
You may have noticed a new ribbon in the sidebar of the site today. It’s the new Childless-Not-by-Choice Awareness ribbon, and I am proud to share it.
The ribbon is the brainchild of Brandi from Not So Mommy. Her goal in creating the ribbon is to raise awareness about our community and to reduce the stigma surrounding childlessness. You can read more about her mission in her post today, and about how she came to choose olive green for the ribbon.
As I told Brandi, as long as the childless-not-by-choice community remains in the shadows, we cannot begin to have conversations around the issues we face. Awareness is an important first step towards education, acceptance, and healing.
But how do we create awareness when we’re in the midst of our own grieving?
If you’ve been reading this blog or my books, you’ll know I’m a big proponent of taking care of yourself first and working through your own grief before venturing into the tricky territory of trying to educate others. But Brandi and I, and many others, are now at a point where we can talk about our childlessness and losses without having a meltdown. If you’re at, or getting to, that stage, how might you start to raise awareness?
Despite writing openly about infertility for the past decade, I’m actually quite a private person, definitely an introvert. It’s not in my nature to wear pins or t-shirts that encourage questions, or to march for awareness. My personal awareness campaign happens one person at a time. Now I’m past my grieving stage, I can:
- Talk to people about the losses of childlessness
- Educate them about what it really takes to “just” do IVF or “just” adopt
- Encourage empathy and understanding to help others who are grieving
- Keep writing about my experience and sharing it with the world.
What about you? How can you contribute to the awareness of our community in a way that feels right for you? I’d love to hear your ideas.
As always, thank you for writing a thought-provoking blog, Lisa. I appreciate your support of the ribbon and was honored to share your quote in my blog. And I am so humbled that you have placed the olive green ribbon on Life Without Baby. Our tribe is definitely growing, and it is so exciting to see our voices being heard!
It is an interesting idea. I guess Re reading another blog about never being over it is true. I guess it’s easy, to say that people don’t get it, and rail on them for being insensitive , but I never thought about what am I doing to bring awareness to this topic, to others. Hmmmm! Brandi I have read your blog before and it was really helpful with buying children’s toys what ‘s hot etc. And the whole idea of being an Aunt which I am many times over, and relishing that time with my nieces and nephews. Thanks for giving me something to think about and how I can contribute. I ampast the intense grief, but watching a show last night about if a women and her husband want to have kids and how to proceed with her frozen eggs, which made me think of Lisa and her book. It was upsetting not then but later on. But the amount of time I am sad is much less than before. Thanks for putting together these great tribes and encouraging taking care of and responsibility of me. Xo
Thank you for reading Lisa’s blog and my childless not by choice blog, as well. (I’ve never written about children’s toys, though…)
I am glad that you are moving past the intense grief and that your sadness over being childless lasts for shorter periods of time.
I think you are correct in saying “it’s easy to say that people don’t get it, . . . but I never thought about what I’m doing to bring awareness to this topic.” I believe that as those of us who have moved past our deep grief continue to speak up, we will help educate others. Hopefully, that will cause those outside our tribe to be a bit more considerate and perhaps, those currently going through grief won’t suffer as many insensitive comments…