is a writer and public radio host currently based in Las Vegas. She created and published PerformInk, Chicago’s arts business newspaper, for 20 years. She is the mother of twin daughters who are heading back to Chicago for college without her (which is why Carrie is currently going through an existential crisis).
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