Speaker 1: Pushkin.
Speaker 2: The certainty I had was absolute. I don't want that.
Speaker 2: There was not a grain of doubt anywhere, you know.
Speaker 1: Radio producer Helena de Grotte spent the majority of her
Speaker 1: life assuming she would never have kids. That As she
Speaker 1: got older, people's criticism of that choice started to intensify,
Speaker 1: and it left her unmoored.
Speaker 2: Even as I was saying no, no, no, I don't
Speaker 2: want kids, on the inside, I thought there has to
Speaker 2: be something wrong with me for not wanting that.
Speaker 1: On today's show, Navigating the Road Less Taken, I'm Maya Shunker,
Speaker 1: a scientist who studies human behavior, and this is a
Speaker 1: slight change of plans, a show about who we are
Speaker 1: and who we become in the face of a big change.
Speaker 1: When Helena was young and imagine her future, she pictured
Speaker 1: an apartment in a big, exciting city, a cool job,
Speaker 1: and weekends dancing at nightclubs. Children simply weren't in this picture,
Speaker 1: which wasn't an issue for Helena until she was in
Speaker 1: her twenties.
Speaker 2: I love talking to strangers. I'd sit on the train
Speaker 2: or on the bus going somewhere and I would just
Speaker 2: start talking to the person next to me, and they'd
Speaker 2: be like, oh, you know, what are you doing? And
Speaker 2: I was probably still at university and they're like, oh,
Speaker 2: what are your plans after and you know, like, uh,
Speaker 2: do you want kids? And I'd be like, yeah, I
Speaker 2: don't think so. And I said, I don't think so
Speaker 2: because I'd never thought, but I would do that. But
Speaker 2: every time this stranger, whoever they were, men, women, middle aged, older, thirty,
Speaker 2: you know, they would push back so hard and they
Speaker 2: would say some version of you're making a mistake, You're
Speaker 2: going to regret this, You're missing out on the greatest
Speaker 2: love that exists. So I think it's just in response
Speaker 2: to that that I became much more militant. The reaction
Speaker 2: is sort of what turns my ugh, I don't think
Speaker 2: so into a no.
Speaker 1: You know, what were the reasons you found yourself giving
Speaker 1: to others about why you did not want kids?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I think okay, So on the outside, right, I
Speaker 2: said no pretty consistently. But one of the things that
Speaker 2: made me unsure on the inside was the fact that
Speaker 2: if someone ask me why, I could never come up
Speaker 2: with a definitive answer. And my answer also changed depending
Speaker 2: on the day, you all, depending on how I was
Speaker 2: feeling or what I was thinking about. Most that week,
Speaker 2: and so I always felt like I was lying a
Speaker 2: little bit, you know, because I would say something like, oh,
Speaker 2: you know, like I don't think I can combine that
Speaker 2: with the kind of you know, poorly paid work that
Speaker 2: is most interesting to me, or like I think I
Speaker 2: want to travel more, or there's like a lot of
Speaker 2: mental health issues in my family and I don't want
Speaker 2: to pass that on. Every reason I gave I knew
Speaker 2: was not the reason, but it becomes calcified, like once
Speaker 2: you believe something about yourself, you find evidence for it everywhere,
Speaker 2: and so it made it hard for me to trust myself.
Speaker 1: Yes, well, I think what you're describing illustrates that there
Speaker 1: is something very curious about the way we engage with
Speaker 1: this topic. How interesting is it that the burden of proof,
Speaker 1: if you will, the burden lies on the person choosing
Speaker 1: not to do something versus choosing to do something. I
Speaker 1: have so rarely heard someone ask anyone I know or me,
Speaker 1: why do you want kids? The default assumption is, of
Speaker 1: course you should want kids, no justification needed. Go forward.
Speaker 1: We a society will celebrate you, and I don't know
Speaker 1: if that's true in other domains. Right, we would ask
Speaker 1: someone like why are you moving to this other country?
Speaker 1: Typically we interrogate action of some kind, proactive decisions, and
Speaker 1: yet this is one topic. This is one area of
Speaker 1: life that seems to be immune from that kind of scrutiny. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: the marriage might be another example of this. Well, of
Speaker 1: course you want to get married, right, There are just
Speaker 1: certain social norms where we simply don't question that the
Speaker 1: default should be yes.
Speaker 2: I think you're absolutely right that that is in general.
Speaker 2: How it is this said, I think for me I
Speaker 2: would respond with just that question, Oh, tell me why
Speaker 2: do you want kids? You know, And it wasn't really
Speaker 2: to be like contrarian or to hold up a mirror,
Speaker 2: you know, it was really just more like, oh, I
Speaker 2: am curious, though, tell me why is this something you
Speaker 2: feel so strongly about. For instance, with my best friend Sigrid,
Speaker 2: who I met when I was in my early twenties,
Speaker 2: you know, we weren't at all ready to have kids, right,
Speaker 2: none of my none of our friends were at all
Speaker 2: in that stage yet. But she knew for certain that
Speaker 2: she wanted kids, and so yeah, she would push back
Speaker 2: and she would say, but you know, you have so
Speaker 2: much love to give, and like, I think you'd be
Speaker 2: great at it. But I would ask her and probe
Speaker 2: and you know, push her to explain herself just as well,
Speaker 2: you know, like it was really very mutual. She already
Speaker 2: knew back then that she wanted to be a journalist,
Speaker 2: not exactly the best paid field or the most stable.
Speaker 2: So I would also ask her, like, are you not
Speaker 2: afraid that you just won't have the you know that
Speaker 2: it won't be possible logistically to be a journalist. You
Speaker 2: will need more money, you will need to be at
Speaker 2: home at more regular hours, you know, and like, aren't
Speaker 2: you afraid? I just always felt like, once you have
Speaker 2: a kid, you have like an open wound, you know,
Speaker 2: and you have to trust the world. That's hard already
Speaker 2: to be good to this open wound, you.
Speaker 1: Know, absolutely. And it's interesting too that you mentioned, you know,
Speaker 1: people say you have so much love to give, you'd
Speaker 1: be such an amazing mom. There's lots of things that
Speaker 1: each of us would be amazing at that we choose
Speaker 1: not to do.
Speaker 2: And especially love, like that argument that I wouldn't get
Speaker 2: to experience, like the greatest kind of love. That's how
Speaker 2: everyone would put it. It was like a hierarchy, you know,
Speaker 2: the best one that kind of shook me the most.
Speaker 2: You know, when people would say something like that.
Speaker 1: What did that do to your conviction? Did you question yourself?
Speaker 1: Did you think, oh my god, is there something wrong
Speaker 1: with me? Did you think I have to figure out
Speaker 1: a way to get comfortable having kids? Walk me through
Speaker 1: how you would respond to that kind of feedback.
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh I would absolutely land on the question what
Speaker 2: is wrong with me? That is always what I concluded,
Speaker 2: you know, like there has to be something wrong with
Speaker 2: me for not wanting that. And this was not entirely baseless,
Speaker 2: you know, like one of the things that I found
Speaker 2: so astonishing about this decision to have kids is that
Speaker 2: you don't know what you're getting yourself into, you know, Like,
Speaker 2: you can read about it all you want. You can
Speaker 2: read an entire library of books about having children, you
Speaker 2: can talk to everyone you know who has children. You
Speaker 2: will not know what it's like for you to be
Speaker 2: a parent until you do it, you know. And so
Speaker 2: the fact that people were doing it regardless, I thought
Speaker 2: was so brave. And I always felt like I lack
Speaker 2: that bravery, Like I'm a little bit of a control freak,
Speaker 2: you know, I get really knocked off balance when I
Speaker 2: don't know there's like some last minute change or like
Speaker 2: all of a sudden someone suggests sort of like an
Speaker 2: impromptu trip, or I'm always like, oh no, no, if
Speaker 2: I don't have like advanced warning, like I'm not going
Speaker 2: to do it, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, total.
Speaker 2: And so I think that is what I thought about,
Speaker 2: you know, is the fact that I don't want kids
Speaker 2: just another example of me being led by my fears.
Speaker 2: And so that's why I thought, even as I was
Speaker 2: saying no, no, no, I don't want kids, on the inside,
Speaker 2: I thought there must be something wrong with me and
Speaker 2: I want to change that. Is that possible?
Speaker 1: So if I'm hearing you correctly, what you're saying is
Speaker 1: you knew, and so many of us know. We're told
Speaker 1: this time and time again that parenthood is a transformative experience, right,
Speaker 1: It's impossible to predict who you will become on the
Speaker 1: other side of parenthood. And I agree with you. I
Speaker 1: think there is a lot of bravery involved in taking
Speaker 1: that leap. But what I'm hearing you say is I
Speaker 1: wasn't willing to gamble on that transformation.
Speaker 2: Yeah right, yes, And I didn't like that about myself.
Speaker 2: I knew that I was missing out on a lot
Speaker 2: of good life by saying no to things almost by default,
Speaker 2: which I did do.
Speaker 1: So I want to fast forward to when you're twenty eight.
Speaker 1: You have this whirlwind romance with this guy named David.
Speaker 1: You get married very quickly. You are very candid about
Speaker 1: the fact that you don't want kids. He understands that
Speaker 1: that is your reality, that is your preface. Several years
Speaker 1: into your marriage, you find yourself staring at a positive
Speaker 1: pregnancy test. Bring me back to that moment.
Speaker 2: Even before I did the test, I knew it was
Speaker 2: very very early. There was just something different about my brain.
Speaker 2: You know. It's as if like all the hard edges
Speaker 2: of my cells had been filed down. And so I
Speaker 2: saw the result and I wasn't afraid, I wasn't shocked.
Speaker 2: It was confirmation of what I knew was true, and
Speaker 2: it was just such a there was a kind of
Speaker 2: blank in my mind because by that time David and
Speaker 2: I had been fighting so much for years about this topic,
Speaker 2: because I told him that I didn't want kids and
Speaker 2: he had accepted that. But then very quickly after we
Speaker 2: got married, he started trying to convince me. And it
Speaker 2: was sort of light at first, and then ever more
Speaker 2: insistent you know, as we both got older, as he
Speaker 2: started thinking more about what is the point of life?
Speaker 2: You know, he started asking these really big questions, and
Speaker 2: for him, the answer was clear. The point of life
Speaker 2: is to have again. And so he became ever more insistent,
Speaker 2: and he pushed me so hard that I had to
Speaker 2: push back very hard, and so I hardened. You know,
Speaker 2: I had become so inert. The certainty I had was absolute.
Speaker 2: I don't want that. It was almost like a fight
Speaker 2: that isn't a fight because you're not really having a conversation,
Speaker 2: You're just standing there entrenched in your position. And then
Speaker 2: I got pregnant, and it was such a reality check,
Speaker 2: like you can have opinions, you can have like a
Speaker 2: strong stance, and then there's your body having its own program,
Speaker 2: you know. And so it became all of a sudden
Speaker 2: a very different thing. It became like it was no
Speaker 2: longer abstract. You know.
Speaker 1: Tell me what it was like to tell David this news.
Speaker 2: The moment I told him, I could see that he
Speaker 2: was trying to be a good man about this, you
Speaker 2: know that he like he said, like you know, oh,
Speaker 2: you know, and of course you know, this is your decision,
Speaker 2: you know, like your body your choice, Like he said
Speaker 2: that literally, but his face said something completely different. He
Speaker 2: was like holding his hands in front of his mouth
Speaker 2: as he like, oh, and I could tell sort of
Speaker 2: between his fingers that he was just all lit up,
Speaker 2: you know, he was so immediately suffused with happiness and
Speaker 2: wonder and amazement and gratitude. And so in that moment,
Speaker 2: I felt like my attempt at rationality, you know, like
Speaker 2: let me go through the rubric one more time like
Speaker 2: bros and cons and let me then make a decision
Speaker 2: and then inform him like it made no sense. And
Speaker 2: I just thought my reasons or my resistance or my fear,
Speaker 2: it doesn't matter. I felt like he was connected to
Speaker 2: some truth about life that I didn't understand. And so
Speaker 2: I felt like, well, if he feels it. And everyone
Speaker 2: says that as soon as you have a kid, you
Speaker 2: love them like you would take a bullet for that kid,
Speaker 2: you know, like some you are transformed. I was like,
Speaker 2: I mean, probably that will happen, right, So in that moment,
Speaker 2: I just thought, I think I just have to give
Speaker 2: up just standing so firm in my conviction and just
Speaker 2: go with this incredible moment. So I said like, Okay,
Speaker 2: you know let's do it.
Speaker 1: Tell me about the first week of your pregnancy.
Speaker 2: The pregnancy immediately transformed me in a way that I
Speaker 2: didn't even know was possible. I control freak, you know,
Speaker 2: easily anxious. I was calm, and I was optimistic, you know,
Speaker 2: like usually, like I can really get into such a
Speaker 2: doom spiral when I open the newspaper, you know, like
Speaker 2: I cannot get it out of my head that everything
Speaker 2: is getting worse and will only get worse, like there
Speaker 2: are no breaks on my anxiety.
Speaker 1: And sorry to interrupt that, I've heard you say that
Speaker 1: when people will tell you, Helena, you will love this
Speaker 1: child so much. Your experience with these doom spirals and
Speaker 1: the fact that you have a history of depression has
Speaker 1: led you to say, exactly, And so if I were
Speaker 1: to love this kid so much, why would I subject
Speaker 1: them to this life, to this planet.
Speaker 2: Yes? Absolutely, that was so strong, Like either they will
Speaker 2: have depression too, right, because it's hereditary. Or they will
Speaker 2: be fine, but they will have a depressed mom okay,
Speaker 2: also not great. Or they will not be depressed. My
Speaker 2: medication will continue to work. I will not be depressed.
Speaker 2: And still there's all the stuff that's no one's fault,
Speaker 2: you know, just sickness or ordinary misfortune.
Speaker 1: And given that backdrop, then how extraordinary for you to
Speaker 1: feel the opposite. Yes, during this moment.
Speaker 2: I felt so capable, I really, you know, usually I
Speaker 2: feel like, wow, the world is so big and you
Speaker 2: have so little sway, right, Like what can you do?
Speaker 2: You can hold a sign and go protest, and you
Speaker 2: can you know, vote. It's so ridiculous how little power
Speaker 2: you have. And then I was pregnant, and it was
Speaker 2: almost as if my shoulders got broader and my back
Speaker 2: got straighter, and my feet seemed like more firmly planted
Speaker 2: on the floor. And I was really like, bring it on.
Speaker 2: I can protect this child, you know. Sure the world
Speaker 2: that cannot change, not in the way that I would like,
Speaker 2: but I can make a home that's safe and loving,
Speaker 2: and I can give them the strength to face this world,
Speaker 2: you know, with integrity and bravery and love. I can
Speaker 2: do that. There was a way in which I didn't
Speaker 2: recognize myself, but I love this new self, and I
Speaker 2: was like, if the me who has the child is
Speaker 2: a me who can do it, then what's the problem, right?
Speaker 2: The me who doesn't want to have a child is
Speaker 2: like it doesn't. She doesn't exist anymore, so we don't
Speaker 2: have to worry about her anymore. You know, this new
Speaker 2: one is totally capable.
Speaker 1: So what happened next?
Speaker 2: You know, there was something a little sad about feeling
Speaker 2: so great, because I was like, wait, this is how
Speaker 2: a lot of other people feel all the time, you know,
Speaker 2: like they feel like, oh, life is a gift, and
Speaker 2: you know, every day is another opportunity to do something beautiful,
Speaker 2: you know. And and sure things are bad right now,
Speaker 2: you know, politically, but yeah, you know, maybe by the
Speaker 2: time my kid is growing up, you know, things will
Speaker 2: be better and we'll have a more beauty full society.
Speaker 2: I was like, wow, people, there are people who go
Speaker 2: through life like that. Yeah, duh, that they would want
Speaker 2: to have a kid, you know, of course.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And so when I felt that way, I thought, Okay,
Speaker 2: welcome yourself. Thank God for this change. I'm not going
Speaker 2: to dwell on the fact that I've not always had this.
Speaker 2: I'm just gonna run with the fact that I have
Speaker 2: this new chance, I have this new lease on life,
Speaker 2: you know, and I can be the person who is
Speaker 2: fit to be a mom. And then that changed this
Speaker 2: feeling of competence and calm I think lasted for about
Speaker 2: two weeks and then there was like a steep cliff.
Speaker 2: It just the hormones changed or I don't know what happened.
Speaker 2: You know, I felt, yeah, like my brain was back
Speaker 2: to how it always is, you know, I got afraid again.
Speaker 1: After the break, Helena makes a decision that changes everything.
Speaker 1: We'll be back in a moment with a slight change
Speaker 1: of plans. Helena's first week of pregnancy was not at
Speaker 1: all what she expected. She experienced a lightness, a newfound
Speaker 1: confidence about her ability to parent children in an uncertain world.
Speaker 1: But that sense of peace and hopefulness didn't last, and
Speaker 1: she found herself questioning again whether to go through with
Speaker 1: the pregnancy.
Speaker 2: You know how like when you do drugs and you're
Speaker 2: having such a good time and then the next day
Speaker 2: it's almost as if you have to pay for it,
Speaker 2: you know, like the Yeah, the size of my happiness
Speaker 2: is now the size of my Like.
Speaker 1: I appreciate, I appreciate that you think that I've done drugs.
Speaker 1: I've never even had alcohol. So that's what you're working
Speaker 1: with here. Okay, great, I can appreciate intellectually what you're describing.
Speaker 1: The comedown.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the colmdown exactly. It was almost as if I
Speaker 2: had a come down, you know, the hormones left, and
Speaker 2: I wasn't just dropped into my previous anxious self. I
Speaker 2: was dropped into like that Helena on overdrive.
Speaker 1: Wow, so you were totally catastrophizing, almost in an irrational way,
Speaker 1: right your brain? Yeah, full on rumination OCD yes, intrusive thoughts.
Speaker 2: Oh, absolutely, Yeah.
Speaker 1: What did you decide to do now that you felt
Speaker 1: you had reverted back to old Helena with old Helena's
Speaker 1: preferences but actually magnified because of all the anxiety and
Speaker 1: all of the intrusive thoughts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't think i've I've ever been as terrifying,
Speaker 2: because it's like before, when I was just thinking about it,
Speaker 2: right before I was pregnant, it was like I don't
Speaker 2: want to have a kid, you know, it was about me,
Speaker 2: But now I was so acutely aware of my decision
Speaker 2: will affect not just me but this new person. Yes,
Speaker 2: am I equipped? Yeah? You know this feeling of like,
Speaker 2: oh I'm capable right, Like my feet are so firmly
Speaker 2: planted in this oil. I can take care of this
Speaker 2: kid that was gone. And I felt my own powerlessness
Speaker 2: to protect them. Yeah, and I really thought this is,
Speaker 2: you know how like I'm always so when something terrible happens,
Speaker 2: whether that is like a grandparent dying or you know,
Speaker 2: war being declared. But then you see the parents how
Speaker 2: they try to shield their kids, and if they cannot
Speaker 2: shield them, still try and create a little pocket of normalcy,
Speaker 2: Like parents swallow their own fears and repress their tears
Speaker 2: so that they might give a safe pocket for their kid.
Speaker 2: And I felt incapable of doing that. I thought, I
Speaker 2: am terrified myself. I will not be able to repress
Speaker 2: my fear so that I can make sure my child
Speaker 2: is not afraid. I'm not going to be able to
Speaker 2: do that. And a child deserves better than that. A
Speaker 2: child deserves a parent who can protect them. So I
Speaker 2: decided to have an abortion. And I had such mixed feelings,
Speaker 2: you know, about having an abortion myself. It really wasn't
Speaker 2: something I did lightly, and especially because I knew how
Speaker 2: much it would hurt David.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it's so interesting, as you know, I
Speaker 1: have a whole chapter at the end of my book
Speaker 1: devoted to my own journey toward motherhood and then slightly
Speaker 1: away from motherhood, and in all of the complexities, and
Speaker 1: I I do think society tells us we should always
Speaker 1: try to conquer our fears, and I think there are
Speaker 1: truly limits on that. And I just I just think
Speaker 1: that fear is instructive. Right, Your fears were valid and instructive,
Speaker 1: they were saying, Helena, I have history of depression. I'm
Speaker 1: having acute anxiety. I'm not sure that I have the
Speaker 1: right emotional constitution to be a parent. And I think
Speaker 1: there is actually something deeply brave in surrendering to that
Speaker 1: reality rather than resisting it, given how strong the forces
Speaker 1: are to try and quote conquer it, resist it. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I just want to say, like the the recognition of
Speaker 1: one's own limits is another form of bravery. Maybe that's
Speaker 1: what I'm trying to say.
Speaker 2: It's so moving to hear you say that. No one
Speaker 2: has ever put it like that, and I definitely have
Speaker 2: never thought that. I've always seen it as a version
Speaker 2: of capitulating, of giving up. But you know it's so
Speaker 2: often said, right, well, what if you had a physical disability,
Speaker 2: like what if you had Huntington's disease? Would you chastise
Speaker 2: yourself in the same way? Would you be like, oh,
Speaker 2: it's just you know, if only you wouldn't give up,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, if you were missing a uterus, you wouldn't engage
Speaker 1: in the kind of self puration. I just think we
Speaker 1: have an unfair standard when things creep into the psychological,
Speaker 1: then we think, oh, it's a totally malleable space. You
Speaker 1: can fully control your thoughts, you can fully overcome this,
Speaker 1: this is a workable problem. Psychology is biology. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's constraints, and I just.
Speaker 2: Feel like, wow, if your mind can be so reality shaping,
Speaker 2: that is reality. Even if it's not other people's reality,
Speaker 2: it is for you.
Speaker 1: Yeah. How did David respond to your decision to terminate
Speaker 1: the pregnancy.
Speaker 2: David is not someone who talks about his feelings a lot.
Speaker 2: I mean he will tell me like I want to
Speaker 2: have a child, but there's not like that deep introspection.
Speaker 2: And so I could see that he was struggling. I
Speaker 2: could see that, you know, he wasn't eating properly anymore,
Speaker 2: and he wasn't like he's usually like always ready for
Speaker 2: an adventure, you know, very kind of embodied, you know,
Speaker 2: would always be like on his bike or surfing or
Speaker 2: you know, just so full of joy and you know,
Speaker 2: lust for life, you know, and that just started eroding.
Speaker 2: His shoulders started getting hunched, you know, his complexion was gray,
Speaker 2: he was losing weight. It was really as if like
Speaker 2: the light in his eyes was being dimmed. You know.
Speaker 2: It was so terrible to see, and I felt guilty.
Speaker 1: Of course.
Speaker 2: I also felt afraid to sort of push and pro
Speaker 2: because I knew it was because of what I had done,
Speaker 2: you know, and it's horrible to hurt the person that
Speaker 2: you love the most. But then he took like a
Speaker 2: turn for the better, you know. He started taking care
Speaker 2: of himself again, started eating, started working out. He was back,
Speaker 2: you know, and I was so happy. I really thought
Speaker 2: that was such a hard period and we've come through
Speaker 2: it and he and he's probably sort of made peace
Speaker 2: with it and rediscovered like how much good there is
Speaker 2: in our relationship. And that's when he told me. We
Speaker 2: were lying in bed one night and he and he
Speaker 2: I seriously, we had just had a party. I was
Speaker 2: so happy, you know, I really thought, like this is
Speaker 2: a new chapter. You know, what can possibly shake us
Speaker 2: now if we've survived this. And then he told me, like,
Speaker 2: I can't do this anymore. I know that I want
Speaker 2: to have a kid. I have to go try this.
Speaker 2: I understand that you don't want it, like I see
Speaker 2: now that I will never be able to convince you.
Speaker 2: I have to go try. Yeah, and that was it.
Speaker 2: We were in New York. He took the plane to California,
Speaker 2: where he's from the next day, and that was that.
Speaker 1: Not everyone has had to face this kind of incompatibility,
Speaker 1: but I think there's probably so much that's universal about this,
Speaker 1: where there are trade offs and sacrifices intentions in any relationship.
Speaker 1: And I wonder what it felt like for you to
Speaker 1: lose this relationship.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it shattered my world, you know. I
Speaker 2: thought we had come out the other end. I thought, Wow,
Speaker 2: we're so strong together now, and all of a sudden
Speaker 2: he was gone and I was alone. I was so
Speaker 2: angry with myself, like was it really worth this, you know,
Speaker 2: like this, this stupid, stubborn decision, this fear, really more
Speaker 2: important than being in this relationship with this person that
Speaker 2: you love so much and who loves you. Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1: And I just.
Speaker 2: After that, I was so determined to get to the
Speaker 2: bottom of why, and to get to the bottom of
Speaker 2: do I have to accept who I am? You know?
Speaker 2: Can I change and It's not like I was thinking,
Speaker 2: can I I want to try and want to have
Speaker 2: a child. Like it was not like that, you know,
Speaker 2: It's just more like, you know how like sometimes you
Speaker 2: can just be so tired of being yourself. You know.
Speaker 1: Of course this is such an interesting part of your story, Helena,
Speaker 1: because what I've observed from this windy path that you've
Speaker 1: taken is your repeated willingness to challenge your own convictions
Speaker 1: throughout this journey. And I know there's such an exhaustion
Speaker 1: that accompanies in decision It feels so tempting to just
Speaker 1: you know, we had a professor on a slight change
Speaker 1: of plans. You talked about how exhausting decision making can
Speaker 1: be and how we actually often defer our decision making
Speaker 1: to others in an effort to eliminate any of the
Speaker 1: psychic stress that comes along with decision making. And I
Speaker 1: wonder there would have been such a simplicity in you
Speaker 1: just you know, planting your flag and saying from the
Speaker 1: time that you were twenty one, right when you started
Speaker 1: getting asked this question, I'm not going to have kids?
Speaker 1: What gave you the energy to keep the interrogation alive?
Speaker 1: Do you see yourself as someone who is open minded
Speaker 1: in this way, who's open to seeing their belief shift.
Speaker 2: Mmmm hmm. I'm thinking of the best way to answer
Speaker 2: this question. There are a few things here. One of
Speaker 2: them is I have this conviction that if only I
Speaker 2: throw enough effort at a thing, I will be able
Speaker 2: to get to the bottom of it. Also, like you know,
Speaker 2: I'm a very curious person. I've made curiosity my job.
Speaker 2: I'm always taught talking to strangers and trying to find
Speaker 2: out how do you live? How do you deal with pain?
Speaker 2: You know, and despair? Where do you find beauty? And
Speaker 2: you know, I've been making radio stories for like fifteen years.
Speaker 2: I've talked to I don't even know how many people,
Speaker 2: thousands probably, And always the real question that I have
Speaker 2: no matter what we talk about, you know, whether it's
Speaker 2: like the Civil War and me and mar or it's
Speaker 2: like a poetry collection you know, about someone you know
Speaker 2: falling in love for the first time. My real question
Speaker 2: underneath everything is always, how is it that you want
Speaker 2: to keep living? What is your recipe? And I haven't
Speaker 2: found the answer yet, yeah, because there is no one answer, obviously,
Speaker 2: you know. But I feel like if only I have
Speaker 2: a whole library of answers. I will be able to
Speaker 2: do it, which is such a joke because I haven't
Speaker 2: found the answer yet, but I am doing it so clearly.
Speaker 2: It's some kind of illusion or you know, like a
Speaker 2: story that I tell myself, you know, but it's a
Speaker 2: story that keeps me, that keeps me looking, and that
Speaker 2: keeps me alive.
Speaker 1: It's been many years since you and David ended your
Speaker 1: relationship over this. I'm so curious to know what your
Speaker 1: thoughts are on the topic of motherhood today.
Speaker 2: Yeah. First, I'm so happy with my decision. I really
Speaker 2: I love the life that I've built, you know, And
Speaker 2: I have finally realized that you can be happy with
Speaker 2: your decision not to have kids and still wonder sometimes
Speaker 2: what if and still have that ache sometimes like would
Speaker 2: I have loved this more than my current life? And
Speaker 2: I have come to a place of peace with that, Like,
Speaker 2: not every moment of doubt or not every moment of
Speaker 2: ache means that you have to like throw throw everything away,
Speaker 2: you know, like you can actually be like every life
Speaker 2: includes things that you know, I have a little sting
Speaker 2: in them, and that's okay. And I think because of that,
Speaker 2: because I'm at peace with my decision not to have kids,
Speaker 2: I am more than ever in awe of parents crazy
Speaker 2: about kids. You know, my friends are having kids now,
Speaker 2: you know, Like my closest friends are all star to
Speaker 2: have kids. And I cannot tell you, Maya how happy
Speaker 2: it makes me that I get to be a part
Speaker 2: of that. Like I'm not their mom, you know, but
Speaker 2: I am someone to them, and I am someone to
Speaker 2: their parents, you know. Like one friend calls me auntie,
Speaker 2: you know, which is so sweet. Yeah. I hadn't ask
Speaker 2: for this, you know. Yeah, and some of them it's
Speaker 2: not not like they have a name, but I get to,
Speaker 2: you know, hear about the most intimate stories you know,
Speaker 2: of like the insanity that they feel when they're awake
Speaker 2: at you know, four am, with their kid, not having
Speaker 2: slept for months, you know, through the night and the
Speaker 2: dark thoughts that they have. I feel like they see
Speaker 2: me as a safe person, you know.
Speaker 1: Who can uniquely be there for them, giving your sider lens.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it feels like such a privilege to be
Speaker 2: there for them. I still get sad, you know. One
Speaker 2: of the things that makes me sad is so I
Speaker 2: love languages. I speak a few, and I've always wanted
Speaker 2: to be there for a kid's language development and the
Speaker 2: thought of having had a bilingual kid, you know, like, ah,
Speaker 2: I won't get to see any of that, and that
Speaker 2: makes me sad.
Speaker 1: What do you do with that sadness? So do you
Speaker 1: interrogate it? Do you let it resurface this question as
Speaker 1: an open one yet again? Do you sort of have
Speaker 1: a lid on it and just say, Okay, I'm feeling sad.
Speaker 1: I'm just going to let the sadness pass. It's a
Speaker 1: feeling that's going to coexist with my choice. Yeah, how
Speaker 1: do you think about engaging with the sadness when it comes?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm I'm actually grateful for the sadness. Huh.
Speaker 1: Now wait, tell me more.
Speaker 2: Like before, the sadness would like throw me off balance
Speaker 2: and make me think like I must be wrong about everything,
Speaker 2: you know, And now I think No, the sadness is
Speaker 2: born out of curiosity, It's born out of love, out
Speaker 2: of empathy, imagination. You know, it's a sign of all
Speaker 2: these beautiful things, you know, Like, it's not a it's
Speaker 2: not a it's not a defo. How do you say,
Speaker 2: do you speak French like it's.
Speaker 1: Not a do you think I do drugs. You think
Speaker 1: I speak French? You really provestigate me?
Speaker 2: Why you are? You are so talent? You know everything else?
Speaker 2: So like sorry that I just hate on the two
Speaker 2: things that you don't know how to do. Like, oh, like,
Speaker 2: it's not a character flaw, you know, Like, there's nothing
Speaker 2: wrong with me for having pain. It's it's a it's
Speaker 2: a sign that I'm alive, you know.
Speaker 1: And that you can have complicated emotions about a decision that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that I can see the beauty in something
Speaker 2: that I haven't done. That's okay, right, Imagine that everything
Speaker 2: we haven't done you have to then sort of pretend
Speaker 2: as if that's the only good way to live and
Speaker 2: everyone else is wrong. Like, ugh, you know that would
Speaker 2: be not great.
Speaker 1: So many of the conversations I host on this podcast
Speaker 1: are about the fact that we as humans so desperately
Speaker 1: seek cognitive closure. We want black and white answers. We
Speaker 1: want definitive, clear explanations for things and reasons, and like
Speaker 1: you said, the pro con list that fully computes, and
Speaker 1: it is very uncomfortable for us to live comfortably in
Speaker 1: the gray space. And from what I've gathered from your story,
Speaker 1: you were searching for that definitive answer for so long.
Speaker 1: It's why you were on this crazy roller coaster where
Speaker 1: every peak and valley was what's wrong with me? And
Speaker 1: how can I? Can't I just figure this shit out?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: Like, can't I even just figure this situation out? And
Speaker 1: yet now when I hear you talk, you've clearly experienced
Speaker 1: an evolution of sorts, which is you have found peace
Speaker 1: in basically knowing the answer, but not one hundred percent
Speaker 1: knowing the answer. And so I would love for you
Speaker 1: to share any wisdom or advice you have for listeners
Speaker 1: who are like I want to get to the Helena
Speaker 1: place mentally, maybe either deciding between taking a new job
Speaker 1: or leaving a relationship or moving to another country or
Speaker 1: any other massive life decision, and they're the type of
Speaker 1: person that is worried about feeling massive regret in either direction.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the furthest that you can get is
Speaker 2: to get comfortable with discomfort, Like it will be discomfort forever.
Speaker 2: I don't think comfort is the thing that you should
Speaker 2: look for, you know. I think pain is there forever. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and hopefully you can make the pain a little smaller
Speaker 2: and a little less, uh, you know, earth shattering right
Speaker 2: where every time you have to go back to the
Speaker 2: drawing board.
Speaker 1: You know, was there a moment in time that you
Speaker 1: can remember where you first realized that the path forward
Speaker 1: would not could not involve full clarity, but would need
Speaker 1: to require some at a minimum low grade discomfort all
Speaker 1: the time.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, it was in conversation. So I made this
Speaker 2: whole podcast, write eight episodes. I worked on this for
Speaker 2: three years. Yeah, and the state of purpose of this
Speaker 2: podcast was I'm going to figure this out and put
Speaker 2: the issue to bed once and for all. That was it.
Speaker 2: You know, it was like, oh, I can up stand
Speaker 2: doing this for the rest of my life, you know,
Speaker 2: like there are other interesting topics in the world are Yeah,
Speaker 2: And for this podcast I talked to so many people,
Speaker 2: people I knew well, people I didn't. And it was
Speaker 2: actually someone I didn't know well who got me there.
Speaker 2: And it was I think because they didn't know me well,
Speaker 2: you know, like they didn't have a stake in my
Speaker 2: life at all, you know, they could sort of say
Speaker 2: it as it is, yeah, because that's not a thing
Speaker 2: that people like to do, you know. They like to
Speaker 2: protect your feelings and they're like, you know, especially people
Speaker 2: who love you, right, and what he said, was you
Speaker 2: will be disappointed either way, and I laughed. I was like,
Speaker 2: oh that's you know, like I'm with you, like that's
Speaker 2: sort of the glass half empty kind of way of
Speaker 2: looking at life, Like I share that. But he was like, no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: this is not like this is not a glass half
Speaker 2: empty situation. This is reality. Here's the thing, he said,
Speaker 2: we only get to live life once, but we get
Speaker 2: to question it as much a team time. Exactly. It
Speaker 2: isn't a number of times, right, There's no limit to
Speaker 2: how much we can question our life, but we can
Speaker 2: only live it once. And it was like that, like
Speaker 2: it's almost you know, like anything that is like so wise,
Speaker 2: you know, it's as completely obvious the moment that you
Speaker 2: hear it, right.
Speaker 1: It has to land at that particular moment. Yes, and
Speaker 1: someone's ready to receive it. Sounds like you're ready to
Speaker 1: receive that.
Speaker 2: And I think it showed me that I had been
Speaker 2: asking the wrong question. Yeah, you know that the question
Speaker 2: that I had been asking was what do I want?
Speaker 2: You know? And I think the question that I should
Speaker 2: have been asking is what can I live with? You know?
Speaker 2: And those are different, Like I love that one has
Speaker 2: like a definitive answer like I want the you know,
Speaker 2: but like what can I live with is sort of
Speaker 2: an acknowledgement that you can want different things. You can
Speaker 2: want things that are mutually exclusive. You can want them
Speaker 2: all and maybe you want one more and one just
Speaker 2: a little bit, you know, and so you just have
Speaker 2: to This is also what I came to, like, you
Speaker 2: can waste your life doubting. You can really do that forever,
Speaker 2: and that's not a way to spend your life. So
Speaker 2: I think for me, that feeling of peace right that
Speaker 2: I have reached, it's a decision. It's not something that like,
Speaker 2: oh I woke up feeling one day, you know. It's
Speaker 2: a decision to do every day again, you know, and
Speaker 2: like every day that I have or every time that
Speaker 2: this little like ooh ouch, you know I'm missing out
Speaker 2: on this. Every time that that comes up, I feel it.
Speaker 2: I let it envelop me and then you're like, Okay,
Speaker 2: I think I can live with it.
Speaker 1: Hey, thanks so much for listening. Helena made an eight
Speaker 1: part podcast series called Creation Myth about her decision of
Speaker 1: whether or not to have kids. We'll link to it
Speaker 1: in the show notes and join me next week when
Speaker 1: I talk to Professor Sonya Lubermirski about how we can
Speaker 1: feel more loved in our lives.
Speaker 3: Most people think to feel more loved, I need to
Speaker 3: change myself. I need to make myself more lovable. Or
Speaker 3: I need to change the other person. I need to
Speaker 3: convince them to love me more. But it's actually not
Speaker 3: the right approach. You don't have to change yourself, you
Speaker 3: don't have to change the other person. You just have
Speaker 3: to change the conversation.
Speaker 1: That's next time. On A Slight Change of Plans, I'll
Speaker 1: see you then. A Slight Change of Plans is created, written,
Speaker 1: and executive produced by me Maya Schunker. The Slight Change
Speaker 1: family includes our showrunner Alexandra Garratin, our editor Daphne Chen,
Speaker 1: our lead producer Megan Lubin, our associate producer Sonia Gerwitt,
Speaker 1: and our sound engineer Erica Huang. Luis Scara wrote our
Speaker 1: delightful theme song, and Ginger Smith helped arrange the vocals.
Speaker 1: A Slight Change of Plans is a production of Pushkin Industries,
Speaker 1: So big thanks to everyone there, and of course a
Speaker 1: very special thanks to Jimmy Lee.
Speaker 2: The