I Never Wanted a Daughter

Mia Hayes
5 min readMar 15, 2022

My mother’s abandonment made me worry I’d ruin a daughter

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels

San Francisco’s Clement Street was crowded with vegetable displays and pedestrians pulling rolling baskets as I navigated Tate’s stroller along the sidewalk toward 6th Avenue. My two older boys, ages six and four, tagged alongside of me with their hands grasping the stroller. Every so often we’d stop, and I’d select bananas or turnips from the displays and hand…

--

--

Mia Hayes

40-something trying to live several lifetimes at once. Stay-at-home author, mom, and wife.