Tick, Tick…Boom!
No more timelines to meet.
No, this is not a review about the new musical drama that was released on Netflix starring Andrew Garfield that my teenage daughter recommended I watch. This is my attempt at analyzing how childhood experiences influence the choices we make (or do not make) as adults. Lessons learned and starting over.
This is not about my parents either, but I have to set the stage for you — my reader. I grew up in a city in South India, in a Brahmin household. My father worked in the merchant navy and sailed the high seas until he was 69 years old and lost his battle with cancer. He was in all respects a “visiting” father, a provider for the family.
My mother had worked for a few years in a clerical position before getting “arranged” married to my father. She didn’t particularly like working and was more than happy to default to the role of homemaker. I am not so sure she knew what she signed up for when it came to raising two children as a single parent. But that’s beside the point.
My takeaway as a child: I wanted to be married to someone more than just a provider. I wanted someone to be an equal partner and parent in raising children together.
Growing up, I heard my mother say repeatedly that girls need to get married by Age 22–24 and finish having kids by Age 30. The biological clock was one key consideration in this timeline, but I also realize the timeline generously allowed for the completion of a college education and a timely marriage that would be arranged. Note: Dating, being in relationships, and then marrying for love didn’t feature anywhere. It was neither talked about nor was it entertained.
Being first-gen college graduates, both my parents wanted me to get a college degree, of course! My father wanted me to become an engineer and my mother wanted me to become a doctor. Why? Because that was the thing to do. My brother was compliant and became an engineer. I, on the other hand, wasn’t convinced I needed to comply. Without digressing too much about my career choices [which warrants its own story], let me fast forward and tell you that I pursued special education. I wanted to make a difference in the lives of children with disabilities. I was ambitious enough to delve deeper into the subject and arrived in the United States at the age of 21 for a graduate degree.
Somewhere along the way, I was in a serious relationship with someone I met when I was 18. He was easy to talk to and more importantly, was attentive and present. I thought I found my soulmate. One problem: although he was Indian and from the same region, he was not a Brahmin. Big problem! My father was progressive enough to discount that detail but my mother took a good ten months to come around to that idea. She not only had to get over the fact that I was marrying out of caste but also that I veered from the arranged route.
Tick: I was 24 when I got married. Looking back it was a simple wedding and one of the happiest days of my life. We were both in our startup jobs, I as a special education teacher in a school and him as a senior analyst in corporate America. Add a doctoral degree to the mix along the way and our first child at Age 28. Tick: By 30 I had my second child. The birthdays of my two children were again the happiest days of my life. Wow, I did pretty well with my timeline, I thought.
I was so focused on sticking to the script and meeting that timeline. Now I had to create my timeline moving forward. So I did. My next stop was getting promoted to Associate from Assistant Professor and receiving tenure. Eventually, I would be a Full professor. Being good at what I do and being known as an expert in my area, being well-published, was a given. Raising two children along the way WITH my husband was also a given. Right? Wrong, very wrong!
Just like I was certain about what I wanted as an adult based on my childhood experiences, I did not account for the same holding true for my husband. He had his unfulfilled childhood desires that shaped his goals as he was rising the corporate ladder. He wanted to be the best possible provider for the family. This required being married to his work, late work hours, and a fair bit of work travel. It meant my goals had to take a back seat and I had to assume a large role in raising the kids. After all, I would never be the one making the six-figure salary.
Wha? What just happened? I soon found myself in a place I didn’t want to be in. It was a matter of time before there were irreparable rifts in our communication and relationship. I was unhappy but I couldn’t “fix” things on my own. My career timeline was derailed and I was struggling to think that this is what life was about…just adjust. It took me a while but after a few years of therapy and skating parallelly in a lonely, unhappy marriage, I realized that we had grown apart. He wasn’t a bad person, but we just didn’t share the same values in life anymore. Or at least we weren’t aligned in how we would go about living up to those values (if we still shared them). The only thing holding this marriage together was the children and this was no way to live.
The COVID-19 lockdown was the silver lining. It gave me the time and space to think, write a lot, process things, and make a change. I asked for a separation in March. We lived in what Walker calls Twilight Zone until he moved out in August. “Yes, I will be the plaintiff,” my words in an email to our mediator this week as we filed for an uncontested divorce.
BOOM: I will be 45 this year. Albeit late by a few years, I’ve reached my previously set career goals. Soon-to-be divorced was not an item on my timeline. No more milestones to reach, yet I have a whole life ahead to live. As I continue on this path to healing and doing things that make me happy, I will take it one day at a time. I’ve replaced a timeline with a visual of all the things I’d like to do: read, write, run, walk my dog, play tennis, cook, meet up with friends, travel, and learn a new language. Starting over is to find the adult “me.” My children are my strength and my advice to them is to not have any preset timelines and to be open to dating multiple people before marriage because now I know that with every relationship there is more to learn about yourself.