The story about the fact that I do not perceive myself as a mother although I am one at the moment, and a mother of three boys at that, actually begins about 23 years ago.

At that time between the rows of desks at the French High School in Sofia a conversation took place between me, my friend and the beauty queen-excellent student of the class. The conversation was on the topic of how we imagine each other in 10 years’ time. The girls were unanimous about me. “A very good mother”, they said. This offended me very much. It sounded extremely underestimating to me – as if they had told me you’re no good at anything else anyway, you do not have any particular talent, do not possess great intellect or beauty, it is not possible for you to have the will and courage to become a writer, traveler, discoverer, a good lover, president, company boss and everything else – but you will be a great mother. I was thrown into despair and I decided to resist this early status quo that did not correspond to my bold dreams of being independent, traveling, having men and adventures for which my fifteen-year old self was thirsting for.

The image of a mother repelled me terribly – I imagined a good-hearted and easy-going slightly overweight woman who cooks, cleans, sews and waits for her husband and kids to come home. I imagined someone who set the table and anxiously awaited the comments of everyone on whether she had managed to prepare one more dish and allowed the evaluation of her family to either lighten up her fat cheeks or bring them into a frown.

I did not want such a destiny!

I dreamt of being loved and having sex with the boy I had been in love with for the past two years, for us to be free and away from our parents’ guardianship. To read books 24/7 and spend our last money for cinema tickets. There was nothing else that I desired at that moment. And the two of them said – “mother”!

But as it happens in stories, the two evil fairy godmothers turned out to be right. If the beauty queen-excellent student happened to see one of my recent media appearances, I am sure she would say: “There you go, I knew it, she became a good mother.”

Today I am the mother of three boys – Hristo – 15, Gabriel – 8 and Carlos – 6, and I did not give birth to two of them. I took them from a social institution for children, deprived of parental care. It is a long story. And because my husband and I decided to be foster parents and not to adopt, this decision turned out to be extremely exotic for the latitudes of Bulgaria, it brought huge media interest and so they started broadcasting me, my husband and my children as portraits of modern, brave people who do heroic things. We went down this path without much pleasure because media coverage is always two-dimensional and puts you in stereotypes that tire you out.

We would agree in the beginning on the request of some organisations with the aim of popularising foster care. But it turned out that in two years we had not managed to influence people that much and we were only wasting our energy. Nowadays we refuse to show ourselves most of the time. But! I really did become popular as a foster MOTHER. Obviously some things are not a coincidence. I still remember the story from my school-days with a smile and the understanding that, yes, I became a popular mother. 

Actually the truth is that “I’m not a mother”. I feel like a girl. I love being lazy, sleeping with my clothes on, being alone, taking walks with a friend of mine, with whom we laugh like crazy at everything we see on the street, I still love making out with my husband in public and if entrance doors were not locked we would probably end up having sex in front of someone’s door. I love spending money without thinking much, I hate shopping around Christmas, I hate going to institutions and talking to administrative clerks, because I do not understand anything they say and I panic. I feel confused even when I have to get a simple document issued. One could easily deceive me - I am naïve. I give money to beggars. I do not invite guests to my house lately. I do not like family friendships or, to be more precise, I avoid them. I believe that people who love me and really know me do not come over to my place, Instead I travel with them and take walks, we giggle and wander about. I believe that there are some scriptwriters up above who scribble the script of a sitcom every day, but I am on to their tricks now and they are obvious to me. I hate working for a corporation and spending pointless money on expensive bags and shoes. I am always a little bit tattered and I cannot be insolent.

I get angry and I do not like myself when I have been pushed around, stepped on and ignored so many times that I have to shout and be rude in order to survive. I hate shouting and being rude. I am even a little bit dumb and unambitious. I fall in love very easily. But I am careful, I do not want to be unfaithful because this would hurt my partner. I usually have a problem with clingy people and I find it hard to handle them. I do not want to lead anyone on, I just want to be light like a butterfly and flutter around.

I do not like it when someone makes me feel guilty about love. I love the sunny stains on the streets, the wise faces of babies that I walk past, I love the sincere exchange of words, self-irony makes me laugh, I like the weaknesses in other people. Sometimes I blush. I love touching, tasting and smelling. I get confused by salespeople who ask me what I would like. I would like nothing, except to touch something in the shop and leave. I usually do not have any money.

This is pretty much what I am, today more than ever. I have already managed to look at myself in many mirrors and at the age of 38 I know these things about myself. I have accepted myself and this is the only way that things inside me can be good, I do not self-destruct. I have had periods of struggle and perseverance, of rejection and suffering, when I have put on different characters as if they were somebody else’s clothes and felt bad that way. It is a pity really that it has cost me so much time in order to take the unnecessary things off of myself and accept myself the way I am, deservedly after a long struggle. They can hardly get to me anymore. They still try!

One of the big traps in life is motherhood, it is! No matter how prepared a woman is she can never even imagine what awaits her. There is an enormous weapon, which Updike defined as “the little god”. When the mother gives birth to a child, she already posesses her little god whom she is fully dependent on. If the baby is happy, Mum is also happy, if the baby is ill, Mum is also ill. This is inevitable for every normal mother. But how is a woman’s identity to survive in this situation? I don’t know exactly. But these are the steps I took to raise a human being and manage to remain a human being:

First step: 

When I gave birth to Hristo on 20 December, 1995 and they showed him to me for the first time in the maternity ward… I, ummm, had a revelation so to speak! I saw clever little eyes on a little person and I told myself “So this is how it is – a stranger has come to be on Earth and I have to get to know him and help him to grow up”. When I hear mothers telling me that they felt incredible love even at that first moment, I do not believe them. For me this was a key moment that I will never forget and that I’ve followed the whole time while I’ve been raising my son – to acknowledge his sovereign right to be a separate person, different from his father and I. It was difficult for me to preserve that right of his in kindergarten and especially in school. 

The hardest thing was to bear the reproaches of “family friends” regarding my son’s upbringing. They considered him arrogant and spoilt; because he has always voiced his opinion and insisted that his tastes and wishes are respected no matter how old he is. In our culture it is unacceptable for a child to have the right to tell his elder to put out his cigarette or turn the music down, or that he does not like this restaurant. The last of these reproaches turned into a scandal two years ago when I finished with the communication between families once and for all.

Second step:

I managed to teach myself that it is not important for there to be cooked food and done laundry every single time, so that I can prove what a flawless mother-machine I am.

Third step:

I learn not to be afraid. I cannot control everything. 

Fourth step: 

I talk to him about myself – I do not hide my weaknesses, pain, my dreams, how many times I have hurt his father and what has happened to me from him. I admit my mistakes.

At the end I will only say that I do not know what I have accomplished, but I love communicating with Hristo and above all traveling with him. And as far as the other two little munchkins, whom I saved from the social institution for children deprived of parent care are concerned, we are still at the beginning with them. At the moment I am teaching them to know the world around them and to follow the rules for survival. They reminded me how many delightful things surround us.

I am happy with the four men who surround me. I succeeded in saving myself from some traps and in teaching them that Mum is not the perfect creature from the milk advertisement. That is why I really believe that “I am not a mother”, but rather just a lucky woman who has a big family with a lot of men and tons of laundry.

Milena Dimitrova, foster parent