I looked at her and asked why she thought I might not do it all again. She said, “Because you never talk about those first few years.” I knew then that she had noticed every silence, every time I changed the subject, every photograph where I looked happy but somehow distant. I finally told her that in 1996 I hadn’t wanted children, and that I had said yes because I loved her and couldn’t bear to watch her cry. She started crying herself and asked whether I had ever regretted having them. I told her no—not once—not after they were born.
Then I told her there had been a period when I resented all three of them, and that was the hardest truth I had ever said out loud. She asked how I could possibly have hidden that for so long. I said because children shouldn’t have to carry the knowledge that their father once wished their lives had been different. I also told her that the resentment eventually disappeared, not because I forced myself to love them, but because they became people I couldn’t imagine my life without. She asked whether I would have chosen the same life if I’d known everything beforehand. I looked at her and said, “I don’t know—and that’s the first honest answer I’ve given you about it.”
She was quiet for a long time, then asked whether I was angry that she had wanted children so badly. I told her I had been angry at myself for saying yes without telling her what I really wanted. She reached across the table and took my hand. Then she said, “I spent thirty-one years believing I gave you the family you wanted.” I told her, “You gave me a family I never knew I could love this much.” She started crying again, and I did too. Before we went to bed, she asked me one more question: “If you could go back to 1996, would you tell me the truth?” I said, “Yes—and I’d still hope you stayed.”
