A few months ago I came across an article—which I’ve been trying to track down, but I can’t for the life of me remember who it was by or where it was published—by a creative nonfiction writer talking about not wanting her young son to read or hear about some of the essays she had written before she ever planned on having children. She was concerned about her son learning about some of the more sordid details from her life as a twenty-something, in which she did some things that she wouldn’t want her son doing. As a writer, she had felt compelled to be very open and honest, but as a mother, she wanted to keep some of these details from her son, feeling it would throw her credibility into question when it came time to tell him not to do these very same things.

As a soon-to-be-mom myself who is working on a sort of would-be memoir style series of letters that I plan to revise and then give to my daughter when she’s old enough, I found this topic extremely interesting. This is something I’ve been wondering about too—what should I tell my daughter, and what should I withhold? Do I tell her about my forays into drugs? Do I tell her how old I was when I first had sex? Or more importantly, in my opinion, do I tell her about some of the horrible, horrible things I used to think about other people? Do I tell her about what a miserable, judgmental person I was in my younger days? 

The answer, I’ve decided, is yes. I want her to know me, to really know who I am, and in order for that to happen, she must know who I was, how I came to be this person I am now. And I want her to know that these things are normal. I don’t see the value in telling her I never smoked weed. I don’t see how she would benefit from me pretending the only man I ever slept with was her father. And I definitely don’t see how it will help her if I pretend I never made mistakes, never did or said or thought things I’m ashamed of now.

I guess the truth is, part of the point in writing these letters to her is that I want her to know these things. I’m sure I’ll revise my opinions on parenting as I go, but at the moment, I feel like I want to have a really open relationship with my daughter, and I don’t want to arbitrarily forbid her to try things that I know are just a normal part of searching for yourself. Maybe by writing about these things and then letting her read them, I can connect with her on a deeper level than I would have been able to otherwise. Maybe knowing these things about her mom will help her when she’s faced with difficult decisions herself.