Life Without Baby

filling the silence in the motherhood discussion

Archives for April 2010

Useful Advice

My friend Elizabeth passed along a poem to me from Garrison Keillor’s website. It’s called Useful Advice, by Catherine Tufariello, and begins:

You’re 37? Don’t you think that maybe
It’s time you settled down and had a baby?

I laughed at the first line, but quickly stopped laughing as I kept reading. Instead, I began checking off all the lines that I’d heard, maybe even writing a few extra lines for her. I know nothing about this poet, but I am certain, from reading this, that she heard every single one of these lines on her journey. You can read Useful Advice here.

Also, please take a second to visit Elizabeth’s blog, A moon, worn as if it had been a shell. Elizabeth writes about her life with baby, as  the mother of three children, including her daughter, Sophie, who is severely disabled. Elizabeth is a tireless advocate for children with special needs and offers a frank and often surprising perspective on the challenges as well as the rewards of raising a child with disabilities.

The Decision

I was not one of those women who never wanted children–quite the opposite. For as long as I can remember I had a vision of a family that included children—four to begin with, but as time went on I adjusted that number based on various opinions on population growth, financial considerations, and the practical implications of trying to lug around four kids. Regardless, a family with children was always in the picture of my future.

My primary reason for not having children back then was that I just didn’t meet anyone I really wanted to go through that with. Even in my 20’s I think I had the foresight to look at the long-term consequences of breeding with each prospective partner and decide that the cons would eventually outweigh the pros. So I was in my mid-30s before I finally met someone I knew would be a reliable, committed, and fun father. Not long after that is when I discovered I couldn’t have children of my own without some serious medical intervention—something I wasn’t prepared to do.

So, my decision to not have children was a long time coming. It came out of weighing the pros and cons of continuing what had become a mad quest for children, biological or adopted, and finally deciding that most important thing for me was a loving relationship with my husband, one built from mutual respect for one another’s needs and wants, and realizing that a family of two was all we really needed. Once the decision was made, we were both happy with it.

But now, comes another decision: At 40, I am still within the window of conceiving naturally, and even though it would be virtually impossible because of my condition, I’m at an age where hormones do funny things. What if I got pregnant now? It’s an odd situation to be in, having hoped for so long for a baby, but I’ve made a decision that not having children would be the best thing for us now. So, my dilemma is this: after dealing with infertility for so long and finally being told I will never have children, do I now need to start using birth control again to make sure it doesn’t happen? The irony is too ridiculous, so for now, I’m doing something I never did in my younger years; I’m taking my chances that it could never happen to me.

The Fairy Tale Ending

Continuing our topic of stereotypes, I came across this Salon article by Tracy Clark-Flory, about the pressure on single women to marry and settle down. She says:

… a new study has found that the “spinster” stigma is still alive and thriving — and it’s worst for women in their mid-20s to mid-30s. After reaching the age of 25, LiveScience explains, women begin to feel “scrutinized by friends, family members and others” — including themselves, of course — “for their singlehood.”

Ah yes, the old “When are you going to settle down?” question. Stick around all you 20- to 30- year olds, because not far behind that one is, “When are you going to have kids?” As Clark-Flory goes on to point out:

Decades later, that warning [that being too picky will lead to a life of spinsterhood] has been passed along fully intact and internalized even by supposedly enlightened young feminists like myself. It just goes to show how cunning and insidious that prince charming, fairy-tale ending is.

And the same goes for having children. While many women do think it through, weigh the pros and cons, and make the decision to have or to not have children, many more feel the pressure from society, family, peers, and just follow along with what’s expected of them, and some of them discover that the fairytale isn’t really what they wanted after all.

Meet the GINK

Meet Lisa Hymas. She’s the senior editor at Grist, the online environmental salon, and a self-proclaimed GINK: green inclinations, no kids. Hymas makes a strong case for child-free living, including reducing the impact of over-population on the environment. But even though her manifesto is environmentally-driven, she makes a strong statement about how we childless and child-free women often side-step the conversation about kids. Hymas says:

Parents talk all the time about the delights and challenges of raising kids, to other parents and to all the rest of us, and I don’t begrudge them that. We childfree people rarely discuss in public the upsides and downsides of life without kids—and that’s what needs to change.

I couldn’t agree more. For too long, being childless has been something that shouldn’t be discussed, something we should be embarrassed about, or something that isn’t a topic for polite conversation. We’re sending a message to young women that living child-free isn’t an acceptable option. And we all know that it is.

You can read Lisa Hymas’ GINK manifesto here. Tell us what you think.

Whiny Wednesday

Last week a Tennessee woman pinned a note to her 7-year old adopted son and put him alone on a plane back to Russia.

People, a child is not a purchase. You cannot get a refund on your child, biological or adopted, just because he didn’t turn out quite as you’d hoped. I understand how the desire for motherhood can taint a person’s view until she can see only what she wants to see when the chance of having a child is presented to her. But this is a human life we’re talking about here. If you choose to be a mother, you choose to be a mother FOR LIFE, not just until it gets too hard.

That’s my gripe. What’s yours?

The Myth of the Crazy Cat Lady

I like to tease my nieces and nephews by telling them that if they’re not nice to me, I’m going to leave my (u-hum) millions to a home for cats. But how far from reality is the stereotype of the childless woman filling her home with feline companions? Do we women really need some small helpless creature to nurture in order to satisfy our natural instincts? I’ve been told by more than one person that instead of having children I should just get a dog instead, and during my time cruising the infertility websites, I came across countless references to fur-babies, the pets we childless women supposedly use to substitute for our offspring.

I have a cat. There, I admit it, but I have a cat because I love cats and I never had a cat growing up, so as soon I had a stable place of my own, I adopted a kitten and I’ve always had one since. Do I treat my cat as a substitute for a child? Of course not; I would never let a child get away with the things my cat does. Carve up my new couch? Climb up on the table during dinner? Throw up on the carpet without making some effort to get to the bathroom? All these actions from a child would deserve some kind of response, ranging from a stiff talking to, to being grounded for a week. But punishing a cat is cruel and pointless. She’s a cat; she’d put back her ears, give me a dirty look, then just go and do it again. But do I talk to her? Do I hold her like a baby? Do I blow raspberries on her stomach? Well, yes, but that doesn’t mean she’s a substitute for a child.

So, do we need to fulfill some in-built need to nurture? Can the need be satisfied with a relationship with an animal? Does nurturing a career or our creativity or a dream suffice? What do you think? Let us know.

Top 10 Best Things About Child-free Holidays

10. Making up fun new traditions all of your own

9. Enjoying uninterrupted adult conversation over dinner

8. Being able to wriggle out of family obligations without Grandma pouring on the guilt about never seeing her grandkids

7. Being able to serve sugary foods without risk of your guests having sugar-induced tantrums

6. Not having to battle your conscience about loving versus spoiling when shopping for gifts

5. Not feeling obligated to call every toy store within a 50 mile radius to find the last available hot item du jour

4. Not having to wipe a layer of dust off said item du jour two weeks after the event

3. Not having your favorite holidays become all about the kids

2. Choosing not to celebrate at all

1. Having the option of spending the holidays with someone else’s kids, feeding them sugar, spoiling them rotten, riling them into Tasmanian Devils, and then going home to your nice peaceful house.