Life Without Baby

filling the silence in the motherhood discussion

Happy 3rd Blogiversary

cakeTomorrow marks the third blogiversary of Life Without Baby! Three years ago, I sat on the patio of a little café in Wine Country, I ordered a dozen oysters and a glass of sparkling wine, and I wrote my first blog post. My, how time has flown.

For the sake of my health I am writing this post from the couch in my office and drinking tea rather than champagne, but it’s fun to reflect back on the past three years and see how far the blog has come, and how far I have come on my own journey.

I’m thinking of all the people who’ve come and gone from the blog over the years, those who’ve stayed, and those who’ve become good friends. I’m thinking about the 808 posts, 359, 577 visits, and 5,594 comments that the blog has accrued, and it makes me smile.

So, maybe it is cause to crack open the champagne after all. In fact, I’ve decided to throw a party to celebrate. And as with any good party, there’ll be presents.

If you’d like your very own copy of my book, I’m Taking My Eggs and Going Home: How One Woman Dared to Say No to Motherhood (or you’d like to give one to someone else) you download a free copy in whichever e-format you like from Smashwords. Just use the coupon code EJ59W.

In addition, several people have expressed an interest in the new Road Map to Healing program, but don’t have the resources to pay, so I’m also offering a Pay-What-You-Can donation option. Registration is normally $159, but this weekend you can sign up for whatever amount you can afford to pay (although, I’m asking that you consider a donation of at least $30.)

You can learn more about that program here, then if you’d like to enroll, please use this link, not the registration link on that page. 

Both these presents are only available for the blogiversary weekend only, so if you want to get yours, please do so before the end of Sunday.

Oh, and if you’d like to bring your own blogiversary present to the party, the best thing you could give me would be to write a glowing review for my book on Amazon.  It’s about the most valuable gift a writer could ask for.

So, thanks for all your support these past three years, and I do hope you’ll get yourself a present to celebrate.

It Got Me Thinking… About Beauty Tips

Girl ThinkingBy Kathleen Guthrie Woods 

I am so annoyed right now. Just got forwarded a link to “mommy blogger beauty tips,” and guess what? Every tip I looked at (before I stopped myself) applies to non-mommies too. (“Drink plenty of water”? Yeah, that’s original.)

What is the problem with calling this campaign “beauty tips for all women”? WAKE UP, you marketing “geniuses”! By targeting your products and advertisements to mommies only, you make me want to run to your competitors. I have more money and more time to spend on my beauty regime than a busy stay-at-home mother has, so you do the math.

Let me repeat: I, a childfree woman with a healthy salary and free time to follow morning and evening beauty routines, am boycotting you.

Kathleen Guthrie Woods is a Northern California–based freelance writer. She’s tired of being ignored by mommy-centric media. 

Your Stories

Young woman sitting on floor with a laptopSadly, I have no guest post this week. But you can change that!!

I’d love to share your writing here. Even if you think you’re not a writer, you have something to say, a story to tell, a point-of-view to share. And if you think you’re the only person to ever feel a certain way, I promise you, you’re not.

If you need some inspiration, here a few recent posts from Kathleen, Sparkling Rain, Maybe Lady Liz, Amelia Ricardo, and Robin.

If you’d like to share your story, please take a look at the writer’s guidelines for ideas and suggestions. If you’re concerned about privacy, you’re very welcome to writer under a pseudonym. And if you have a blog or website of your own to share, I’m more than happy to toot your horn.

I looking forward to hearing what you have to say.

Whiny Wednesday: The Public

Whiny_WednesdayYesterday I took myself down to my local library to do some nice, quiet research. It wasn’t to be. Instead I got a loudly hissed lesson on sentence structure from a homeschooling mom who’d decided to turn the public library into her own private classroom.

I hightailed it to a nearby café and found a quiet corner near a woman who was busily working on her laptop. All was fine until she made a phone call and began loudly exchanging her clients’ confidential financial information. I now know exactly how much money several members of my community have in their retirement accounts. Fortunately, none of them were people I knew personally.

It’s always amazing to me how people lose sight of the fact that public places are exactly that…public!

It’s Whiny Wednesday (hurray!) who or what’s rubbed you the wrong way this week?

“Perfect Red”: A Valentine’s Day Interview with Author Jennie Nash

Jennie Nash bookIt’s Valentine’s Day and what better day to talk about the topic of passion—not necessarily the romantic kind, but the “courage to follow your dreams” variety.

I had the opportunity to talk with my good friend, author Jennie Nash about her new novel Perfect Red and about her passion for encouraging dreamers and creative types. And by the way, she was instrumental in prodding me to follow my own passion, to write my book and create this site!

You can see the interview below and read Chapter 1 of Perfect Red here.

Jennie NashI have my own copy of Perfect Red, and if you’d like one too, Jennie has generously offered to give away three signed copies. All you have to do is email her and on Sunday February 17th she’ll select three winners at random.

You can reach her at: jennie.nash [at] gmail [dot] com.

Whiny Wednesday: Information Overload

Whiny_WednesdayI am on information overload. Between my email, my phone, the Internet, the news, the constant chatter, chatter, chatter of 21st century life, I feel as if my head is going to explode.

Oh, how I would love to unplug and sit in silence for a week. But the truth is, I don’t know if I could do it.

It’s Whiny Wednesday. What would love to unplug from for a week?

 

My Inner Cranky Old Lady

Furious womanIt’s Valentine’s Week (because no commercially-driven holiday ever lasts for just a day anymore) and my inner Cranky Old Lady and I are having words again. As you can probably tell just from my opening sentence, she is already getting the better of me.

My Cranky Old Lady doesn’t like Valentine’s Day. It’s too commercialized, too many expectations on people to impress and throw around good money on overpriced roses and dinners. It snubs people who don’t have a special Valentine in their lives, and it points a rude finger at their singledom. What’s more, it’s yet another holiday, originally intended for adult lovers, that’s been hijacked by kids and their cute “I love you Mommy” Valentine’s cards. Nope, my inner Cranky Old Lady abhors Valentine’s Day.

But I kinda like it. Oh, yes, it’s all those things my Cranky Old Lady says it is, but I don’t want to hate it. My Cranky Old Lady has taken over too many holidays from me over the past years and I’m ready to take them back.

In her defense, I know she did me a favor by keeping me away from the Hallmark holidays and protecting my tender interior. She talked me out of Halloween, Christmas, even July 4th, to keep me from the hurt I was feeling about not having children for those holidays. She did the right thing by me, and I appreciate that, but I’m ready to come out and play again.

Part of the silver lining of not having children is that I’m not bound to anyone else’s expectations of how holidays should be celebrated. If I want to celebrate Valentine’s Day, I can. If I don’t want to, I don’t have to. And this year I choose to lock up my Cranky Old Lady and embrace the silliness and blatant commercialism of the day. Who knows, I might even break my Crank Old Lady rule and wear something red!

Do you have an inner Cranky Old Lady? When do you let her out and when do you put up a fight?

 

Follow Friday Comes to the Blog World

hashtags1If you’re a Twitter user, you’ll probably know about Follow Friday. Follow Friday is a chance to give a shout out to tweeps you follow and spread the word about what others are doing.

I always seem to forget about Follow Friday, so this week I thought I’d bring it to the blog and share the happenings of some of my fellow bloggies.

On The Road Less Travelled, loribeth hits on a topic I’ve been trying to articulate lately—the obsession we have with the life we didn’t get to live and how easily that story can come to define us.

Jody Day at Gateway Women is taking that same topic and shaking it up with her upcoming book, “Rocking the Life Unexpected: 12-Weeks to Your Plan for a Meaningful & Fulfilling Life without Children.” She’s crowd funding to get the book published, so if you’d like to help her, you can find out more here.

Over at Silent Sorority, Pamela is celebrating her six-year Blogaversary and reminiscing about the Bad Old Days when the blogosphere was all but silent on the topic of living childfree after infertility.

La Belette Rouge has a word or two to say, most eloquently, on the topic of bitterness.

And at No Kidding in NZ, Mali makes a case that not having kids keeps you young.

Please check out these blogs, if you haven’t already. And in case you are a Twitterer, you can find Life Without Baby tweeting and twittering at @lifewithoutbaby.

Asking for the Help You Really Need

holding handsLast week I wrote about learning to ask for help and I’ve been thinking a lot about that topic since. Why is it so difficult for so many of us to ask for help?

Mali made a great point in her comment:

“I used to think asking for help was a weakness. Now I realize that asking for help is often the hardest thing, and requires real strength and honesty and courage.”

It does take a lot of courage to ask for help, especially from people we care about or who know us as strong, independent women. I also think that often we know we need help, we just have no idea what we need and who to ask for it.

When I need help, I’m fortunate enough to have some true friends and understanding family members I can turn to. My friend C is a wizard at research. If I need informational support, I go to her. My friend K is an ace networker, so if I need to find someone who’s shared my experience, she would know someone who knows someone. If I need someone to be pragmatic, I call M. If I need someone to call me out on my BS, I plan lunch with SC. If I need a friend who’ll say nothing, but just give me a hug, J or C will do that, and if I need someone to commiserate on the injustices of life, SR is my go-to girl.

Mr. Fab is a fixer. If I tell him a problem, he’ll instantly go to work on a solution. But sometimes it’s not what I need. Sometimes I just want to talk and know that someone has heard me. Sometimes I just want someone to listen and say. “Aw, that sucks!”

For several years I would ask him for help and then get frustrated when he didn’t offer the kind of help I really wanted. Finally, I figured out that I needed to be specific. “I don’t need you to fix this; I just need to talk about it,” I told him. Even as I saw him register my request, I could sense that not trying to fix my problem went against his instinct. But when he saw that simply listening helped me to talk my way to my own solution, we both ended up getting what we needed.

Now, when I need to ask for someone’s help, I also try to be specific about exactly the kind of help I need, whether that’s feedback, a solution, or just someone to hand me Kleenex while I pour my heart out.

What have you learned about asking for help?

Finding support and learning to ask for help are just two of the topics covered in the new Road Map to Healing course. I’m sharing a little love right now and offering this course at a special “new program” rate until Valentine’s Day. If you’re looking for help in coming-to-terms with a “life without baby,” please consider joining me.

Where Do You Turn for Help?

Last week I wrote about learning to ask for help and several of you commented that you’d had the good sense to seek professional help when you needed it.

thinkingOne of the things I’m aiming to do on this site is to provide information about resources and support, and this is where I need your help.

On the Learn page you’ll see a section call Therapist Directory. You’ll also see a big blank space and “Coming Soon!” I need your help filling in those blanks.

Have you worked with a therapist or counselor who really understood the special issues of dealing with unplanned childlessness or infertility?

Do you know of support groups in your area that help women come-to-terms with being unable to have children?

Do you have a resource for grief support?

If you have kind of resource that might benefit others, please share it here. You can add it to the comments on this post, or if you’d prefer, you can contact me privately through the Contact page.

When you’re facing a life without children, sometimes it’s impossible to know where to turn. We can all help one another by sharing whatever resources we find.