Untamed - Glennon Doyle Page 0,40

up, climbed the stairs, and opened Chase’s door. He sat up in bed and smiled. For the first time I saw him as my daughter’s big brother. She’s so lucky, I thought. I kissed his silk cheeks, and he followed me downstairs, holding the railing, one careful step at a time. I wrapped him up in a puffy jacket, scarf, and hat and took him for a walk on the path around the tiny pond in our neighborhood. I needed to get outside. I needed more space surrounding this gigantic news. I needed sky.

I remember that Chase and I were chilly. I remember that the air was crisp and the sky was clear. I remember that halfway around the pond, when our little town house had become tiny in the distance, a goose crossed the path in front of us and Chase laughed. I remember that the goose got a little too close, so I picked up Chase and I walked the rest of the way around the pond with him in my arms, his legs wrapped around my waist, my nose nestled in his neck. All these years later, I can still smell his neck: powder and toddler sweat. I can still remember thinking: I’m carrying both of my children. All by myself. My son’s head resting on my shoulder, my daughter’s heart beating in my body. I have everything.

We decided to name our daughter Patricia, after my mother. We’d call her Tish. She’d be wrapped in the same olive skin, black hair, and Japanese features her older brother inherited from his dad. I dreamt of her all day, every day. I could not wait for Tish to be born. In fact, when I was thirty-eight weeks pregnant, I got in the bathtub and told Craig that I would not come out until he found a way to schedule an induction. He found a way. A few days later, I was holding my daughter. When the nurse placed her in my arms, I whispered, “Hi, angel”—and then took a good look at her. I was surprised. She was pink, with light skin, hair, eyes. She and I matched.

Along with his looks, Tish’s older brother inherited his father’s easy-breezy, accommodating temperament. I’d made the rookie mistake of attributing Chase’s easiness to my masterful parenting. When my friends complained about how hard parenting was, I’d agree outwardly and think: Suckers. What’s so hard about this? Then Tish was born, and I suddenly understood what was so hard about this.

Tish was born concerned. As an infant, she cried constantly. As a toddler, her default was set at displeased. For the first few years of her life, I spent all day, every day, trying to make her happy. By the time she was six, I’d given up on happy. Each morning, I’d sit on the floor outside her bedroom door holding a whiteboard that said, “Good morning, Tish! We will be pleasant today!” When she came out scowling, I’d point to the board and explain that “pleasant” meant: Act happy. Just pretend. This is our social contract with the world, kid: ACT HAPPY. Suffer silently like the rest of us, for the love of God.

Tish rejected my memo. She would not act. She refused to be pleasant. One day when Craig came home from work, I met him at the door, crying. Tish was upstairs, crying. I said to him, “She is untenable. Incorrigible. I cannot handle her. Where did this drama COME FROM?” To his credit, he did not answer in words. He just looked at me sitting on the floor, weeping, and gave me enough time to think: Oh. I see. Tish is me.

My therapist neighbor warns me not to force this limiting, narcissistic narrative on my daughter; she insists that children are not carbon copies of their parents. To that I say, “Okay. I see your point. But I also see my daughter, lady.”

When I realized that Tish was me, I remembered that acting happy was what had almost killed me. I quit trying to make Tish happy or pleasant and decided just to help her be Tish. Tish is fourteen now. She is still turned inside out. What she feels and thinks on the inside, the world hears and sees on the outside. When she becomes upset, we assume she has her own valid reason. So we say, “I see that you’re upset. Are you ready for a solution yet? Or do you just need to feel