Life Without Baby

filling the silence in the motherhood discussion

And the Survey Says…

checkFirstly, an enormous “Thank you” to the 127 of you who took the time to complete the recent LWB survey. I’m truly blown away by the response.

I’m still sifting through the data and analyzing what it all means, and of course, there are questions I wish I’d asked, but for now I wanted to share a few insights:

  • Over half of you are in your 30s and another third in your 40s. The over 60s and the under 20s aren’t hanging around with us (or aren’t filling surveys.)
  • Many of you (60%) said you were either trying to come to terms or at the stage of accepting and making peace. More than 20% of you are still trying/hopeful for having children.
  • Over 90% of you said you’d used the blog and found it useful, so hurray for that, especially as no one said they’d used it and didn’t find it useful. J What surprised me was that for all the other areas of the site, more than half of you said you hadn’t used it but were interested. So what are you waiting for? Snoop around.
  • The most popular type of post on the blog was “Personal Journey Stories,” with 84.5% saying they enjoy these posts, with my personal experience stories and guest posts following closely behind. What this tells me is that we want to hear other people’s stories, so if you’ve been dancing around the idea of submitting a guest post, do it! We want to hear.
  • The most popular topics were: “Dealing with friends and family” (72.6%), with “What’s Next in Life?”, “Ups and down of childfree living”, and “Finding Fulfillment” all following close behind.
  • When it comes to resources, printed books, ebooks, and a regular newsletter are of most interest to you. This is good news for me, as all these things are either in the works or on my to-do list.
  • An overwhelming number of you said you wouldn’t use a support group, either via phone or in person, or attend an in-person workshop. So, what I’m hearing is that you love the community and knowing you’re not alone, but you don’t want to come out in public and talk about this topic. I’m with you on that.
  • Almost half of you expressed an interest in programs and course online, so I’ll be taking a look at those again soon. Stay tuned.
  • Perhaps the biggest surprise was how many of you (over 40%) said you’d like to support the site through the purchase of LWB merchandise. If you were one of those people, I’d love to hear more about what that means? Would you use a discreet LWB coffee mug or are you looking for t-shirt that says “Childfree and loving it!” (or something in between)?

As I let all this valuable information percolate, I’ll be thinking about what changes I need to make to the site and what I need to do more of. A quick to do list so might look like:

  • Sharing more of my own story and encouraging you to do the same.
  • Getting the ebooks I’ve been noodling out of my head and onto the page
  • Getting the resource page pulled together to include other books you might find useful.
  • Writing more posts addressing the topics that are of most interest to you.

If you have other ideas or suggestions, I’m always open, so please leave them in the comments below.

And finally, many of you added wonderful and generous comments at the end of the survey. I’d like to thank you for those and I let you know that I have printed them all out and stuck them above my desk for those days when I wonder why I keep talking about this topic.

It Got Me Thinking…About When Life Gets Funny

Girl ThinkingBy Kathleen Guthrie Woods 

Earlier this week I received a lovely invitation to an “Egg Meets Sperm Networking Mixer.”

What the fruitcake?!

Perhaps it came to my mailbox because someone (or some program) noticed that I write a lot about “babies” and “being childfree” and determined this would be the perfect event for me. Upon closer inspection, I discovered that the event was being hosted by one of the many LGBT organizations I support, and it was intended for gay couples who are exploring their options in adoption, surrogacy, and IVF.

But before I could think through any of this, I reacted by throwing back my head and laughing out loud at the absurdity of it all. Oh, my crazy, mixed-up, outrageously funny life!

As the days passed, I found myself still chuckling as I replayed this in my head, and it dawned on me how far I have come in the past three years. If I had received this invitation earlier in my journey, it might have brought on tears, a grand pity party, or a fit of anger at the unintentional cruelties that served to remind me of my losses and lacks.

The primary reason I can sit here today and laugh about it is because I have been able to heal. And the primary reason I have been able to heal is because I’ve been allowed to grieve, share, commiserate, and celebrate with the amazing community of compassionate women I’ve encountered through LifeWithoutBaby.

If you’ve been a part of LWB for a while, thank you for being a blessing in my journey. I am so grateful to you for your openness and support. If you are new to LWB, stick with it. I know today may be a difficult day for you—I’ve been there. I also know that better days are ahead. You will heal, you will move forward, and you will laugh again.

Kathleen Guthrie Woods is a Northern California–based freelance writer. She is mostly at peace with being childfree.

Whiny Wednesday: All the News That’s Fit to Print?

Whiny_WednesdayStanding in line at the grocery store last week, I spotted the rack of gossip magazines.

There were four magazines on offer, and the headline of every single one was celebrity baby news.

Honestly, I think I’d rather have toe nail fungus updates.

It’s Whiny Wednesday; what’s under your skin (or toe nail) today?

Finally, Some Truth About Celebrity Infertility

hollywoodThere’s been a lot of hoopla lately about celebrities coming out and “admitting” to their struggles with infertility. While I applaud their courage for speaking up, I can’t fail to notice that these confessions always seem to come after the arrival of the miracle baby or the successful adoption. It perpetuates the myth that “it will happen if you only keep trying.”

So, what a breath of fresh air it was to learn that actress Aisha Tyler had opened up on “The Talk” about her struggle with infertility and her decision to “stop putting [herself] through the torture of the hormone injections.”

Instead of sugarcoating her story and giving the kind of canned upbeat response we’re used to hearing, she told some hard truths:

“A lot of women are going through [infertility], and I feel like sometimes they are made to feel badly or ashamed—like ‘Oh, you’re not being hopeful, or you’re not being positive,” she said, in an interview for Glamour. “I just wanted women that were also in this stage to feel like they’re not alone and they’re not the only ones going through this. But also know that if you feel like, ‘Maybe this isn’t for me,’ then that’s an OK choice to make too. And you’re not a bad woman if you don’t want to put your body through this or wreck your finances because of it.”

I think this is the very first time I’ve heard this said on such a public forum, so kudos to Aisha for her courage to speak up. (And Aisha, if you’re reading this, we’d love it if you’d write a guest post. Just saying.)

Of course, I have to add that Aisha’s revelation wasn’t known to the show’s hosts beforehand and they were completely caught off guard. “I swear I thought Aisha was going to say she was pregnant,” said host Sheryl Underwood.

It seems we still have a long way to go to change attitudes about infertility, but this conversation feels like a step in the right direction.

Talking About Not Having Children

No talking.previewAs all of you know, it takes an awful lot of courage to talk about not having children. I know you’ve all been met with looks of confusion, dealt with inaccurate assumptions and unhelpful suggestions, and watched as people have broken eye contact to look almost anywhere else than at the “woman who doesn’t have children.” And those of you who’ve dealt with infertility know that most people can’t even bring themselves to say the word, let alone have an open conversation about it.

Nobody really wants to talk about this topic, least of all us. But a group of courageous women and men are about to do that in a very public forum—a New York City theater—in The Cycle: Living a Taboo. 

The aim of this live forum is to pull back the curtain on a taboo topic that affects millions of men and women, and to change the conversation about the realities of infertility, reproductive medicine, and living a life without children.

The Cycle: Living a Taboo forum will take place on September 27 at 8:00 pm at the Tribeca Performing Arts Center in New York City. You can get all the details and tickets to attend in person at the event website. If you’d like to go, but don’t want to go alone, please think about using the community pages to find a friend to go with.

The wonderful Pamela Mahoney Tsigdinos is one of the women behind this event and, if you can’t make it in person, you can add your voice virtually at her site, Silent Sorority.

We’ll also be hosting our own virtual forum on the community pages. Please jump in and make it your own forum for saying what goes unsaid.

If you have a blog, Facebook, or Twitter, please consider stepping out and spreading the word.

It’s time we had a different conversation about infertility and living without children, and we are the ones to change it.

It Got Me Thinking…About Why I Can’t Grieve

During August, as I enjoy some travel time, I’m sharing some of my favorite and your favorite posts from the past year. I’ll look forward to seeing you again in September. ~Lisa  

Today’s post was originally run on 10/9/12

 

Girl ThinkingBy Kathleen Guthrie Woods

It’s impossible to put on mascara when you can’t stop crying.

I learned this little truism the day after we put our sweet 14-year-old dog to sleep. I’d spent the day intermittently sobbing and whimpering—set off by her empty bowl, her favorite spot in my office, now vacant, and tiny reminders of my everyday companion. I had pushed off most work-related tasks, but still had to pull myself together for an evening event I needed to attend. With a lot of deep breathing, as well as promises to myself that I could continue crying my eyes out later, I managed to make myself presentable.

I’m not new to devastating losses. Almost daily, I still think of the best friend who died tragically when she was just 20, my beloved grandmother and “hot date” for movies who passed in 1993, and my father-in-law who left us 914 days ago. But the outpouring of emotions I experienced after losing Scout was a new breed of grief. Guilt, gratitude, longing, regret, relief, loneliness, heartache. At times it consumed me, as, I think, it should. And that got me thinking….

As a woman who is childfree by circumstances, I have never fully grieved the loss of my dream of motherhood. For 25 years or so, I’ve been in this crazy dance between longing and hoping, praying and wishing, denial, regret, jealousy, despair, having faith and losing faith. I used to beg God for a neon sign—seriously—a message so clear that said either “You will have children, so stick it out!” or “You aren’t going to have children. Get on with your life!” And the years went by. And the years went by. And here I am. I am 46 years old, childfree by circumstance (don’t you dare accuse me of making a “choice”), and I describe myself as “mostly at peace” with my status. But there are days when I still think “What if….”

I won’t trivialize the pain of our sisters who are childfree by infertility. I’ve held too many friends and sobbed with them over miscarriages, failed IVF treatments, and the loss of their dreams, and I know too well that their paths are filled with heartbreak. But because LWB is a place where we can safely share our deepest hurts, please allow me to say that there are times when I’ve envied their ability to grieve. My friends had defining moments when they could let it all out, when they could ask for support, when support was offered even when it was not asked for. Think of my journey like the quiet drip-drip of a faucet; it’s imperceptible, so no one calls in the plumber, but over time it causes the same amount of catastrophic damage as a flood. I have never had a moment of finality, never experienced that intense period of grief, and on some very deep and possibly damaged level, I wish I could.

Selfish? Perhaps. But hear me out. I know that grieving is necessary. The sobbing period winds down, you put your experiences into perspective, and then you move on. For I so would like to be able to move on. I want to embrace this path I’ve been given and find new purpose in my life. I’d like to feel that the wanderings of my childbearing years were not just wasted time. And I fear that, if I skip past the crucial grieving phase, I’ll never get to the phase of accepting and, ultimately, to that day when I can feel content with my circumstances.

P.S. Grief is a topic we’re addressing head-on here at LWB. If you are feeling stuck, consider signing up for the upcoming LWB Mentoring Program that starts this evening. You’ll find more information here.

Kathleen Guthrie Woods is a Northern California–based freelance writer. She’s wrapping up a memoir about her journey to coming to peace with being childfree (and clearly it’s a work in progress).

Whiny Wednesday: My Shower Invitation

During August, as I enjoy some travel time, I’m sharing some of my favorite and your favorite posts from the past year. I’ll look forward to seeing you again in September. ~Lisa 

Today’s post was originally run on 5/29/13

Whiny_WednesdayAfter telling a friend recently that I haven’t had an invitation to a baby shower in years, guess what popped into my inbox last week?

But here’s the kicker: the invitation is from someone I don’t know who’s throwing a shower for someone else I don’t know, who happens to be expecting twins.

I scratched my head for a while wondering how to handle this. Should I point out I know neither the hostess nor the mother-to-be or should I just show up bearing gifts? (Okay, I was kidding about the latter.)

I guess this is the Universe’s strange idea of a practical once, and for once, I’m actually laughing.

It’s Whiny Wednesday. What strange, ironic, or downright annoying things are going on in your Universe right now?

Whiny Wednesday: Living After Infertility

During August, as I enjoy some travel time, I’m sharing some of my favorite and your favorite posts from the past year. I’ll look forward to seeing you again in September. ~Lisa

Today’s post was originally run on 3/28/12

Whiny_WednesdayI subscribe to Resolve’s “Living After Infertility Resolution” Support Community. Or at least I used to until yesterday, when I removed myself from the mailing list.

Apparently, the only viable “resolution” for infertility is pregnancy and the “support” forums are filled with questions about the best strollers for twins and complaints about weight gain at 24 weeks. When I dug back into the archives I found exactly THREE posts from people trying to move on with a childfree life.

I avoid using profanity in a public forum, but not in the comfort of my own home, so when I tell you I said, “Forget it!” you can fill in your own blank for what I really said.

I think that Resolve does wonderful work in helping people deal with infertility, but for those of us who have run out of options or made the decision to get off the crazy train and get about the business of building a life without children, that support is non-existent. Unless a miracle baby happens, there is apparently no living after infertility.

Well, that’s not the case here, sisters. I am alive and well and swearing like a sailor to prove it. And when National Infertility Awareness Week comes around next month, you’d better believe I’m going to be out there saying, “Hey!!! What about us?”

It’s Whiny Wednesday, my wondering living friends. If you’ve got something to say, now’s the time. Just watch your language, if you don’t mind.

Whiny Wednesday: People Who Ought to Say Nothing

During August, as I enjoy some travel time, I’m sharing some of my favorite and your favorite posts from the past year. I’ll look forward to seeing you again in September. ~Lisa 

Today’s post was originally run on 4/4/12  

Whiny_WednesdayKathleen’s post about mistakes and well-intentioned people got me thinking about people who really ought to just mind their own business.

A few years ago, when I my glorious plans for motherhood were just beginning to come crashing down around my ears, Mr. Fab and I went wine tasting. As a rich, fruity cabernet was hitting my bloodstream and making my crappy world feel better, a woman (whose world was feeling a little too good) leaned over and said, “Should you be drinking?”

I was confused for a moment, until I realized she was peering at my belly. Admittedly, I’d put on a few stress pounds over the previous year, but I was beyond mortified that she’d mistaken my bloat for a pregnancy, especially considering that was the one thing I was truly aiming for.

I’d like to tell you that she realized her mistake immediately, but alas, she had to ask me twice – the second time for everyone around us to hear.

So, while I agree that most people are well-intentioned when they make a faux pas, in some cases, people just ought to keep their traps shut and mind their own damn business.

It’s Whiny Wednesday, ladies. Let ‘em fly.