When We Think We Want Something and Then Realize We Don't Want It After All.

When I was in A.P. English Literature in high school, I remember my teacher, Mrs. M., telling an insightful story. She had a friend who had been married and was also childless. This friend wanted a baby very badly and a baby was not happening for her. She was so obsessed with having a baby that the thoughts of becoming a mother consumer her daily thoughts. It got so bad that she could not want past the infant's section of a store without crying. Her husband grew so tired of her, that he divorced her because of her constant depression over not having a baby. She eventually married again and that time she got pregnant! She was so thrilled! Then my teacher did not see this friend again until the child was just turning 2 years old. (That makes me wonder if it was someone who worked at the high school). She asked this friend "How's motherhood?" The friend then replied: "I hate it! This is 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and I have no time to myself!" My teacher then said to the class that she wanted to slap her. It is tragic that her friend spent so much time feeling sorry for herself because of not being a mother. She cried so many years, had sleepless nights, and lost her first marriage. And then, when she finally became a mother, she did not like how difficult parenting is. She obviously never thought things through, did not think about what being a parent meant. It would not surprise me if that second marriage also failed, with her misery over being a mother. Parenting is about self-sacrifice and lots of dedication. A parent's life is never their own and that never stops, even when their kids become adults. I know that in my own life I have wanted many things. I wanted to live abroad. I lived in South Korea for a few years. I liked living in South Korea very much and I miss it a lot. Unfortunately, I did not like teaching English as a Second Language. I did not like classroom management. I also did not take to the Korean culture very well at all. I did not like how Koreans are often not direct with their communication, for they prefer to "save face" with people. I would rather have people tell me like it is. Yet, that is because of my own culture. I am glad I lived abroad, but it was not all that I had hoped it would be. I was also obsessed with finding a boyfriend and getting married. I wanted to get married so badly all my life. Even when I was a child I knew I would go off to a good Seventh-day Adventist college or university and then marry a nice guy I would meet there, if I didn't already know him in high school. I would get married before graduating college or just after graduation, and we would immediately start a family. Then, we were hopefully going to serve as missionaries for a while and eventually settle back in the United States and send our 4 or 5 children to Adventist schools. We would then have grandchildren and continue being active in our church. Well, none of that happened. I am now 43 years old, never had any meaningful romantic relationship, have no children, and have been sporadically employed. I never focused enough on career development when I was younger, for I was so obsessed with getting married. I was also indecisive and let my family run my life. I should have did whatever I could to be on my own and stay on my own. I realized that ADHD and mild autism have affected these goals. I now wonder, if I did get married and have a family, how would it have worked out? What if I had all those things for them to not work out anyway? If I had chosen another country other than South Korea to live in, would things have been better? WOuld my marriage been happy? Would I have had the family I had envisioned? Would I have been a good wife and mother? I have to admit that I don't like working with children. I never liked baby-sitting. I hated working at the summer camp when I was 20 years old. I hated teaching the young kids in Korea. Would I really want children of my own? I also no longer believe in the Seventh-day Adventist Church. I realized that in July 2010, when I was in Seoul on a hot day and reading my Bible alone in my apartment in Sangbong. I had just gone through a lot of stress and was reading Daniel 8 to see if I really did believe in the SDA church after all. I know that the whole Adventist Church is based on the Millerite moveent of the 1840s. The Adventists then took that movement to be the Investigative Judgment. The book of Daniel's account of a vision of the Ram and Goat talks about a military takeover, not the Second Coming of Christ. I then abandoned Adventism. I wish I had done so many years earlier. I still show up at my old church and some SDA events sometimes to see old friends and family. I can't agree with all their theology anymore. I should eventually get my name taken off the books, but that will have to wait a few years. It will happen. I wish I hadn't wasted so much of my time trying to only find a Adventist man to date and marry. I wish I didn't attend Adventist schools. I wish I didn't think I only had to attend SDA schools, volunteer with Adventists, and work for Adventists. I am glad for change. I wish I never had to put up with this organization for so long.