Names have been changed.

I first saw Michael walking down the street my first day of high school. I felt something inside my stomach that told me he was the one. He was a junior at our high school; I was 14 and he was 16.

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We quickly became a couple. We’d meet before and after school just to spend extra time with each other. Every day after school, we held hands and walked to Central Park and sat for hours on a park bench, no matter how cold it was.

I hated when it hit 5 o’clock, because that was when the fairytale ended.

That was when I had to return home and deal with my real life. When we parted, he would kiss me goodbye, and tell me he loved me, and that he would see me tomorrow.

My boyfriend made me forget about my troubles at home. My relationship with my adoptive mother was terrible. She hit and threatened me. She’d get enraged and keep me in the house if I forgot to do a single chore.

She insulted my biological mother, who’d died when I was 2 and who was supposedly one of her closest friends. During our many arguments, she would throw in my face that I was “selfish, just like my mother.”

She wasn’t what a mother was supposed to be like, and I always told myself that I’d never be like her when I had my own kids.

She would try to get close with me by asking about my personal life, but I knew better and never told her about Michael. I knew that if she knew how much he meant to me, she would try to ruin my happiness somehow. She was vindictive. So I kept my relationship secret from her.

My Escape

After five months of dating, Michael and I lost our virginity to each other. We trusted each other and were comfortable with our decision. His mother worked a lot, so we spent a lot of time after school at his house—watching movies, playing video games, ordering food, taking naps. For those few hours, it was like we lived together.

Michael was my heart, another part of me. He was my first love and, I hoped, my last. I had never felt more beautiful in my life.

In the midst of a conversation under the covers one day, he asked me to marry him. I was speechless at first, then I kept asking him, “Are you sure, are you sure?” And then I said “Yes.” A few months later, for our one-year anniversary, he bought me an engagement ring, and we told each other we would get married sometime during or after college.

Maternal Feelings

That summer I began feeling deep maternal emotions. Children were drawn to me, and I had a new affection for them. Looking at children started this beckoning emotion in my heart, making it heavy and full, as if I was missing something.

One day in Barnes & Noble, Michael and I thumbed through baby books. I told him how I had been feeling and how it felt right to conceive our child soon. He looked at me and smiled, kissed me on my forehead and rubbed my stomach, but told me it wasn’t a good time because we were both so young and had school to think about. He said his mom would kick him out if she found out I was pregnant.

Part of me knew he was right, but my intuition also felt right. Out of respect for Michael and his wishes, I didn’t purposely try to get pregnant; we had protected sex. But if I had, my first choice was going to be to keep it. I loved Michael, and I knew I would love this child.

Looking back, I realize that the abuse and neglect of my adoptive mother, and the absence of mothering, was largely why I wanted a child so much. But at the time, I was convinced a child would bring me happiness. Everything seemed right. Michael loved me very much, and I knew we’d make amazing parents. Already we seemed married. I took pride in how solid and grown-up our relationship felt.

One time I asked my adoptive mother if she would kick me out if I ever got pregnant, and she said no. She had had a lot of friends with babies when she was my age, so she knew the situation. In fact, she had always assured me that if I had a baby, she would help me out, so I didn’t see the situation hurting anyone.

The Loss of My “Family”

Fast forward 10 months, and I was in a nightmare. Michael was no longer the guy I knew and loved. He had changed, become possessive and indecisive, always breaking up and getting back together with me. He started yelling at me and trying to control the things I did, jerking me around like a yo-yo on the days he decided he was in love with me.

image by Froylan Garcia

For weeks at a time he refused to speak to me, and seeing him in school was torture. He’d see me in the hallway and act like I wasn’t there. He screened my calls, so whenever I called him, it went straight to voicemail.

I was left with nothing, it seemed. This was the man I planned to devote my life to, who I thought loved me as much as I loved him. I tried my best to be patient with him, to try to change his mind, to salvage our love, but unfortunately I didn’t know that you can’t make people love you. (I found out later that Michael was going through mental health issues of his own, and having a delayed reaction to his own abusive father.)

That summer Michael broke up with me after my birthday by simply not talking to me. I never understood why. I tried to move on, but it didn’t seem to work at all. He was all I could think about, because I really missed him. He was still a part of me.

My best friend found out she was pregnant that summer. I was so happy for her, but it also made me miss Michael and the baby I had wanted. That summer was also the summer I moved out of my adoptive home. Things had gotten so bad that my adoptive mother physically attacked me in our kitchen, and we ended up fighting. I wasn’t going to allow her to abuse me anymore and I was fed up with her taking advantage of me.

I moved to my grandmother’s house for a year, and then my dad and I got an apartment together, which is where I still live. (I didn’t live with my dad before for financial reasons, but we’ve always been close.)

This Time, for Grandfather

About a year after the break-up with Michael, I wanted to get pregnant again. This time it had nothing to do with a boy, but with my father.

My father has HIV, which I’ve known since I was 13. At the beginning of my junior year, soon after I started living with him, he came down with pneumonia, which put him in the hospital for two days. My world shook. I thought my dad was close to dying.

I was afraid that my father would never get to meet my children. My dad was my best friend, and he meant the world to me. And children were going to play a big part in my future. I didn’t want to have one without the other.

I decided that I should have my baby right after I graduated high school. I would conceive around late September, and give birth in June before my first year of college. That way I could take the summer off to nurse my baby for her first three months.

I know it sounds crazy, but to me it was pure logic. I never had relationships with my grandfathers so it was something I had always wanted to give to my daughter. Having the baby would give me the opportunity to share my greatest creation with my father before he died. More realistically, it would give me a real family. I was very fond of the idea of living with my father and daughter.

I had thought that after Michael, maybe the baby yearning would go away, and I could focus on my own life. But it didn’t. And this time I felt like I was on a schedule controlled by my dad’s death.

It bummed me out that I wouldn’t have my child the way I’d always wanted—with a man I wanted to marry and spend my life with. But I really wanted to do this for my dad. My plan was to ask my best guy friend (who is straight) to be my sperm donor.

I told my dad my plan when we went for a walk one night. “Dad, I really want children in the future, and it means so much to me that they know you, but our situation is kinda messed up right now, with you being sick. I’ve given this much thought, Dad, and it’s really hard for me, but I think I want to get pregnant right after high school. Just as a precaution. I figure when I have the baby, I’ll be in college already with a job, and you don’t work so I know you would help me raise her when I’m busy. You will, right Dad?” I laughed, trying to make the situation light.

He wasn’t too keen on the idea, but he supported it, and that’s all that mattered.

The thought of having a child so young didn’t bother me. I felt no societal pressures from school or my family, because throughout my life, I’d known teenage girls with children. It seemed socially acceptable.

Relieved That I Didn’t

Fortunately, I never went through with that plan. Instead I changed my life in other ways. When I moved in with my father, I started supporting him and myself financially, and living a very independent life. I’ve accomplished so many things since I left my abusive mother at age 16: I started working for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), became a published writer, began modeling, and worked several jobs. In the last two years, I’ve learned a lot about myself.

I realize now that my life wasn’t very fulfilling when I lived with my adoptive mother. Because of all her abuse, I wanted to love and treat my daughter (in my daydreams the baby was always a girl) the right way. I wanted to give her a relationship with a mother that I had always wanted and never got.

If I had had a baby, I wouldn’t have been able to do everything I’ve done. Not having a baby has given me so many more opportunities. I just got accepted to college where I’ll be majoring in film, and I’m starting my own website featuring women I photograph. When my life goals have been accomplished, and I have seen the world, then it will be my time to have a child.

Michael hurt me so much that he took some of my love for children away. I find myself no longer wanting to play and care for them like I used to. I don’t see them as angelic creatures anymore, but as somewhat of a burden. I don’t like thinking that way, but I do. If I do ever decide to have children, I want to be married first, and be financially stable.

Living with my adoptive mother, I was so sheltered and depressed all the time, I barely did anything. I didn’t get to enjoy my adolescence, and motherhood looked better to me than what I was going through. Now that I know I have so many options in life, I see that a child would have only hindered my future. A child is a future, and it’s a beautiful future, but now I just don’t see it as mine.