I received a long sad birthday message a little over 4 mins of my mom giving me a thorough description of my birth. It’s hard when she wants to wish me a happy birthday, but also sorry for being a shit mom with me. Before I make your mornings bitter with my background story, look at me.
My poor mother was alone in the hospital since my dad was working at his new job and it was at a factory. He wasn’t allowed to take off to be with my mother. My grandmother was home with my sister who was just 15 months. My mom’s friends weren’t available, but one was and he stayed to help my grandmother. My father’s friends and family were MIA, because my grandmother (paternal) dislikes my mom since she’s Boricua and they are Dominican. She made sure none of the friends and families ever helped my mom out with anything. Not even the birth of her grandchildren.
My mom was bitter since she needed a son, my dad was very verbal about the one job she had to do... (machismo meng) so she didn’t really care for me in the get go. She needed a son to win over my grandmother.They didn’t check my sister’s gender during pregnancy since they truly believed she was going to be a boy... so since that didn’t happen I guess the pressure, was on me? My mom’s labor story is ridiculously long since she had to be induced into labor, which lead onto a 32 hr process. She wakes up alone to find out I was okay and was still a girl. She had to notify the nurse to call her mother to tell her she’s okay. She was alone in the room with me.
This is the mother and I. I was a pink baby. She was grateful that I was healthy. I am grateful she made it through labor alone. I can’t make this blog sweet.
Years later
If you ever wanted to know what I always wished for every year, it was for a pup. Someone smaller than me to care for. My mother always felt bad towards me and one day on my 10th bday, we flew to our house in Puerto Rico. She showed me the cutest black dust bunny I’ve ever seen. A baby pup that was born earlier in April. She told me “this is something I’ve waited so long to do for you.”
She got me a companion that loved me so much and I loved in return. We didn’t take her right and then, it was a weekend getaway for the 2 of us. We waited for our dust ball to get older. We returned for summer vacation and everyday that month I visited the pup with its family and we played together every day until the end of the summer. The last two weeks she stayed with us and was happy the whole time so we were confident in flying her out to NY.
My birthday was rarely special for me since my family wasn’t perfect and the preferences of my older sister was noticeable. She was born 2 days before Thanksgiving so that was a “sign”. Every year became better because of this little dust ball. I never knew she was my emotional companion. She was my everything. I miss her dearly, but I still pay tribute to her every birthday.
This is me right now , paused writing the blog post. It’s 7:31? I place this sweater on one of my fluff dolls and hug it. Tell it I love them and I miss them.
Every year for my birthday I always feel a bit sad, but she was the one that always made me shed a tear for love. I’ve never received so much love from someone that I always wanted in my life. Does that makes sense.
Happy 29 to me. If you are a friend here, remember that you have a little bit of my love and I am happy to be included in your life as you are in mine. Thank you for being there with me through the good and bad.
-Nanette
PS Miss you Tiny
