Family Values

I couldn’t keep torturing myself with questions of whether or not to do it. And I know there are no guarantees… I might end up with a devil-baby plagued by cholic, and post-natal depression induced by sleep deprivation… (of course it could all be a dreamy-easy second-time-confidence situation!) but, either way, I want people to be sharing it with. The good and the bad. Not just Rosie. Not just mum and dad.

So I invented ‘fairy god-parents’. They’re special trusted friends, both old and new… people I can lean on and who will be repaid in barrow-loads of love, appreciation and baby vomit.

When I first talked about it… people were flattered and then they asked ‘but what does it really mean?’. I think a few of them might have experienced the silent guilty thought - ‘what’s in it for me?’ (I still don’t know exactly…)

The fact is that I can’t see into the future and having a baby is sailing into unchartered waters. Anything could happen. But I made it clear that each individual could make whatever commitment they wish to… and that it should probably be an organic, variable one - as work commitments change, people have their own kids and lives… and baby’s needs evolve.

Simplest put… it’s an invitation to be part of our family… a pact to ‘come and play!’

Lolling about in bed. Inviting a small spirit to come and be part of all our lives.

After getting over all the excitement… and the hilarity of waiting for the sperm to arrive… and all the ‘performing for the camera’ stuff…

Not to mention the crazy logistics of co-ordinating insemination and orgasm…

Languid. Distinctly post-coital. Trying to remember the last time I lay in the sunshine reading a book…

It didn’t seem to matter there was no lover to ’share the moment’ with… looking out at the tree-tops it felt more like it was between me and the baby…

I wasn’t going to tell them until later… after all I wouldn’t if I was in a straight relationship would I? I’d just be having lots of sex and celebrating our success with them sometime after the first trimester ;-/

But several friends persuaded me that, if I wanted Mum and Dad to be involved in the baby’s life, I should start as I meant to continue, open and honest… after all, what was I scared of?

Basically I was scared that they wouldn’t approve… This is how the conversation went when I eventually told Dad on camera.

Sonja: Well one of the things that I wanted to talk to you about is… I’ve been thinking about it for a long time… and I talked to Mum about it ages ago but I haven’t done recently because she was ‘under-whelmed’ by the idea… is that I’d like to have another child…
Gramps: Mmm. (pause) Well, yes. (pause) That is under-whelming isn’t it?
Sonja: (pause) Well… why? (pause) Why is it under-whelming for you?

Mum refused to talk on camera (a decision I respected) but without the ‘interview’ excuse it was, in fact, quite hard to book a time when the three of us could sit down together and have a meaningful conversation… I explained the whole ‘fairy god-parent’ thing… said I knew their time was already pretty over-committed because they both still work full-time and look after my sister’s kids a fair bit…I wasn’t counting on them but I hoped they’d be involved… Mum accused me of positioning her ‘at the bottom of the ladder’… the conversation got quite tearful… and heated…

I said I’d never felt that they genuinely accepted me… she said I was just ‘too sensitive’. I tried to give them tangible examples…
I said ‘Remember that time my girlfriend came camping with us all at Christmas and you said ‘Fine, as long as you don’t touch one another in front of the kids? Do you think that was OK?’.
She said ‘Well yes, because it’s outside the norm…’
I said ‘Mum, being black or in a wheel chair is also outside the norm! What sort of message do you think you’re sending the kids… Rosie knew we were girlfriends and she didn’t have a problem with it… don’t you think it’s better for her to see me being happy and intimate with someone I love… than being fearful and uptight because some homophobe might have a problem with it?’
She said ‘Are you saying we’re homophobic?…’
I couldn’t even answer straight…
I think I just said ‘Sometimes you behave in a way that makes me feel like I don’t fit…’.
Still, it somehow got turned around into being my problem.

The thing is, I do know they love me… and at the end of the day they’ll be there for me and the kid… but that’s the problem with this sexuality stuff, it’s so goddamn SUBTLE! It’s NOT quite the same as race or gender… because, for me anyway, it’s not something I choose to make overtly visible.

Known or unknown? Involved or distant?

I debated these things endlessly and considered my number one priority - avoiding the angst and grief of family court that I’m still going through with Rosie. Obviously the easiest thing would be to go with an unknown donor so that I had complete control… only problem is that I’m probably still fertile and as such, in South Australia, I’m not eligible for treatment by one of the ART clinics (Assisted Reproductive Technology).

Apart from not fancying the expense and medical invasiveness of being treated interstate… I still held dear these romantic notions of a collective of loving friends and family members being around for the child… No matter how hard I might try and eliminate him from the picture, in my imagination I had a spot reserved for the biological father. It has always been my preference to be principal carer… but I liked the idea of the child knowing it’s ‘donor-dad’ as just one of a group of ‘fairy god-parents’.

I worked my way through a small list of a couple of prospective donors, but nobody saw it quite the way I did… and the one thing I dreaded most was conflict… so negotiations were always protracted as we tried to cover all possible eventualities and intangible expectations…

Evetually I found a local guy who was happy to be involved, but on my terms… and better still - we get along!

Check out the little paper bag the first specimen jar was delivered in!

When it comes to having another child… I’ve got a bit of baggage. When Rosie was born I was living in Sydney… 800 km away from extended family support… and my peers were groovy, ambitious and singularly childless. When I found out I was pregnant I realised I’d never even held a baby before!

Rosie was born with macrocephalus and had brain surgery when she was 8 days old. We were told it was likely she was going to be severely disabled. After the operation she decided breastfeeding was a bit too hard and, convinced that she really needed breast milk for healthy brain development, I fought with her for the next 3 months… every 3 hours.

My partner was working 70 hour weeks and when he was around… he made me feel I wasn’t coping. Pretty soon I started to believe it, and the slide into post-natal-depression-land was a quick and easy one…

Recently I was commissioned by US web-site filmaka.com to make a micro-movie on the theme of ‘Stuck in Traffic’. I remembered feeling trapped in the crazy, sleep-deprived head-space of first-time motherhood…

Will it be different this time?

Google - Stuck in Traffic