Leftist Living in 2015!

Happy New Year, everyone!

I had the best NYE ever, folks. Do you know what I did?

I slept. 

That's right: I got in bed at 11pm on December 31st, and save rolling over to cover my ears with a pillow because some people in the neighbourhood insisted on fireworks, I didn't wake up until 8am. I'm twenty-three years old and this was the first time I did exactly what I wanted on New Year's Eve (my daughter was at her dad's and I made my S.O. go to the Lagos Countdown event without me because sleep trumps loud music and fireworks any day of the year, including New Year's Eve). I woke up in 2015 and I was the most pleasant version of myself, no lies. I wish my whole year could be that way! Alas, this is real life, and I'm not in Kansas anymore...

Having done the customary end-of-year reflections and pre-new-year projections, I have come to the conclusion that 2015 is going to be quite something. This will be my first year doing the whole, entire 'adult' thing; I will be living on my own, working full time and parenting without domestic help (at least for the foreseeable future). Note: my daughter starts school in a week (2015! Such exciting times!), so that's a whole new dimension to my life that I have no experience with. I also plan to do (and share) a bit of research about Yoruba culture, religion and traditions on here, while championing my feminist cause as an unmarried parent in a relationship where I am, you guessed it, sexually active and patently unashamed thereof. I'm diving straight into the deep end here, people.

Based on all of the above, I have no illusions that this will be an easy year - if anything I suspect I will have a surfeit of material to comment on and take issue with on the blog, because you know how the world works. A self-determining woman is the biggest threat to the stability of the human race, next to the gays and free streaming on porn websites. What is the world coming to, one wonders?? To be frank I can already see some of the scenarios in which someone somewhere will try to help me fix my life because they have determined by the length of my skirt and the age of my child (and my nose piercing that I'm still too chicken to get) that I am Doing It Wrong:

• navigating PTA and such-like
• attempting international travel with my daughter and S.O. (none of our surnames match, see?)
• dealing with nosy parkers who think I'm a bad parent because I won't beat my child
• defending my areligious position/explaining that Yoruba religions are not 'fetish'
• attempting to explain why I do yoga and meditation to my Christian family
• generally handling the fallout of being a leftist rabble rouser with strong opinions about pretty much everything.

I can't wait. (No, really. I can't. The sooner it begins the sooner I can get past it. Can I get an Amen?).

So, this is my manifesto for 2015: I will experience things, many of which I suspect will be quite hilarious in hindsight, and I will write about them in critical feminist-speak, because this is necessary. Especially considering that this happened:

Where are the African feminists taking over the African internet in Africa???

It's going to be a fun year, people. And since I plan to do a bunch of writing, I hope you plan to do a bunch of reading. I'm not learning all this feminist-speak for nothing! Love, peace and comfortable jammies,

Loulette.

Young Unmarried Mother

It has been over a year since I had my daughter; twenty-three months since I found out I was carrying an unplanned pregnancy (ironically, I got pregnant in the same month when I decided I was going to donate my eggs to a fertility center, but that's a story for another day.) In that time, I have lived through what feels like a lifetime of experiences, many beautiful and rewarding, many not.

Being a young unmarried mother isn't easy. That statement is in fact too simplistic to capture just how incredibly difficult it can be, and I have had it a lot easier than most people who find themselves in my position. I have a supportive family, her father is identifiable, I work in a field that pays well, and ASUU gave me a chance to earn money instead of wasting my time acquiring an obsolete education. Life is better for me than for the average Y.U.M.

But still, there are some aspects in which my experience is exactly the same as every other girl or woman in my shoes. And that's what I want to talk about today.

1. "You can't possibly know what you're doing."

In choosing to keep and raise my child, I decided that getting pregnant at all was, to borrow a quote, the last irresponsible thing I would do where she is concerned. But people can't seem to get that.

You know what racial profiling is? Well, let me introduce you to Maternal Profiling. People look at me and my daughter and immediately assume her mother is somewhere else in the vicinity. If I had a pair of shoes for every time I've been asked, 'where is her mother?', I would be Carrie Bradshaw. Then when it has been established that I am indeed her mother, my competence is immediately called into question. I'm offered ridiculous unsolicited advice, asked insulting questions - the really forward ones attempt to take her from me to 'make sure she is okay.' Many older women seem to forget that everyone, their own insensitive selves inclusive, raised their own children mostly by instinct and intuition. There's no manual, not even when your 'happy married life!' cards come before your 'it's a girl!' cards. I'm not saying there are no bad mothers; I'm saying that the fact that I am young and don't have a husband doesn't automatically make me one. Does she look healthy? Does she look happy? Is she developing normally? Then surely that tells you that whatever I've been doing so far is working, does it not?

2. "You're a mother. You should (not)..."

People also can't seem to get that they cannot decide for me how to conduct myself and my life as a mother.

Don't tell me I can not or should not do this or that, 'because, don't you know you're a mother?' Especially if I haven't asked you. I carried her in my body for nine months. I gave birth to her in the most painful experience of my life. I have been her primary caregiver till now. Of course I know I'm a mother. I am also a young woman in my early twenties, and I'm not about to set myself and my child up for a lifetime of resentment by giving up everything that means anything to me simply because I want to appear to random strangers and/or presumptuous family members to be a 'good mother'.

I chose to raise a child, and in doing so I chose to do my best to give her everything she needs to become a well-rounded person. I know I will make mistakes along the way, I know there will be things I will be unable to handle with the amount of experience that I have, and I will seek advice and help in those situations. But please don't tell me how to live or raise my child - if you want someone to follow all your instructions on parenting, do it yourself.

3. "You should be ashamed of yourself."

Some people seem offended because I haven't internalized any sense of guilt or shame over my 'mistake'.

It is my theory that many people become unintelligent when confronted with someone in my position, because I don't know how else to explain the number of times I've been asked, 'You have a baby? How come?' Nobody believed Mary when she said she was still a virgin because, big surprise, there is only one way to get pregnant. I wasn't raped, I'm thankful I didn't get pregnant from such a traumatic event; I had consensual sex. Does that bother you? The fact that a young unmarried woman had consensual sex bothers you? Why? Oh, it's fornication. It's a sin. Well, so is lying, and checking out the pastor's wife's ass and thinking about all the ways you would hit that, and changing the numbers on your expense report at work, and casually looking at Pornhub. What's your point?

Dear Christians, when Jesus died, He took care of ALL sin(s). The fact that your patriarchal socialization tells you a young woman shouldn't have sexual agency or enjoy sex has nothing to do with anything - please go and nurse your patriarchy in front of someone who cares. I had sex. God isn't having aneurysms over that fact, so why are you?

• 'Don't you know unplanned children have a hard life?' Life is hard for everyone. Ask Kylie Jenner.
• 'Don't you know she will want to know her father?' She knows her father. And even if he wasn't around, planned children lose their fathers too, sometimes even before they are born. So...
• 'You've jeopardised your future.' No, I've changed it. Every person's future is the result of overcoming challenges, self-inflicted and otherwise. That's life.
• 'Girls born to unwed mothers get pregnant young too.' I will do my best to ensure it doesn't happen to her. And if it does, I and millions of young women in the world have lived through it and made something of themselves. I don't see why she won't too.

I could go on and on, but here is the point: I refuse to feel bad for taking responsibility for my actions. If it bothers you that now there is chubby-cheeked evidence of my sex life in the world, maybe you should stop thinking so much about my sex life.

Unplanned pregnancies happen. And sometimes unplanned pregnancies become babies born to unmarried young women. Ditch the hypocrisy, set your prejudices aside, and cut young unmarried mothers some slack. Things are difficult enough for us as it is. And if you can't do those things, then you should probably just keep your opinions to yourself, because I can't guarantee that the other Y.U.M's out there will be as civil as me. 

Love, peace and soiled diapers.