One of my father’s favorite stories was about the night I was born. “We didn’t have a name picked out for a girl on the way to the hospital,” he said. “Your mother was so sure it was going to be a boy.” He always laughed then, everyone laughed. “So I had to pick out the name,” he said.
It took me years—I mean years!—to realize that this story wasn’t funny. By then, I was an adult woman, married, and expecting a baby. Hearing him begin again, I said, “Dad, every time you tell that story, it hurts me. It says, “You’re not what we wanted.” Please don’t tell it again.”
I don’t know why it took me so long to figure out that this story was hurtful. Maybe because parents are our first authority figures, so we believe them—not for any good reason but “because I said so.” Finally I said so, said no, and my father stopped telling that story.
When my daughter was born, the first thing I did was call her by name.
“Sara!”
