Love Is Free

The mamas have pressured me into matchmaking.

I'm flattered, to be honest.

To be seen as worthy of such a grand adventure. The thought of bringing two fated people together makes me giggle. Maybe I have watched too many romance K-dramas; the kind where they finally kiss in the last episode. And Turkish dramas, the kind with the tough mafia guy who falls hopelessly in love with the fierce doctor. Or Japanese BL dramas, where two coworkers spend half the series slowly realizing they are in love. Old Fashion Cupcake is the name, for those wondering.

I'm a sucker for historical Chinese dramas too.

But let's get back to the matter at hand: matchmaking.

It was fun until the mamas started describing their dream daughter-in-law.

"My son owns his own law firm, so she must be well educated, from a two-parent household, financially stable, below 27, and from this tribe."

To each their own.

But as someone who had her first child at 33, I know life doesn't always follow the plan.

The best person for their son may be a lot less put together than they imagined.

She may be humble and loyal. She may be an orphaned firstborn daughter who is financially stable but only now learning how to set boundaries with her siblings and coworkers. She may have a complicated family history. She may have spent years surviving rather than building the perfectly polished life that looks good on paper.

She may not tick every box.

She may, however, know how to love.

At the tender age of 34, 35 in December, I can confirm something I wish more of us understood earlier:

LOVE IS FREE.

It isn't earned through acts of service, accolades, family connections, financial status, the right tribe, or being born into the right circumstances.

When I got married, I was a newly unemployed 27-year-old with big dreams and a very uncertain career.

I didn't have everything figured out.

And yet, I was loved.

Love has exposed me to a lifestyle that would have taken me a lifetime to build on my own. I'm grateful every day that I get to raise my daughter myself. The fact that we have never been separated since she was placed on my chest while my womb was still open on that operating table is a privilege I don't take lightly.

I often find myself trying to be worthy of it all.

The community. The parties. The peace. The joy. The country club membership. The beautiful home. The life.

For a long time, I think I understood these things as something I needed to continually deserve.

As though love was an account I could overdraw.

As though if I stopped being useful, impressive, accommodating or grateful enough, I might somehow lose my place.

But I've been learning something different.

These things are given to me because I am loved.

Not because I have perfectly earned them.

Not because I have performed enough acts of service to justify receiving them.

Not because I have become so accomplished that I am finally worthy of being poured into.

They are choices.

Someone chooses to show up for me.

Someone chooses to pour into me and my family.

Someone chooses to make room for us.

And I can be grateful for that without turning gratitude into a debt.

I was reminded of this recently while helping organize a bridal shower.

During the planning stage, I mentioned it to a friend, and she offered to host it in her backyard pool area.

I remember being so impressed.

"You would open your home for me?"

What a privilege.

I eventually didn't take her up on the offer for other reasons, but I walked away from that conversation feeling grateful that I had access to such generosity.

Someone had simply said, You can use my space.

There was no elaborate transaction.

No invoice.

No tally of what I owed her in return.

Just generosity.

Just love expressed through consideration.

And I think about this often in my coaching sessions.

I've sat across from healing firstborn daughters who have spent years pouring themselves into other people.

They remember everyone's birthdays.

They organize the celebrations.

They show up when someone is sick.

They lend money.

They pay school fees.

They send money home.

They solve problems.

They make the phone calls.

They become the emergency contact.

They carry the emotional weight of the family.

And sometimes, underneath all that giving, there is a quieter hope:

Maybe if I keep showing up, they will finally see how much I love them.

Maybe if I provide enough, I will finally feel valued.

Maybe if I keep sacrificing, they will choose me.

This is where black tax becomes particularly complicated for firstborn daughters.

There is a very real cultural expectation placed on many of us to contribute to the families that raised us. Supporting your parents or siblings isn't inherently unhealthy. Generosity can be beautiful. Responsibility can be beautiful.

But sometimes giving stops being generosity and becomes an emotional negotiation.

I will give you this if it means I get to belong.

I will rescue you if it means you won't abandon me.

I will keep paying if it means you won't call me selfish.

I will keep showing up if it means you will finally acknowledge everything I've done.

And because firstborn daughters are often praised for being responsible, selfless and dependable, nobody notices when responsibility quietly turns into self-abandonment.

Sometimes we don't even notice it ourselves.

We just call it love.

We call it being a good daughter.

We call it family.

We call it doing what needs to be done.

Until one day we realize we have spent years purchasing consideration with our own exhaustion.

And there is another side to this conversation that we don't talk about enough:

family entitlement.

Sometimes the firstborn daughter isn't the only one who has attached conditions to belonging.

The family has too.

She may grow up hearing, directly or indirectly:

You're the eldest.

You should know better.

Your siblings are looking up to you.

You have to help your mother.

You have to take care of your brothers and sisters.

When you become successful, don't forget us.

None of these statements are necessarily malicious on their own.

But repeated often enough, they can create a very particular kind of identity.

The firstborn daughter learns that her place in the family comes with obligations.

She is not simply a daughter.

She is a resource.

A backup plan.

A second parent.

A future provider.

The one who is expected to have it together.

And when she begins to step outside that role, the family can experience her boundaries as betrayal.

Suddenly, the daughter who used to be praised for being responsible is called selfish.

The daughter who used to be generous is accused of forgetting where she came from.

The daughter who spent years helping becomes entitled the moment she says, "I can't."

And this is where things become especially complicated.

Because sometimes families don't just receive the firstborn daughter's sacrifice.

They begin to expect it.

They build their expectations around it.

Her generosity becomes the baseline.

What was once a gift becomes an obligation.

And when a gift becomes an obligation, it stops feeling like generosity.

It starts feeling like a tax.

This is why black tax can become so emotionally loaded for firstborn daughters.

The question isn't simply, "Can I afford to help?"

Sometimes the deeper question is:

"What will happen to my place in this family if I don't?"

Will they still see me as a good daughter?

Will they still respect me?

Will my siblings still love me?

Will my mother say I've changed?

Will they accuse me of becoming selfish?

Will they remind me of everything the family did for me?

And so she pays.

She sends the money.

She solves the problem.

She shows up.

Not necessarily because she freely wants to, but because the emotional price of saying no feels too high.

We sometimes teach children that belonging is conditional and then become surprised when they grow into adults who are terrified of disappointing us.

We tell the eldest daughter she is responsible for everyone and then wonder why she struggles to distinguish responsibility from guilt.

We praise her selflessness and then feel betrayed when she finally develops a self.

But love cannot mean:

"You belong here as long as you continue to perform this role for us."

That isn't unconditional belonging.

That is belonging with terms and conditions.

And perhaps part of healing is learning that your family is allowed to have needs, but you are not required to meet every need in order to remain worthy of being their daughter.

They can be disappointed.

They can disagree with your choices.

They can wish you gave more.

They can even misunderstand your boundaries.

And you can still belong to yourself.

Because adulthood requires us to ask a difficult question:

If I stopped providing, who would I be in this family?

Not because we want to abandon the people we love.

But because we need to know whether we are loved for who we are or primarily valued for what we provide.

There is a profound difference.

A healthy family can appreciate your contribution without making your contribution the price of admission.

They can be grateful when you help without treating your help as something they are automatically owed.

And perhaps that is one of the most difficult things for a firstborn daughter to learn:

You can love your family without becoming their provider, rescuer, or proof that they raised a successful child.

You can contribute without surrendering yourself.

You can be generous without being endlessly available.

You can say yes because you want to, not because you're afraid that saying no will cost you your place.

Because your place in the family should never have been something you had to purchase in the first place.

And maybe this is also why matchmaking has made me think so much about love.

We spend so much time trying to determine who is worthy of being loved.

The right age.

The right education.

The right family.

The right tribe.

The right finances.

The right background.

We create checklists as though love can be engineered.

But people are not resumes.

They are not family trees.

They are not bank accounts, degrees, tribes or age brackets.

And love is not a prize handed out to the person who checks the most boxes.

The woman who looks perfect on paper may not love your son well.

The woman who doesn't meet every requirement might.

The man with the impressive career might not know how to hold your daughter through the difficult seasons.

The man with very little might have a heart that makes room for her in ways you never anticipated.

Sometimes the person you love will arrive with a complicated history.

Sometimes they will be in the middle of becoming.

Sometimes they will still be learning boundaries.

Sometimes they will be healing.

Sometimes they will be completely different from the person you imagined.

And sometimes, they will love you anyway.

That, to me, is the great adventure.

Not finding someone perfect enough to deserve love.

But finding someone who freely chooses to love you—and learning to receive that love without spending the rest of your life trying to repay it.

Because love is not a debt.

It is a choice.

And perhaps the greatest matchmaking lesson of all is this:

Don't spend so much time looking for someone worthy of love that you forget that love was never something any of us had to earn in the first place.