Creation Myth, Episode 1: Nothing Complicated

Helena knows she doesn’t want kids. She’s sure of it. Almost. It was a constant topic of conversation with her friend Sigrid in her 20s. Sigrid would try to convince her, but having children was not what she wanted for her life. Then one day in Paris, she meets David. Hear all episodes of Personally: Creation Myth now, early and ad-free, on CBC Stories Premium on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/channel/cbc-stories/id6443681642.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  The youth mental health crisis is growing, and social media is a major driver. Kids are spending up to nine hours a day on screens, often unsupervised, and studies show a direct link to anxiety, depression, and even suicidal thoughts. That's where Gab comes in. Gab offers safer phones and watches for kids with no social media, tailored to every age, offering the right tech at the right time, or Tech in Steps. From GPS-tracking-enabled watches for younger kids to phones with parent-enabled apps for teens, each device allows kids to more safely grow their independence. Visit gab.com/getgab and use code GETGAB for an exclusive offer.

• 0:41Speaker 00

  That's G A B B dot com forward slash get gab. Gab: Tech in Steps. Independence for them, peace of mind for parents.

• 0:52Speaker 01

  This is a CBC Podcast.

• 1:02Speaker 02

  We met in Paris.

• 1:08Speaker 02

  Not for the romance. I'd suggested Paris because it was close. I'm from Belgium. And I was only going because I was trying to forget my ex.

• 1:20Speaker 02

  This ex had been smart and beautiful and abusive. All I wanted now was a man who'd make me feel good for a few hours and then kindly disappear from my life forever. So I'd gone online and found David. He was American, traveling through Europe, but about to go back home.

• 1:48Speaker 02

  Perfect.

• 1:56Speaker 02

  When I arrived at Gardiner, it was noon, and it looked like it would be raining all day.

• 2:03Speaker 02

  I got out my umbrella and walked half an hour to the Modern Art Museum, the Centre Pompidou.

• 2:14Speaker 02

  He was already there.

• 2:17Speaker 02

  His shoulders were impossibly broad, and he was leaning against the railing in this way only Americans can. You have to be from the heart of empire to be so at ease.

• 2:32Speaker 02

  We headed to the closest café we could find and sat under a plastic tarp.

• 2:38Speaker 02

  It made me smile, seeing this man in a rainy place. Every one of his profile pictures had been sunny, whether he was on a glistening ski slope or on a beach in his wet suit, smiling next to his surfboard. I'd half expected him to be rain repellent.

• 2:58Speaker 02

  I was worried I wouldn't be his type. I looked nothing like the female lead with the flowy hair I imagined next to him. My hair was short, dark, and I was wearing the Northern European uniform, all black. But I shouldn't have worried.

• 3:18Speaker 02

  All it took to have him look at me with shimmering eyes was ordering a tea in French. I liked him. He was attentive, comfortable to be around, and very funny.

• 3:34Speaker 02

  But it was cold under the tarp, and when my hot tea was gone, David suggested we go to his Airbnb.

• 3:45Speaker 02

  We sat down on the couch, close enough that our bodies were touching. I could feel the buzz between us.

• 3:57Speaker 02

  But nothing was happening.

• 4:01Speaker 02

  I couldn't take it anymore, so I turned to him and said, "Are you gonna kiss me, or what?"

• 4:10Speaker 02

  And he did.

• 4:15Speaker 02

  The next thing that happened was that the condom broke.

• 4:22Speaker 02

  David jumped up, started apologizing, asked if I was okay. I was fine. But he took my hand, looked me in the eyes and said, "Whatever you decide, I support you. I don't sleep with anyone who I couldn't imagine having a child with."

• 4:41Speaker 02

  We'd met only a few hours before. Was he some sort of Christian? And I hadn't noticed? A Republican? Then again, I didn't know many Americans. Maybe they were all like that? I was ready to make a joke. But David looked at me like this was an actual conversation we were having. So I put my hand on his and said, "Don't worry, I wouldn't go through with it anyway. I don't want kids."

• 5:20Speaker 02

  I'm Helena de Groot and from CBC's Personally, this is Creation Myth.

• 5:32Speaker 02

  I got obsessed with the kid question in my early twenties. I was in no way ready to have a kid. But did I want one? Did I not want one? It felt like the biggest decision I would ever make.

• 5:48Speaker 02

  My thinking was that I would probably not have kids. It wasn't something I'd ever dreamed of for myself. Then again, maybe I was just scared. Because I was not the most emotionally stable. Even small things could knock me off balance. A stack of dishes a roommate left in the sink, a party next door that went on all night, two days of pizza in a row. My friends knew that about me.

• 6:16Speaker 03

  And I'll just put this away so I don't bump it.

• 6:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 6:19Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 6:19Speaker 02

  And no one knew it better than Sigrid. She's my oldest friend. For my sanity, I need things to be a certain way.

• 6:29Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 6:29Speaker 02

  You know, like, the house has to be perfectly organized and there has to be this kind of food on the table. And if I haven't slept well, I just don't function. So I have to, and I do go to yoga every day, you know, just for my mental health and stuff.

• 6:43Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 6:45Speaker 02

  Sigrid was different. What I'd always admired about her was that she had a sense of proportion. She was passionate about the things that mattered, her friendships, her first big newspaper article, she's a journalist. But about things that didn't really matter, she didn't get worked up. So what if she saw midway through an interview that she was wearing a shirt with a coffee stain? The same was true now that Sigrid had kids. She was merely amused when she came downstairs and found her six-year-old making himself breakfast, wielding a sharp knife. And when her 12-year-old said she wanted to skip school to go and protest the war in Gaza, she said, "It's against the rules, so it'll be your problem if you get punished.

• 7:30Speaker 02

  But if it's important to you, go."

• 7:34Speaker 02

  But if there was one thing that I envied about her, it was that she went easy on herself, too.

• 7:42Speaker 03

  Yeah, you know that.

• 7:44Speaker 02

  And I love that, that you'll just be like, this is gonna be an off day because I slept like two hours, you know, whatever. I'll wrestle through, tomorrow's another day, you know? And I've just always been afraid that I couldn't do that, you know, that I would just fall apart.

• 8:02Speaker 03

  If you had a kid?

• 8:03Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:04Speaker 03

  Yeah. I've had that fear, too. Like, what if I would feel that it's too much or that it's not worth it? But I think you can kind of just trust biology there.

• 8:21Speaker 03

  Wait one second, Helena.

• 8:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:22Speaker 03

  They're knocking on my door. Yes?

• 8:25Speaker 04

  Want to eat?

• 8:26Speaker 03

  No, thank you, but I'm recording.

• 8:30Speaker 03

  Thank you very much.

• 8:31Speaker 02

  What was that?

• 8:33Speaker 03

  It's the Ukrainian refugees living here.

• 8:36Speaker 02

  Oh, I forgot that they were living with you.

• 8:41Speaker 03

  And he's very, very sweet. And he's so now, you know, he's knocking and saying, do you want to eat? I'm cooking.

• 8:50Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 8:53Speaker 02

  How had I forgotten about the two Ukrainian refugees living with Sigrid and her kids? If I had taken in two total strangers, strangers who had fled a literal war zone, I would not let you forget my heroics.

• 9:09Speaker 02

  Though, who was I kidding? I wasn't taking anyone in. I loved talking to strangers. A conversation at the post office could make my day. But I didn't want them to move in. What if they left all the lights on? Or blasted bad music? Or had friends over all the time? I got stressed when someone got the inside of my dishwashing gloves wet.

• 9:32Speaker 02

  I didn't like this about myself, but that's who I was. I loved spending time with people as long as I could walk away.

• 9:49Speaker 02

  David and I hadn't talked in three years. But then, one spring, I went to visit a friend in the US and thought, why not? Let's see if he wants to meet up. He did.

• 10:04Speaker 02

  Again, I wanted nothing complicated. A few days of sunshine and desire, then go home.

• 10:13Speaker 02

  I didn't know it then, but David had bigger plans.

• 10:19Speaker 02

  He'd had a dream about me. In the dream, the two of us were wrapped in an embrace. The light was filtered as if through white curtains.

• 10:31Speaker 02

  And I was pregnant.

• 10:41Speaker 02

  With that image in mind, he drove to the airport.

• 10:48Speaker 02

  Once I got in the car, he put a bag with snacks and fresh orange juice at my feet and took me on a carefully planned, week-long road trip through his home state, California.

• 11:03Speaker 02

  It was my first road trip. I didn't even have a driver's license. Growing up in a European city, I just took public transport. But here was a man with a car, and he knew how to drive it, through nature like I had never seen: redwoods with hundreds of year-old trees, and ocean water that wasn't gray like the North Sea, but a clear, blue-green.

• 11:32Speaker 02

  I was enchanted.

• 11:39Speaker 02

  Whenever something caught his eye, David would park the car so we could look together.

• 11:45Speaker 02

  I wasn't used to this mode of traveling. I was used to diving into the history of a place, the political system, read the novels that were written there. But David just looked.

• 12:00Speaker 02

  He had an uncanny ability to see whales in the distance. Unfortunately, however much he pointed, all I could see was water and more water.

• 12:11Speaker 02

  It didn't matter.

• 12:13Speaker 02

  He got me to notice other things: the waves, the eucalyptus trees, the warmth of his body as he held mine.

• 12:27Speaker 02

  As we drove, we also went through a list of questions I'd found on The New York Times, designed by a scientist who had succeeded in making people fall in love in his lab. "What would you save in a fire?" "What are you most ashamed of?" "How do you think you'll die?" "What is your life story?" in four minutes.

• 12:47Speaker 02

  I wasn't too sure what my life story was. My parents were still together. My sister and I were close. We all liked to read and play music. The most dramatic thing about me was probably the mental health stuff. A few times, it had gotten pretty bad. And I was always scared I'd do something that would set it off. So I'd gotten used to living with one hand on the railing. David was different. He surfed, climbed volcanoes, spent months driving through the mountains of Bolivia and Argentina to study the movement of tectonic plates. He'd manned a weather station in Antarctica. He lived in Brazil to learn capoeira, in China to learn Mandarin. What would my life look like if I let myself take risks?

• 13:32Speaker 02

  I imagined having a go-bag by the door with a few changes of clothes, dry shampoo, a microphone, and my passport, so I could hop on a plane whenever something happened. David would do his fieldwork. Then we'd both come home to our cozy apartment in a big city, regale each other with our stories, and recharge.

• 13:56Speaker 02

  I never asked David how he imagined our life together.

• 14:12Speaker 02

  On the last day of our trip, we did the only thing that made sense to us. We went to San Francisco City Hall and got married.

• 14:27Speaker 02

  David knew I didn't want kids. I'd told him a few times, including the day we met. And I told him again while we were in line at City Hall, "Do not marry me if you want kids." But he responded, "I'd rather be with you than have kids."

• 14:48Speaker 02

  He didn't mention his dream with the filtered light where I was pregnant.

• 14:56Speaker 02

  In my mind, the issue was settled.

• 15:01Speaker 00

  The youth mental health crisis is growing, and social media is a major driver. Kids are spending up to nine hours a day on screens, often unsupervised, and studies show a direct link to anxiety, depression, and even suicidal thoughts. That's where Gab comes in. Gab offers safer phones and watches for kids with no social media, tailored to every age, offering the right tech at the right time, or Tech in Steps. From GPS-tracking-enabled watches for younger kids to phones with parent-enabled apps for teens, each device allows kids to more safely grow their independence. Visit gab.com/getgab and use code GETGAB for an exclusive offer.

• 15:42Speaker 00

  That's G A B B dot com forward slash get gab. Gab: Tech in Steps. Independence for them, peace of mind for parents.

• 15:52Speaker 04

  Hi, I just had to tell you that I think your podcast has changed my life.

• 15:59Speaker 04

  Season one of Sold a Story hit a nerve. It was about teaching kids to read. We have gotten this wrong in New York and all across the nation. Now we're back with a new season. This time, we go beyond reading.

• 16:11Speaker 00

  I've literally been told by my district that I should not be teaching math. I should be facilitating math.

• 16:18Speaker 04

  I'm Emily Hanford. Go to your podcast app and follow Sold a Story.

• 16:24Speaker 02

  The first time Segred met David, she had to laugh.

• 16:28Speaker 03

  He looks like a superhero. Like, that jaw, it's ridiculous.

• 16:35Speaker 03

  It is.

• 16:38Speaker 03

  He looks like he would be named Buck or something.

• 16:43Speaker 03

  And you're like, Emily from Amartre, you know?

• 16:51Speaker 02

  So what did you think of us, you know, being together?

• 16:54Speaker 03

  I liked him.

• 16:55Speaker 02

  You did?

• 16:56Speaker 03

  Yeah. Well, he's a very kind, warm person. Yeah.

• 17:03Speaker 02

  And when we got married, did you think that I would have kids? That I would like change my mind?

• 17:17Speaker 03

  Yeah, probably, yeah. Also because, well, most of my friends who said that they didn't want kids, maybe they weren't with the right person. And then five years later, they were with the right person and then they had kids. And you were good together, you know? So yeah, I could imagine that you would be swept along with that. Yeah.

• 17:47Speaker 02

  I can't remember when exactly, but David told me about that dream he'd had, the one where I was pregnant. "I could just see it," he'd said. "You'd be such a good mother."

• 18:01Speaker 02

  I didn't know what to say. I was halfway through packing up my life in Brussels so I could move to America. I had so much on my mind. I'd quit my perfect job at the Belgian Public Radio, sublet my apartment, and I was spending my days saying goodbye to my beloved Brussels, my family, my friends. I was excited for my new life, this new me. Maybe I would learn to drive and go on my own road trip. Maybe I would have the guts to become a real journalist. Maybe I would even make a critically acclaimed podcast and win a prize.

• 18:41Speaker 02

  But what if no one cared about some Belgian lady's podcast? What if my black clothes were not seen as sophisticated but sad? What if I sounded like a book when I spoke? Because that's where I'd gotten most of my English. And when a cashier or barista said, "How are you today?" Should I respond, ask them how they are doing? Or would that just hold up the line and irritate everyone? Should I say Helena de Chroetz or Helena de Groot?

• 19:13Speaker 02

  Meanwhile, David had found an apartment for us in San Francisco. He showed it to me over Skype. It was beautiful. Wooden floors, high ceilings, and bay windows with little mosaics of stained-colored glass. Then, on a Thursday in early January, I boarded the plane. Eighteen hours later, David came and picked me up from the airport and drove us to our first home. He was so excited to show me where we'd live together. He had thought of everything we'd need, even the boring things, cleaning supplies, a shower curtain, and he'd built shelves for the books he knew I'd bring.

• 19:58Speaker 02

  But when I walked through the door, instead of seeing his effort, all I saw was the image of my mother at Brussels Airport, her eyes red and swollen from crying all night. And I saw the apartment of a single man. Every object was gray or plastic or pleather. His face fell when he saw mine. "We'll make it ours," he said. "I know I'm not good at this stuff."

• 20:39Speaker 02

  The next morning, he took me to a diner, something I only knew from movies and wanted to try. As I marveled at the booths, the chrome-lined bar stools, the giant portions, and the endless coffee, he squeezed my hand, his eyes lit up. Then he went to work, and I started Googling public radio jobs. I wasn't allowed to work yet, but I wanted to be ready when my green card arrived, whenever that would be. It could be weeks, months, another year. So for now, I decided to make it my job to get to know America, starting with San Francisco.

• 21:27Speaker 02

  Most mornings, I'd take my computer to a coffee shop and journal. I wouldn't include anything about my day or my feelings, how lost I felt without a job or even a single friend, that David and I had had our first fight because he wanted me to at least consider having a family with him. I didn't write any of that. What I thought made the most sense was research. I tapped on my keyboard. The first humans to have set foot on what is now San Francisco would not have been able to see the ocean. It would have been a great plain with a view of a distant ridge of low-lying hills.

• 22:10Speaker 02

  I'd copy a few more paragraphs, sip my coffee, think about Earth and time. Then I'd start a conversation with whoever was sitting next to me. But all anyone wanted to talk about was their app idea, their startup, or their upcoming IPO. So I'd pack up my computer and start walking through the neighborhood, the Mission. It was beautiful, the murals, the park on a steep hill, the candy-colored Victorians. Curious about the inside of those houses, I started searching for listings.

• 22:52Speaker 02

  I had never seen prices like that, 3, 4, 5 million. On the sidewalks, I saw folks who lived in tents, but we could afford the ridiculous rent and the price of an $8 ethically sourced pour-over coffee. And so I remember these fights that I had with David, like, "And you want to bring a kid into this?" I was just so angry with him and with America, and I would go on and on about segregation and income inequality and no support from mothers and how the gender imbalance between us would only get worse because, of course, he worked in tech, so he made all this money, and I was a freelancer trying to find work in media, so who would stay home with the

• 23:36Speaker 02

  kids, you know? And I just got so angry because that was not a context that I could imagine becoming a mother in, you know?

• 23:45Speaker 03

  But why did you take it as a given? You could have changed that.

• 23:49Speaker 02

  While I could not change America, we didn't have to live in this sci-fi dumpster. I begged David to move. He was the most adventurous person I'd ever met.

• 24:04Speaker 02

  Maybe we could travel for a while, find someplace where we could both be happy. But he said he'd done enough adventuring, enough living out of the trunk of a car, eating cans of beans and unidentifiable meat. He'd seen places few people got to see, and he was grateful. He was ready to settle down and start a family.

• 24:30Speaker 02

  This was the opposite of what I wanted. My whole existence had been lived settled down, at the piano or on the couch with a book. I wanted to go outside, talk to people, learn about history from those who'd lived through it, get to know my neighbors.

• 24:47Speaker 02

  And I badly wanted to make my way back to my career in audio. So I tried making a radio story, "Green Card Be Damned." I found an article in the paper about a family that was being evicted, and I went over there and talked to them.

• 25:03Speaker 02

  But what could I do? I had no contacts in this country, and my Belgian portfolio wouldn't mean much here.

• 25:12Speaker 02

  I wanted to be the kind of person who'd tried anyway, gave it her all. But what if, in this new country, my all was not enough?

• 25:23Speaker 02

  So I filed the recording away, ashamed of myself for having wasted this family's time.

• 25:32Speaker 02

  But I was desperate to be employed again and feel like a member of society. So when, after 15 months of waiting, my green card arrived in the mail, I took a job as a line cook, doing a few things on an endless loop: prepping carrots and broccoli, massaging kale, boiling bones.

• 25:54Speaker 02

  I often cried in the bathroom. This was not the new life I'd imagined for myself.

• 26:02Speaker 02

  Late at night, after my shift, I would search online for places I would rather be. On Google Maps, I found my favorite literary magazine, which had its office in New York. And I'd click through pictures of their bohemian-looking office, filled with plants and books. That's where I belonged. And then, after three years in California, David accepted a job in New York. We arrived in New York in November. It started lizarding almost right away.

• 26:43Speaker 02

  But after all this time in California, I loved it. The seasons, the buildings, the subway, but most of all, the people. She's doing fine. She's upstairs. I'm about to go get a nap. Good. Good to see you, Yanni. Good to.

• 27:01Speaker 02

  I mean, it's funny, you know? Like, the cliche in America is that New Yorkers are rude.

• 27:06Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 27:07Speaker 02

  But, you know, compared to what we're used to in Europe, they're very nice.

• 27:10Speaker 03

  Us being used to French people, yes.

• 27:13Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 27:16Speaker 03

  No, but, no, of course. I don't think New Yorkers are rude.

• 27:21Speaker 02

  Maybe one or two New Yorkers were rude, but New York itself was nothing but kind. It was almost unbelievable. Within two days, I found us an apartment on the top floor of a brownstone on a quiet street. I made my first friend just a few days later. And within 10 weeks, I'd lined up two of my dream gigs.

• 27:42Speaker 04

  Do you want to start with a?

• 27:42Speaker 02

  Yeah. Two podcasts about my favorite topic: books.

• 27:46Speaker 05

  And hopefully, he's just entertained by that bone and it doesn't pick up the gnawing sound. People just think that's me, right?

• 27:55Speaker 02

  I zoomed all over the city with my microphone, spoke to writers I'd admired for years, and had meetings at the place I knew so well from Google Maps, the office of my favorite literary magazine. Only now, I was really there, sitting on their old leather couch, discussing which stories we would adapt for sound.

• 28:20Speaker 02

  One night in bed, David pulled me in close, kissed me, and whispered in my ear how proud he was. He even had a present for me: tickets to the opera. That Thursday night, we put on our shiniest clothes, got on the subway, and walked into the building and up the Cinderella staircase, where a stranger took a picture of the two of us grinning in front of the epic chandelier.

• 28:52Speaker 02

  But while I felt like the city and me were lovers, David's New York experience was nothing like mine. He was taking the subway at 5 every morning to get to midtown before rush hour and then work crazy hours at a startup he only half believed in. He'd brought in some plants and some photos of seaweed to hang on the wall. But that didn't change the fact that the view from his office was nothing but other offices. When he came home, he was still all smiles and funny stories. So I didn't realize until it was too late. David's gentle soul, raised on palm trees and temperate weather, was withering away.

• 29:40Speaker 02

  Then the pandemic happened, which was particularly brutal in New York. Sirens went by our apartment day and night, and morgues were filling up so quickly that bodies were stored in refrigerator trucks. One day, David asked me, "What is the point of life? If all we do is work, and then, what, die?" He wanted his life to be about more than that. And he told me, "I really want to have a child with you."

• 30:13Speaker 02

  A child. I'd only just gotten my career back on the rails, and I love my work, lived for it. I wasn't going to give that up.

• 30:22Speaker 03

  But I do remember, Helena, that I think I tried to kind of push back a bit on your view that it would be incompatible, like to do the projects you want to do, to do the jobs you want to do, like the independence, that that would be incompatible with kids. And so I do remember not agreeing with you. Like, you don't have to choose. You can have it both, you know?

• 30:47Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, I also think we just come from such different families, right? Like, my mom used to be a teacher, and then when she got pregnant with me, she gave that up and stayed home with us kids. And of course, it doesn't mean I would have to do it like she did, but that was the example I had. That's what I could imagine. And I think it's very different for you, right?

• 31:12Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. My mom, throughout my childhood, she was a student and then a PhD. So she did kind of an academic career after having had small kids. And then they split fifty-fifty on everything.

• 31:25Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 31:27Speaker 02

  David said, "That's what we would do too." He promised he'd find a job that would let him work part-time, and we'd divide the childcare fifty-fifty. Fifty-fifty, what was he even talking about? Only one of us would be spending nine months growing this baby. And I was terrified of pregnancy. Being pregnant when you don't want to have children, like, I can't imagine anything more scary, you know?

• 31:52Speaker 03

  No.

• 31:53Speaker 02

  That's like alien, like the movie, you know?

• 31:56Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 31:57Speaker 02

  And it just felt so unfair that the person who wanted it less, or maybe not at all, would have to do more, even if after birth we can split it fifty-fifty, which I doubt, because David is also wildly unrealistic, you know?

• 32:16Speaker 03

  Yes, but he's a capable man, you know? Like, there's no reason he wouldn't... Yeah, maybe he didn't know it before, like, how much work it is, but he would find out after one day. Who would know that?

• 32:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 32:30Speaker 03

  But actually, Leona, what you're saying is like, you didn't want it. But you, you kind of went looking for other reasons than just not wanting it. Like, one reason being economic aspects or the inequality, but but that is like, yeah, kind of beating around the bush.

• 32:50Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 32:51Speaker 03

  You know?

• 32:52Speaker 02

  Mm hmm.

• 32:55Speaker 02

  I just have

• 32:58Speaker 02

  in general, like, a hard time really trusting myself. And I'm sort of afraid to admit this because, you know, it's, it's just gonna sound like natalist propaganda or whatever, you know, but

• 33:17Speaker 02

  I do feel like, well, maybe, um,

• 33:24Speaker 02

  you know, there.

• 33:27Speaker 02

  I don't know why it's so hard to say.

• 33:32Speaker 02

  I do wonder about, like, what meaning I can find in my life. Like, what am I building? What am I living for?

• 33:49Speaker 02

  It can just feel exhausting, you know, like, every day, here we go again, let's try and find some meaning, you know, and of course, some days it goes better than others, like, when I'm having a really good conversation with a stranger that I'm interviewing, you know, then I'm like, yes, this is my purpose, you know? And making this project feels really meaningful to me, you know, I I hope that I can maybe help someone who's listening feel less alone, you know? Because it can feel really lonely, that like, when you don't want kids, you always have to be so clear about it, you know, on the outside?

• 34:32Speaker 02

  Because you don't want to give rope to people who are trying to convince you. So you have to be like, really firm and clear and unwavering.

• 34:41Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 34:42Speaker 02

  But of course, on the inside, it's not necessarily like this, you know?

• 34:46Speaker 03

  No.

• 34:47Speaker 02

  And so, even though I keep saying I don't want kids,

• 34:53Speaker 02

  I am filled with doubt.

• 34:55Speaker 03

  No.

• 34:57Speaker 02

  And especially because like, okay, the opinion of strangers, I can tune that out, you know.

• 35:03Speaker 02

  But you know, the way you thought about me and

• 35:08Speaker 02

  I don't even want to say try to convince me because I feel like that's not really, I mean, that's totally what it was. But I just mean like, you weren't pushy or annoying. Like, yeah, like you would say something like, but Helena, you're so good at love. Or like, having a child is creating a world with them. And you would raise your kids in a way that you like, you know? So if you like music and books, you would raise your kid with a lot of music and books.

• 35:41Speaker 03

  At any time, did it bug you that I didn't just accept when you said like, you know, I don't want it because of X, Y, Z?

• 35:48Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, initially, I think-

• 35:52Speaker 03

  What, did you feel judged in any way?

• 35:59Speaker 02

  I didn't feel judged by you.

• 36:05Speaker 03

  Good.

• 36:05Speaker 02

  But I judged myself. I always felt like, what the hell is wrong with me that I don't want this?

• 36:15Speaker 02

  And I remember this one time, actually, when I did feel like you managed to make something shift in me, you know? It was after you had your second child and you were thinking like, you know, should I have a third? Which always happened when you were on vacation, you know? And you were like relaxed and well rested. And of course, you'd get back to your life in Brussels and start working again and be like, what the hell was I thinking? But the reason that you were even considering having a third child was that after Alfred was born, your second, you really noticed like immediately, from the very moment that

• 36:58Speaker 02

  he was born, like how different his consciousness was from Nora's.

• 37:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 37:06Speaker 02

  And you said- I'm just so curious to meet the others, you know? Yeah. Get to know them, get to know who they are as people. And it's so funny to me because like, that's not really talked about a lot, you know? Like curiosity about who are these kids as people, you know? And I like people. Yeah, yeah. A lot. And I love getting to know them. Yeah. I mean, that's why I am a radio producer and interviewer, you know? Yeah.

• 37:46Speaker 02

  It was around this time that I got to know our nine-year-old neighbor, a little boy who lived in the apartment across from ours. A few months earlier, his grandmother had died. And now this little kid was getting angry over nothing. He couldn't find his phone charger or something like that. And he would get so angry that he would start screaming at the top of his lungs.

• 38:10Speaker 02

  Neighbors had started calling the police. So his mom wanted to do something. And we had chatted a few times in the hallway or the elevator and gotten along. So she asked if her son could come and hang out at ours sometimes when he had an outburst. I said, sure, let him come by. And he did.

• 38:29Speaker 02

  While David was away at the office, this little boy would knock on our door, his face wet with tears. And we'd talk about what happened, breathe a little. Then I'd put on some music and we'd dance or he'd jump on my little trampoline. And then I would get out my crayons and he'd draw. And the whole time he was there, I would be in conversation with myself.

• 38:52Speaker 02

  See, this is nice. I love this kid. I love his little glasses, the way he presses on his crayons as he draws. I love hearing about the fourth grade drama of who has a crush on who. And I love that he leans on me when he needs a calming presence. I've never experienced that. I think of myself as intense, stormy. And the fact that he finds me calming makes me feel so capable.

• 39:22Speaker 02

  Capable of having a kid?

• 39:27Speaker 02

  Couple hours later, he would say, "Okay, I'm going home now," and walk out.

• 39:34Speaker 02

  Once this opinionated, lively little man was gone, I could almost touch the silence in the room.

• 39:46Speaker 02

  It made me feel a lot of things at once: glad to be alone and lonely, exhausted and fulfilled.

• 39:57Speaker 02

  But there was something else. My body was feeling relaxed, my movements slower, my mind oddly at peace, almost as if I was a little high.

• 40:09Speaker 02

  Was this what being around kids made you feel like?

• 40:19Speaker 02

  And then I noticed: my period was late.

• 40:24Speaker 02

  I was pregnant.

• 40:34Speaker 02

  Creation Myth is written, produced, hosted and sound designed by me, Helena De Groot. My story editor and senior producer is Veronica Simmons. Editorial sound design support by Brendan Baker, who also mixed and mastered the episode. Special thanks to my friends Sigrid Melchior for our two decades-long, ongoing conversation. The team behind Creation Myth further includes Anna Ashite, who is our coordinating producer. Executive producers are Cecil Fernandez and Chris Oak. Tanya Springer is the senior manager. Arif Noorani is the director and Leslie Merklinger is the executive director of CBC Podcasts.

• 41:14Speaker 02

  This project was made possible with the support of VPM Media Corporation. I'll be back next week with a new episode.

• 41:24Speaker 02

  Thank you for listening.

• 41:28Speaker 02

  And if you want to binge the whole series ad-free, you can subscribe to our CBC Stories Premium channel on Apple Podcasts. Just click the link in the show description.