By Kathleen Guthrie Woods
I was telling a good friend about a difficult and concerning work-related problem I was having, once again airing my righteous grievances, expressing my frustration at not being able to resolve the issue, bemoaning the fact that my life seemed to be such a never-ending struggle.
“Is this going to define you?” she asked.
What? She’d stopped me cold.
“Is This Going To Define You?” She reached for my hand and took a deep breath.
“Look,” she said, “what you’ve gone through—are going through—is real. And it’s awful and ugly and unfair and everything you’ve said. But. You have a choice. You can wallow in being the victim of all this mess, or you can choose to move forward, in whatever way you can. You can choose what will define you.”
Over the next several days I really thought about what my wise friend had said. She was right. I couldn’t change the choices and behaviors of the other people in this scenario with me, but I did have the power to choose how I would react and who I would become.
Then I got to thinking about my status as a childless woman and how I might apply this advice there. I’m not saying take a stiff-upper-lip approach, because I believe all the stages of grieving are necessary and serve purposes. But at some point, if I want to reach a place of acceptance and peace, I will need to let go and move on. I can choose to be “bitter childless woman” or I can choose to be “strong woman who made the most out of what she got.”
Other people will have their own definitions of me, and that’s their business. The only definition that truly matters, I’ve come to believe, is my own.
Kathleen Guthrie Woods is telling the story about her journey in The Mother of All Dilemmas. As she shares her quest to become a single mother (and ultimately embraces a life without children), she explores why society still appears to base a woman’s worth on how many children she has. Watch for updates on the book’s release here at LifeWithoutBaby.com.
It’s been 8 years since we were informed that there would be no babies. I mourned like I was catatonic. Eventually I decided to create a life out of what was left of me, left of this life that was accessible to me. I volunteer, foster rescued dogs, babysit my niece and nephew weekly (which still comes with its own pain), and I travel. By this years’ end I will have taken 4 international trips, that’s just this year. I have money to spend, time to travel. My body is inundated daily with Auto-immune diseases and that changes things and makes things difficult. But all the money, travel and physical daily suffering pale in comparison to the hole in my soul left from the loss of our babies. I feel like half of my soul died, and I’m now living on half a soul. Im making the best of this life that I have left to me. But moving past infertility? That seems beyond me. It seems impossible. Maybe it will take more time? It’s hard to comprehend what I could do to let go of that heavy dark hole in my soul. And if I’d want to.
I love that! I love this whole entry: [I can choose to be “bitter childless woman” or I can choose to be “strong woman who made the most out of what she got.”
Other people will have their own definitions of me, and that’s their business. The only definition that truly matters, I’ve come to believe, is my own.]
will take this advise and make the most of what life has thrown my way .. some things i can never change no matter how hard i try, not sure if i will ever be a mother .. but what i do know is that i can be the best ME and not let it define me.
“Keep it light, and keep it moving”
My own definition..love it
Enjoyed this post. Thought-provoking as always. ‘The only definition that truly matters is our own’ – yes.
Reading this after a very challenging week at work, which was aggravated by a handful of colleagues. I left Friday with feelings of bitterness and frustration. Thank you for giving me a different perspective to approach these challenges. I realize I am fortunate to have the option to change my workplace environment and plan to do so within the year. This doesn’t define who I am. While we don’t have control over many things that happen in our life, we control our reactions and responses to events.
I received news I would not have children very close to receiving news I also have a chronic illness and early menopause. I have no idea what defines me anymore. Everything I ever wanted is now gone. Am I going to let my childlessness define me? I don’t know. Am I going to let my early meno define me? I don’t know. Am I going to let my illness define me? I don’t know. Do I have a future at all? I don’t know. Guess I’ll find out.
Yes! I remember thinking, after the stillbirth of my daughter, that it would be easy to let this loss destroy me. Or — I could try to use what I had learned to build a better life for myself and maybe help some others along the way. Was that what I wanted her brief existence to mean? — that it destroyed me, that it made my life hell? I don’t think she would have wanted that. I would want her to be proud to have me as her mother — so I try to live up to that image. <3