Mama Drama

I have been walking around for days now, trying to figure out how to succinctly convey the upsetting disparity between the way that my (also dysfunctional, but very different) family is embracing this pregnancy (in a word, "YAY!!") and Speedy's family (specifically, her mother) is.

There is no simple way of describing the dysfunctional dynamics in Speedy's family, but I am going to try to break it down to the primary elements at play here. I should say that this is MY interpretation, and that Speedy may or may not agree with all of these assessments. I will happily make note of it if she reads this and feels I have mischaracterized any of the dynamics I am about to describe.

1) Speedy is and always has been Mama S's sole emotional support.
Mama S immigrated from North Korea, met Speedy's father, a Polish Holocaust survivor, abandoned her promising career as an OB/Gyn to marry him, move to Whitey White Whitebreadtown, NJ where she did not drive, had no local community or family support, and raised Speedy, then her twin sisters, Slouchy and Grouchy*, essentially all by herself. Because Papa S was, at best, emotionally stunted and not present, Speedy, Slouchy and Grouchy were their own island in Whitey White Whitebreadtown, just trying to survive. Mama S clung to Speedy as the eldest child and her sole means of support.

2) Love is finite and perilously conditional.
Mama S believes that love is a fixed quantity; therefore if Speedy loves me, there is less love for Mama S.

3) Speedy's gayness is a source of shame.
She would never, ever admit it, but Mama S is ashamed of Speedy's gayness. Never was this clearer than when we visited the other week. When Speedy's uncle saw me, he gestured at my belly and said, "What happened to you?!" Mama S invented a boyfriend for me on the spot. While Speedy's uncle actually called her on the bald-faced lie (triggering an angry outburst by Mama S in Korean), it was a watershed moment in my understanding of the Family S.

Despite all of this, Mama S is an extraordinary person. She is smart, wickedly funny (in a literal sense), and amazingly on top of life, especially given that she is 83. Speedy loves her, but Mama S's attitude toward us and Speetus is hurtful. To Mama S, Speetus is 1) a new and even more dangerous threat to her relationship with Speedy; 2) less love for her; and 3) not really Speedy's child, but an embarrassing and outwardly undeniable reminder of Speedy's gayness. So instead of being happy for Speedy and sharing in Speedy's joy, she reacts to all talk of the baby with denial (the Uncle Incident), dismissal ("So what? Everybody's pregnant!") or delusion ("I wish it were you," said to Speedy, who is 46.)

She is refusing to commit to coming to the shower, even though she's retired and has literally nothing else to do. Speedy and I would pick her up and bring her back home, and all she would have to do is agree to come. But all she says is, "Why you have shower? Slouchy and Grouchy didn't." My family is flying in from VT and trying to make a weekend of it, but without Mama S's commitment, Speedy and I can't make other plans, because we don't know whether and when we will be driving Mama S back and forth from Whitey White Whitebreadtown. To further complicate things, Speedy's mother, I suspect, is jealous of the time that Speedy and I spend with my family, as it takes away from the time we would otherwise theoretically be spending with her, so I believe part of the obstructionism is because of that.

Anyway, I realize that this drama is minimal compared to what others have endured, but it hurts me to see Speedy hurt by her mother, and to see the different ways we are already being treated because of the gestational circumstances of this baby. Had it been 10 years ago, it would have been Speedy carrying, and maybe I would be facing the same tepid response from my family as she is getting from hers. Maybe, though, Mama S would be able to feel real joy on her daughter's behalf, and maybe Speedy would feel what it is like to have a happy mother. Maybe. But it is not 10 years ago, and this is what we've got. The complicated, tangled, sticky reality of our families and their dysfunctions multiplied and twisted over generations and across different countries and cultures. And as I feel Speetus thump in my belly, I think, "One day, this will all be yours!**"


* I should say that despite the pejorative nicknames I have given them, I like Speedy's sisters a lot, possibly more than Speedy does, even though they are easy to caricature.

** But of course, Speedy and I will do it right, and raise a child free of any emotional scars in our own perfectly happy and balanced cocoon of family functionality.