Two Negatives Do Not Make A Positive...

Never mind the mathematical equation. And that rule on English grammar.


The fact is I am not pregnant. About that I am positive.

My Mama is My Yaya

So said my 3-year old Indie to a small circle of yayas gathered around her one morning in the compound where we live. The women were aghast, maybe thinking that the yaya label my daughter bestowed on me was both insulting and demeaning.

Yaya. Someone paid to mother our children. Is there indignity there?


I am a proud hands-on parent and I "yaya" my one and only child full-time without feeling inferior or inadequate in any way. I have always seen myself as a mother hen and I find great pleasure in taking care of somebody other than myself. I thrive on it, in fact. It naturally follows then that I will make it my duty to raise my own child with my own two hands, without having to place this wonderful task in another person's hands.


Yes, I don't go to work anymore. Yet I haven't worked this hard in my entire life. My current job description is boundless and all-encompassing. What I have now is a 24/7 career. I am on call even on holidays. There are no sick leaves for me, much less vacation leaves. Promotions don't happen either. You start and end with the same title. To top it all, there is no room for resignation or early retirement; it's the kind of work that follows you to the grave.


No matter, mothering my little one, to me, is the most rewarding, most fulfilling job in the world. Paychecks arrive not every 15 days but everyday, every hour even. And they come in the form of hugs and kisses and a thousand I love yous.

A Scar Is Born

It's bikini season once again and to be honest, I'm not so thrilled. Well, to be very honest, it's because there just below my navel is a scar between 2 and 3 inches long, an ugly horrible mark where Indie came from.

Hell, who would have thought that in this day and age one could still get scars like this from C-section! When I woke up from my drugged stupor that day, the first thing that entered my mind—well, of course next to the baby—was the wound. I remember slowly reaching down to feel it with my hand and finding out to my horror that the bandage protecting it was not horizontal. It was, Oh God, vertical. I remember closing my eyes and praying it was just another one of those drug-induced dreams.

The silent anger over a bikini cut that didn't happen quickly dissipated the minute I saw the baby, baby Indie with the darkest eyes and the loveliest cheeks. She was definitely worth the... how did they call that cut anyway?

I was so into my baby and the excitement of motherhood that thoughts of the soon-to-be scar were somehow pushed down the bottom of my brain, albeit temporarily. But then exactly fourteen days after my giving birth, the moment of truth came, rather too early actually. It was time to take the bandage off, time for me to lay my eyes for the first time on the dreaded scar. It was still a bit fresh. Unsightly no doubt. No, hideous. That I was not ready for it was an understatement.

After that day, everything just seemed to sag. My face. My neck. My boobs. My stomach. Plus, of course there was my ego.

For a self-confessed manic-depressive, I'd say I got over it pretty fast. Like a week, two weeks. All right, a month maybe. Still! Postpartum depression could be a lot worse than that. It could only be Indie. She was so adorable she could make me forget about a lot of things. Like scar serums. Plastic surgeons. And oh yes, even bikinis.

Not completely though. But over the years I have learned to accept that looking for the right bikini would be a persistent problem, a problem which I believe will not go away until I near perhaps my mid-50s. Thank God for the return of the maillot. But then again I have yet to find the right maillot for me. But that I suppose is another story.

I'm proud to say I have learned to live with my scar. The love-hate relationship is to be expected. I can be a vain woman after all. That it will be with me till the day I die does not give me cause for hyperventilation, not anymore. Of course, I still find it ugly. But what scar is pretty? It is no beauty mark but a mark nonetheless, the single indelible mark of my humble contribution to the circle of life.