… I’m not interested in your feedback. (Brene Brown)

The amount of ignorance it takes for someone to comment on something they have not gone through themselves, is astounding.

I am guilty as charged; I bring myself to court before bringing anyone else in. The number of times I’ve rolled eyes when children pull a full blown tantrum, much to the dismay of their embarrassed parents is a secret. But I am guilty. And like I said, I bring myself in the confession box before anyone else. I try hard to contain my amazement. Knowing that I have may, many friends who are young moms, I risk offending them. I hope they will forgive me for my honest confession. I am only human. I pass judgement without thought; like everyone else.

My choice of confession was hardly innocent. For someone who got unsolicited advice for ten years, this sounds like the perfect rebuttal. But then again, I have hope in the kindness of my audience. I am safe because I am in the company of young mothers. Fragile, loving hearts. Genuinely kind.

Let me take you back three years. I was an emotional fool back then. We happened to have some guests over whom I was meeting for the first time. The children ran a muck in my house. Please don’t blame me. I am not like that by choice. For someone who tried desperately to have kids and didn’t end up with one or two, I was used to a clean and organized home. Still am. An object would stay in its exact position for six months if I didn’t move it myself. With time, you just get used to being organized and in control, whether you were like that or not.

So, this lady had a baby bump and two of her miniature versions ran havoc in my home. She decided she could wreck a havoc in my heart too. All evening, she told me how having a kid was the answer to all of life’s question. How having a child meant you got your purpose in life. And how, I kid you not, she said it was better to have a boy than a girl, because the your future would be secured. (She had two girls, by the way.)

Till that point I knew it was the ignorant part of her speaking. But then she breached a topic I felt crazy emotional for. ‘Why don’t you adopt? It’s a “sawaab”. Don’t be so arrogant. Adopt. Adopt a boy. How will you spend your old life? You will be left alone. Everyone will be busy with kids.’

It was madness. 

I silently tolerated all that I was being lectured about. And when she went back, I spent the whole week crying my eyes out. My husband made sure they never came back.

See, it’s not that she didn’t “mean well” for me, or that she was talking to me “like a sister would”, it was just not her place to say all that she did. For someone who practically got pregnant every year like it was the easiest thing in the world, she didn’t know a goddamn thing about what it was like to be in my shoes. 

After eight years or so, you come to terms with the fact that you’ll probably never be a mom. You and your spouse grow comfortable with each other; the kind of comfort that couples with children envy for. Not all. But most of them.

You CANNOT go about destroying someone’s idea of a happy life because as blind as we can be at times, none of us get to decide what they get and don’t get in this life.

That evening was an eye opening experience for me. I look back and think, ‘yeah, that is the kind of woman I never want to be’. I never want to be the woman who comments when she hasn’t been in the same arena, getting her ass kicked too.

Period.