Everything is a choice....or is it?

For quite awhile I have believed life is all about the choices I make.  I have always accepted full responsibility for the choices I have made, as well.  I was blessed to have parents who taught me from a very young age that the consequences of my choices were just as much my responsibility as the choices themselves.  If my choice was a bad one, deal with the consequences, learn from them and know that any future choices I make will probably be better because of the lessons I've learned.


As a parent myself now, I want my daughter to know the same thing.  I don't want her to blame others for her successes or failures.  


However, since becoming a parent, I've learned my choices are often "overridden" by societal beliefs.  That's a hard pill to swallow when many of your personal beliefs and choices don't coincide with what society deems as "acceptable", "cool" or "normal".  


Even what I thought would be viewed as joyous, loving choices - like the adoption of my daughter - were met with MAJOR push back from those who said, "Why would you do something like this before getting married?  Do you know many men don't seriously consider single mothers for marriage?"  Or, "If you really want a child, why don't you just have one yourself?  You don't know what you'll get with someone else's baby."  I heard what people considered the most horrible outcomes like, "What if you get a fetal alcohol, crack, or AIDS baby?"  My heart always knew we all get the children who teach us the most in our lives.  And, even giving birth you don't know if you'll produce the "perfect" child (whatever that means).  I believe children are perfect in the form they are created.  I wish no child ever had to suffer, but I also believe our time in this existence is a blip in our soul's journey.  Having worked with the severely physically and developmentally disabled for years after college, I came to believe they were much higher evolved souls than I because they taught me more than any doctoral-level college professor ever did.  They taught me about love, acceptance, laughter and true joy.


The hardest for me still is my attempted choices to raise my daughter in what I felt was the healthiest possible way.  Something as simple as choosing glass bottles over plastic was met by a written notification from her daycare center that glass wasn't allowed in the infant rooms because it was deemed "too dangerous".  I "won" that one, because I pointed out the fact that all of the infants baby food was in glass jars.  


I've literally had parents tell me I was an "abusive" parent because my daughter has never had a Happy Meal.  That I was "brain washing" her by raising her as a vegetarian.  And, that I needed to understand it would be my "fault" WHEN (not if) my daughter was bullied because she hadn't had a Happy Meal, didn't know the latest hip-hop dance tune (even though it this same parent admitted it was degrading to women) and doesn't drink Coca-Cola, because it is an "American tradition".  


Now, I look at choices a bit differently.  Even things I still feel very strongly about, I've had to "let go" just so my daughter and I can exist in this society.  She ate cupcakes the size of her head (or bigger) at the almost daily pre-school & elementary school birthday parties that were filled with refined sugars, artificial coloring, hydrogenated oils and other horrifically unhealthy things, but I have never given on the Coca-Cola (despite having to go toe-to-toe with one of her teachers on that one!).


I accepted and continue to work in a job that goes against my own personal beliefs, because the alternative choice meant continuing to either live off the generosity of my parents or placing us on welfare.  For over a year now, I've applied to every position for which I even remotely qualify and have only received a handful of interviews.  


It really is hard to have to live what I consider a "less than" version of my values.  But, I will never quit working toward becoming all that I dream of being - off the grid, living sustainably, zero-waste, and teaching or raising children, and so much more.  


More than that, I will continue to work toward a world that honors ALL belief and life-choices, so my daughter doesn't have to compromise who she is.