My Choices

So, this is all my fault? I pick the wrong men?

Looking back, I think it's actually a miracle that I've been involved with men at all. You see, when I was about 16-18 I sort of made a vow not to settle down until I was at least 25 years old. I simply thought that before that age would be way too early.

This was a bit strange for someone being from a country where people tend to grow up quickly, start living with someone and even buy a flat and start a family quite early, around twenty or in their early twenties. No matter if they're at university, they just adapt their family life around their studies.

So a lot of my schoolmates and friends were getting all excited about the new home that they were setting up with their boyfriends, working part-time along with school to save up for a new settee. This was when we were 18 and 19. Then they started to get pregnant too and all conversations within the group somehow revolved around pregnancies, babies, baby clothes and baby accessories, the cost of daycare and where to find the best childminders.

It would have been easy just to get sucked in; who wouldn't want to have a nice home with a cute boyfriend and a little baby to make the picture perfect? It would have been so easy just to hook up with some hard working schoolmate and have him take care of me and our unborn children. I would have had security and a future plan to follow.

But instead of finding it tempting, I felt a surge of anxiety whenever I imagined this future for me. And when these girls were talking with glee about the couple-things they had been doing, having the in-laws over for dinner and such, I couldn't help but thinking that they were only playing house, the grown up version. Having recently lost a parent, I was extremely aware of how short life can be and how precious our time is. There's never a chance of going back and taking a different turn if you realise along the way that you'd rather not be where you're at. Becoming a mother at the age of 20 means you'll be a mother for the rest of your life, perhaps for 60 years if you're lucky. You'll be responsible for another person for at least the next 20 years, longer if you keep adding children. Their well-being will affect where you live, how you work, what you do in your spare time, how you spend your holidays, everything!

So I thought to myself, no matter if I fall in love with someone in the next few years, no matter how much in love I will be, I will NOT move in with someone or have children before the age of 25! That way, I thought I could still do and have all the things the other girls did, but do a lot more before that. I could have it all if only I postponed this for a few years.

And so my abstinence from couples' life began; when we graduated, I already had a plane ticket to go abroad, on my own, while many of my friends went home to make dinner for their family.