The Fear of not having it all - Relationships, identity, motherhood?

I was 9 years old and one of my uncle’s addressed my as “XyZ ki beti”. I looked back and without a think said “I have a name”.

My father watched my response and that evening he sat me down and explained me the word “Identity”.

He said “you have a name, but that name is not famous enough for people to remember, hence their will be lots of situations in your life when people will address you by the relationship you have with the person they might know, the context will be different but you will be addressed as daughter,sister,wife etc. However if you want to change that and you want people to address you by your name only, then you need a have your own “identity”- you need to be famous enough for everyone to know your name.

This thought stayed with me. Of course my father wanted me to succeed in my career that time.

And now after 20 years I am a working professional in an adopted country, a wife and a wanna be a mother.

In the race of finding my identity I started describing myself with the relationships I have gained in the due course, isn’t this ironic?

Anyways, now as i matured, I like identifying myself as a proud wife, as a proud daughter(when I visit my maiden house) but does that mean I have stopped the urge of finding myself? Does that mean the 10 year old in me (the go getter) has lost somewhere in this journey?

Yes I am a working professional and have a life apart my husband but what I want to be is not someone famous anymore, what I want to be at this moment is a “mother”.

I am at the peak of my career and having to take the decision of been a mum now means, leaving the market, networks and all the self space I have created for an year(minimum). In this agile world 1 year break means you been irrelevant to the market.

Indra nooyi in one of the interviews said the biological clock and career clock are always conflicting and the guilt can kill you. And I cannot agree more to this statement. As a women we just cannot have it all.

The guilt of not been able to start a family yet, the guilt of leaving my career (my father’s aspirations for me) , the guilt of not being able to be a good wife and most of all “the fear”, yes the fear of not having it all..