By Lisa Manterfield
Do you remember the game Chutes and Ladders? In the UK we called it “Snakes and Ladders” and I loved it. I had a nursery rhyme version with Jack and Jill happily climbing the hill on one ladder, and then tumbling down at the next snake (or chute). Humpty Dumpty, Rock-a-Bye-Baby, Little Bo Peep and her poor lost sheep were all there with their assorted joys and disasters.
In case any one is reading and has no clue what I’m talking abut, Chutes and Ladders is a board game. There are 100 squares on the board and you roll a dice and move along, trying to be the first person to reach 100. If you land on a ladder you get to follow the ladder up and jump ahead on the game. If, however, you land on a chute (or snake) you slide back down the board to a lower number. There’s no strategy involved in the game at all, and it’s pure luck as to whether you joyfully climb the ladder or careen back down a chute.
It struck me that life is a lot like chutes and ladders, especially when you’re playing the “coming-to-terms with infertility” game.
Case in point: A while ago, Mr. Fab and I had a great weekend. It was the first one in a while that we’d spent together just relaxing and enjoying one another’s company. We slept late, took a long walk, planned a vacation, and took a long afternoon nap. It’s on weekends like these that I realize all the positive things that have come out of us not having children.
But on Saturday night we had dinner with some friends at their home. They and the other friends who were invited have adult children, so the evening was spent talking about all kinds of other things not relating to the perils of parenthood. But in their hallway were photos of their children as toddlers, sitting in the garden, laughing those infectious toddler laughs, and for a few minutes I found myself just staring at the pictures and thinking about all that I’ve missed with not having children. My happiness hopped on a chute and slid back down a few squares.
I think that my life is always going to be this way, that I’ll keep making progress and moving gradually towards that place of being 100 percent at peace with being childfree, but there are always going to be chutes thrown in my way: the cousin’s pregnancy announcement, the friends celebrating milestones with their children, those moments when I rethink the whole thing and wonder, “What if we got back on the train? What if that risky and expensive treatment worked? What if we adopted?”
But, for every chute that comes along, there’s a ladder that will take me back up. So, the trick to maintaining sanity and finding peace is to keep living for the ladders.
This is so true!! My hubby and I are on a two week motorcycle vacation…a definite positive to not having children. We’re staying at a friend’s house for the first night (im typing this from their guest bedroom)…and I just got done looking at all their hallway photos as well and listening to our friends gush over their three beautiful grandchildren. A slide down the chute!!! As time has gone on though…there are more ups then down which I am so thankful for.
Kelly, my husband and I also have been on many fantastic motorcycle vacations all over the world and probably would not have done so if we had children. Most of the time we are really settled in our lifestyle, spend much time giving back and helping both our family and society which I am grateful to be able to do. Like so many on this forum though I still have those slides down the chute periodically and then work on climbing back up that ladder. Thank God I’m an optimist by nature. Even just listening to music helps and also appreciating that even those friends and family members with children and grandchildren have their own chutes and ladders to negotiate in their lives.
Oops sorry Kellie, I spelled your name incorrectly,
Such a good analogy. The ” triggers” are all around us. The constant documenting of Hollywood’s baby bumps, cover story in People’s magazine of Batchlorettes’ new-found happiness in baby land, along with life’s announcements of
family/ friend kids’ lives. Amazing how a person can go from happy to unbelievably sad in seconds, just by a comment or picture, sending us tumbling down a chute.
I agree, What a wonderful anaology .. I sometimes think to myself and express to my husband that I would be so much more happier if i could move to an isolated island and just not deal with any social media and enjoy (or at least try to enjoy my childfree-not-by-choice life .. there is always someone or something that ruins the zen and throws me down a chute .. same think with trying to concieve month after month I hate a chute/snake and fall back .. i am certainly trying to keep my head up and looking forward to those ladders .. one day hopefully it’ll all lead us to fulfillment (no matter what the end result may be)
So very timely. I was feeling like I was really in a pretty good place last Wednesday, when I was at my doc’s for my annual checkup, but by this weekend the clouds had descended thanks to a couple of triggers. But by now I know from experience that the “ladders” will come along, probably sooner than later – and in my case, it seems a “ladder” usually takes the shape of an opportunity to actively show care for someone else. So now I know to keep my eyes open for it!
Keep living for the ladders. Well said.
Most of the time I feel that I am doing alright. I am 48 now and have a young friend who is expecting. Her husband is an international student, so their financial situation is not good, they don’t have family here, and they were both incredibly helpful to me when my husband was severely ill (51 day hospitalization, mostly ICU). So… I am actually lending them my house to them for a baby shower. (I will let you know how that works out.) Yesterday I had a long conversation with another friend whose sister is having issues with her daughter. They are well off. The daughter doesn’t work and may be flunking out of university. The parents insist they want her to get a degree, but she just does not care about school. My friend was telling me her sister has distanced herself from talking to her daughter about her future because she gets angry and it affects her blood pressure… At those points, when I get to sleep in and read books, or take quiet walks, I feel pretty much ok that I don’t have kids. I am not a very kid oriented person. They are cute and all, but I don’t want to be around them all the time. I am in education and have always liked working with young adults, even teenagers. Honestly, what affects me most these days is some anxiety about the future. I do things with my parents and my aunt all the time. I call them every evening and plan outings with them. Recently a friend who is widowed (no kids) fell and broke her back. She was in the yard four hours before she could crawl inside her house and get help. She has someone staying with her, but it doesn’t seem that the care is that good.
Talking about ups and downs…Mother’s day and “it is all about them.”
Thanks Lisa and everyone for sharing – a really good analogy and a reminder that there are ladders back up again, for some of us they will never lead to what our heart most desires, I am gradually changing my “desire” – not easy when I have spent 20 years TTC and prior to that daydreaming about starting to TTC! I am 49, I will never climb the motherhood ladder and its truly hard to get my head around that fact. I just don’t think I will ever be at peace with it – I watched the movie “passengers” recently, its basically a love story. I won’t say anything else because I hate knowing anything about a movie beforehand! All I can say is – I think I could be truly happy if I were isolated from society and the constant knife to the chest. This is not to say that I don’t embrace more what I have since stopping TTC, it just still hurts – every day. I am attempting to retrain every “positive thought about the wonderment of motherhood” – and turn it to the real (not negative as such) but – it is tiring, full or worry, what if they are ill, bullied, inured, fall in with the wrong crowd …….. That’s what I am thinking of right now – it helps me to not slide quite so far down the snake (UK!), having just learned today of another colleague’s imminent maternity leave. Also, I’m thinking about the “unreal” adverts on TV – smiling babies, sleeping, happy and content. They do not show the screaming, end of your tether side – the photos on the “wall” and in the hall, they are moments yes (one’s we will not have) but its not how it is most of the time……….small consolation but it helps me through my slide down today’s ladder!