“There is no place safer on this planet than with me,” I say to my sons whenever there is something to be feared under the bed. Within the judgement of peers. Within the insecurities bleeding in their hearts. 

“I will keep you safe.”

“You are safe.”

“I am stronger than all those things.”

 I stroked their hair, pulled them on my lap and snuggled them whenever they would allow. I was always devoted to creating physical touch in my mothering, tangible human connection that spins webs of memories and comfort, available on demand when my arms aren’t. All my limbs are available for them to hold on to. But the truth is, they are safe because I had cut those limbs to bring them into the world. Given my blood for their blood. I was both a creator for others and a grim reaper to Self. 

My soul cracked open and I sacrificed dreams to become a mother. I killed off percentages to grow fingernails, lost mirrors of accomplishments to create clear eyes to read the world and to sing into the wind.

As a young girl, the only girl smothered between two brothers, I knew early on that I was born to breed. My own mother packed her suitcase, filled only with a high school diploma and working uterus, and moved from her father’s house to my father’s house. Both were 19 at the time they made those forever promises. I grew up with an eyelet-draped childhood, a mom who frequented the PTA, drove for our school functions and never forgot to mark everyday as a special day, even when what made those days special were the terrific temper or moonlight chaos that ran unhinged and unpredictable through our hallways. 

But she was a function over a form. She was a mother at the cost of her dreams, if she ever had them. I never heard of them, and if she cried for the girl she once was, those tears were buried in construction paper artwork and bedtime stories and family vacation planning details. 

At a young age, I knew I wanted more. While sons are entitled to their future, daughters whisper underneath the covers of dreams as real as unicorns. I felt ashamed for not having the desire to be her. “You’ll change your mind when you’re older,” they all promised me. I never did, but I changed my heart to fit the mold. After self-exploration, it became necessary to succumb to the majority feeling of duty to procreate. An adolescent draft on the battlefield of humanity. To craft and expand myself and the love of my husband into tax-paying citizens and future breeders of their own. 

I craved a daughter, but also knew that God wouldn’t give me one. I had outwardly hoped for one t0 satisfy the hopes of others, but deep down, there was nothing scarier than having a daughter. To look into hopeful eyes, and try to lie through the reassurances that she could be anything. That the world would let her break out of the paper doll dresses and painted nails. To paint over the misogyny and statistics that will make her prey in nearly every aspect of life.

I broke into the attic of equality, but I am still not there, as my brothers are. She may get closer, stand on the roof maybe, but the beanstalk to power and possibility is only climbed if you have the power of man. Manpower. 

And so, God was tender and instead gave me three sons. Each one is beautiful and capable and possesses the parts of me I sacrificed to bring them into the world. The travels I would not have, the people I would not meet, the hours of sleep and relaxation that they confiscated, and the sense of self they absorbed to feed their bellies, the dreams of their own. A corpse, I lie still, thankful through gritted teeth, for the blessing I was born to receive. The life I was born to surrender. The lives I am blessed to witness.

If a mother dies to give birth, but remains in body-only, is there a resurrection later in life? Do the docked tails of independence grow back after she clocks out of nurturing? Or is there such a thing? Is there ever an end, or just a transfer of responsibility from mother to grandmother? If there is a partner involved, does the mothering translate there? Does he take the torch and allow rest in the tomb for the soul to experience rebirth? Does the soul come back as it was?

Sometimes, I look in the mirror and try to find her. Gosh, you were radiant. You could hide the damage, the shaky knees, the questions so well under the brightness of your optimism. Your skin looks like a costume, take it off. Your eyes have been masked by the worry of another, by the debt paid to Artemis, which was inherited by generations of women before you. 

They tell me that I can have it all. That I can create a moat around what is left of me and paint it to look like self-care. I can return to who I was, and I am better for it. Even though I am still barely 40, I know that I will never see her again. Be her again. Love her again. Watch in wonder as she trusts her feet to find the next lilypad of adventure. Find different hidden doorways of love with a stranger. That girl is gone and her fragments live on in the lives of her three sons.They have the best parts. They have the parts needed to grow strong in the world and go where she could never be. This is why they are safe with me. I would guard my broken pieces, reincarnated into sons, with my life, because at one time, these pieces weremy life. They have plagiarized the prettiest pieces to make art of their own. I will find contentment in that, a washed-up spectator, cheering for the Home Team, feeling the roots sprout anew in the new tilled earth.