It was just too much!
I am blessed to have both my 88-year-old parents and my sister living close by. My parents are downsizing, so we spent a Saturday afternoon going through old photos, sorting them into groups, and telling the stories behind the images. I quietly pulled out all the photos of my children and put them, facedown, in a separate pile.
I went home with a stack of photos and began to clear out room for the beautiful mid-century modern wedding China my parents are passing on to me. In the process, I found a small set of my grandmother’s China that I had saved in hopes of using it for tea parties with my grandchildren. That’s when it became too much, because I will never have grandchildren. I threw out the whole box of tea party China and I gathered all the photos of my children from tabletops and shelves and shoved them under my bed. You see, I lost my youngest son when a therapist affirmed his idea that he was a woman. His brother and father also cut me out of their lives because I cannot agree that we had raised a daughter and not a son.
There are still photos of my children hanging in my entry. If I take them down it will leave a gap, not just on my wall, but in my history. Our homes are an expression of who we are. I am a dressmaker, and when my customers come to my home, they see those portraits and know I am a mother. They ask about my children. In response, I just mention the cities where they live now. That works well enough. It would not work if I began dating. So, I don’t date.
If I took all the photos down, could I forget I have children? Could I just surround myself with things from my childhood, things from my parents, the things I use now, but nothing from the 35 years when I had a husband and two sons. More than half my life is missing and I cannot pretend I am 28. Do I pretend I lived over 30 years as a single woman? That I worked in my original career as an engineer until I suddenly decided to give it up and take in sewing? Did I move and travel by myself, or have I been in my hometown all along and no one noticed?
I cannot reconstruct a life without my family. They were the heart of my life. It would be as false a depiction of my life as is my son’s reconstruction of his childhood as a girl.
So, I left the portraits hanging, even though they are too much to bear.
Oh god this is too much 🥺💔 i wish i could hug ypu and give you back your missing years. Since I cannot, all I can do is pray that something good happens in your life that is good enough to fill the void and missing years with new memories and new years. I don't know if such a thing exists except reparation, but still I pray that for you. My heart breaks for all of us.🥺💔🙏
I also feel your pain. I too am single after a 30-year marriage ended. I have one trans-identified child who wants little to do with me and another who maintains distance in order to manage the sibling relationship. I had to declutter my life to fit my belongings into a small house, so I’ve only kept my favorite photos. I decided to frame the ones that show my kids as I remember them at their best – when they were happy teenagers, involved in sports and music and not so obsessed with their identity or consumed with pessimism about the world. I posted them in a prominent place where I can pause to think hopeful thoughts about them before I leave for work every day.
It’s very hard to feel you don’t have a family any more. I would give anything to feel a sense of belonging to a family again, to have a place to spend Sunday afternoons or to go for Christmas, surrounded by grandparents, cousins, and my own kids. Twenty years ago I had no idea this was the future that awaited me. Most of my friends are still married and have younger children, and they have no idea what kind of culture their kids will be graduating into.