My 21st Birthday

On the day of my 21st birthday, I celebrated in an unusual way; I got my blood tested. In an attempt to get a pap smear, the nurse seemed concerned for me as I gave her background information. “Get your blood tested today, if you can, before the pap smear,” she told me. I had taken the day off work, so I easily found time to do so. Within a few days, I got my results back. As the weeks passed and different tests and examinations were done, I was given more information.

“The chances of you ever having a child is unlikely,” the doctor said to me. It happened over a Zoom call. Thousands of thoughts ran through my brain as I sat in silence. What does this mean for me? What does it mean for my future? While I had never thought about the idea of creating life, it took a part of me. There I was, a woman with her twenties ahead of her — clutching to the idea that she would never have a child.

            It took me a while to process. I had spent my few years on Earth understanding and accepting my feelings and processing both the pain and love that can occur within relationships. But the possibility of never creating a life had never dawned on me. I would be able to create different forms of love for the rest of my life but would never be able to create any form of life. 

Then it hit me — this all started because I just wanted a pap smear. A pap smear — something every woman is told must be done. I couldn’t even do that correctly. It reminded me of a conversation I had with a friend a few months before I found out. I told her I hardly got my period, maybe three or four times a year (something I later learned was a symptom of PCOS).

She asked me if my irregular periods ever made me feel like less of a woman. It didn’t. I had found peace with my lack of cycle, and I was never one to question my womanhood. Yet months later, I found myself asking a similar question: do my low chances of ever having a child make me feel like less of a woman? But what does being a woman even mean? Does it mean being strong and resilient? Kind and warm? Fragile? Uptight? Vulnerable? Assertive? Compassionate?