Life Without Baby

filling the silence in the motherhood discussion

Rules to Live By

(This post was originally scheduled for last Saturday, but apparently I forgot to hit “publish.” Apologies to those of you who came looking for a new post last weekend and got nothing.)

I’ve been reading Whole Living magazine lately. I find the articles interesting and it’s one of the few women’s magazines I’ve found that isn’t focused on children. Refreshing.

What’s also refreshing is that, along with their Mission Statement, they also post their Ten Tenets of Whole Living. You can read them here:

These are a couple of personal favorites:

#1 Happiness is a choice. Make that choice today and every day.

I’ve spent a good chunk of the past few years feeling sorry for myself because I can’t have children. But I’ve come to appreciate the life I am able to have because of my childlessness. I’m pretty happy with this life and, if the opportunity presented itself to become a mother, I am no longer sure I would take it.

#5 Laugh at yourself. You’re funny.

Never a truer word spoken. It’s so easy to take yourself oh so seriously, but really life is pretty ridiculous. Case in point: I married a man who couldn’t have children. We spent five years trying to fix that, only to discover that I was infertile. Not funny at the time, but the irony isn’t lost on me now.

#9 It’s never too late to take the first step toward your aspirations.

When she was in her 60’s, my mum graduated with a bachelor’s degree in science and learned to drive. Anyone who tells you you’re too old to follow your dreams deserves a poke in the eye.

What are some of your tenets, rules that you choose to live by?

Are Bank Loans for IVF Ethical?

I thought long and hard before deciding to post on this topic today. To say it’s controversial is an understatement. But it can’t all be pretty all the time, so here goes:

 

The Bioethics Center, part of New Zealand’s University of Otago, recently posed this ethical question: “Are banks wrongfully exploiting the childless by offering and advertising loans for IVF?”

 

Apparently, ASB bank in New Zealand offers (and makes no bones about advertising) loans to pay for IVF treatments. They have produced a very emotional and persuasive commercial to promote their product. You can watch it on YouTube, but I’m warning you to do so at your own risk. This is direct-to-the-gut advertising at its best.

 

I have very mixed feelings about this subject. On the one hand, I don’t believe that IVF and other fertility treatments should only be available to the wealthy (and at anywhere from $10,000 – $20,000 a round, it’s not something that’s accessible to everyone.)

 

On the other hand, commercials like this fuel the notion that there’s always something else to try, always one more hope left, when sometimes, it’s just time to stop. It targets people when they are at their most vulnerable. In the banking world, they call that a predatory loan.

 

So the question I’m posing to you is this: is it ethical for a bank to offer and advertise loans to pay for IVF?

 

I’ll look forward to hearing your opinions.

 

It Got Me Thinking…Baby Chitchat

By Kathleen Guthrie

We made the rounds of holiday parties in December, and I enjoyed myself 97% of the time. Loved catching up with friends and their significant others, meeting new people, and indulging in yummy things like mulled-spice wine and those little cocktail hotdogs wrapped in pastry and dipped in hot mustard.

Ah, but that remaining 3%. At one lively get-together, I noticed a woman holding a sleeping newborn. I asked how old the baby was and then congratulated her on the new addition to her family. She responded by launching into the gory details of her C-section. I don’t even know this person’s name, but I can tell you a few things about her anatomy and how it was ripped apart during the birth of her child. The man next to me chimed in with his experience of witnessing his wife’s C-section. Feeling at a complete loss, I mentioned my sister had to have a C-section when her 10-pound baby was two weeks late. And then I realized what a complete ass I was for trying to participate in this sorry excuse for chitchat.

I turned away and joined a group of men who were discussing sports…or something. I really don’t know what they were talking about, and it didn’t matter, because all I wanted to do was shake the C-section images out of my brain.

Being childfree can be especially challenging during the holidays, especially if you’re still struggling to accept your status. We have all endured painful questions, awful suggestions, and shockingly inappropriate conversations. I invite you to share a few, and maybe we can start to find the absurd humor in all of this.

Kathleen Guthrie is a Northern California–based freelance writer. She is trying to embrace being childfree.

Announcing the Official Release of My New Book

Drum roll please!

It’s official. My new book is finally available in print!

It feels like this has been a long time coming and I think I’ve sprouted one or two extra grey hairs along the way, but finally it’s here. I’m very excited to be able to share this story and it’s my hope that it will help to shed a little more light on what it means to be childless-(not-exactly)-by-choice.

If you’d like to buy a copy, you can get one here. If you’re an Amazon.com shopper, it will be in stock there sometime next week. I’ll keep the links updated as it makes it way into other outlets.

In the meantime, thank you for your continued support, for dropping in on this site, reading my ramblings, and sharing your own. I really appreciate knowing you’re out there.

As a small thank you and bit of a celebration, I thought I’d have a contest to win a copy of the book. Just leave a comment on this post and I’ll randomly select a winner at the end of the day tomorrow.

Thanks again for your support.

~Lisa

Whiny Wednesday

I love the Internet for the breadth and depth of information it provides, and for the opportunity to read so many varying opinions on one subject. But sometimes I just have to walk away.

Case in point, I was doing research for a post and came across the following comment on an article:

“I take care of my parents. My children will take care of me. You want to force my children to take care of you too, meanwhile you arrogantly and selfishly live a much richer life style. Frankly, every GINK I’ve met was an arrogant, self-righteous, elitist. You should apologize for not adding to the future of our race.”

So after I ranted to myself about not expecting anyone else’s kids to take care of me, how our race of almost 7 billion people doesn’t need much adding to, and how narrow-minded this woman was to tar us all with the same “arrogant, self-righteous, elitist” brush, I stomped off and took a long, hot shower.

This woman was clearly on a mission (she posted about half a dozen comments to the same article) and I can’t believe I let her anger get under my skin.

It’s Whiny Wednesday. What’s under your skin today?

My New Family

I love the New Year. I’ve spent most of the past week taking long walks and thinking about what I want my life to be like this time next year. What do I want to learn, where do I want to be, what do I want to do? Then I’ve spent the past couple of days writing down some goals for the year and making a plan of action.

I have lots of career-related goals, but some of my personal goals include participating in a triathlon, learning some new skills (making cheese, learning a language, as examples), and taking a big trip with my husband. I also have a goal this year of celebrating all the holidays with my “family.”

As you may know, my blood relatives live on the other side of the world and my husband’s family is scattered in a non-geographical way, which leaves us with a family of two (plus the cat.) Although we spent the recent holidays very happily as a family of two, I’ll admit to missing time with family. So this year I’m going to make a family to celebrate the holidays with.

My plan is to build a new family of my own choice, made up of people I like who live close enough to actually see at the holidays. I realize that many of them will have families of their own to celebrate with, but those who don’t will be welcome at my celebrations this year. My first family celebration will be a Valentine’s dinner.

What about you? What are some of your goals and wishes for this year? And what does your image of family look like now?

Tell Us Your Story

In the New Year, I’d like to start a new regular feature. I don’t have a clever name for it yet (suggestions welcome), but I want to start sharing some of your stories and opinions.

We’ve all come from different places and had different experiences, and we’re all in different stages of coming-to-terms with or being happily childfree. I can only write about my own experience and my own point-of-view, and I’d love to include some other voices in the conversation.

So, I’m putting out a call for guest stories. If you’d like to tell your story or if you have an issue you want to air for discussion, send it to me through the About Lisa contact form here. Posts should be in the 300-500 word range and if your post is published, there’ll be a prize.

Sharing Holiday Traditions

Today is Friday, December 17 and no matter how in denial you’ve been up until now, it’s time to face the fact that we are in full-blown holiday mode. I still have cards to write and mail, gifts to buy, and a naked, but beautiful tree that could use some decorations, and I am slowly acknowledging that Christmas is going to happen with or without me.

J and I have been married for almost seven years now and yet we haven’t really established any holiday traditions. When his mother was alive, we often hosted Christmas dinner at our house, but since she passed away two years ago his family has become fractured and they don’t spend the holidays together so much. My family is half way around the world, so we go there about every third year, and in between we kind of ping around like lost pinballs, with no set program for the holidays. If we had kids, I know it would be different.

Growing up, our family Christmas was the same every year. We’d usually go out Christmas Eve to a party at the local social club. There’d be dancing, my parents could have a drink, and it was a 10-15 minute walk home. We often walked home after midnight, so I would look for Father Christmas (Santa) in the sky. I’d hang out my pillowcase (not stocking) at the end of my bed and somehow Father Christmas would always manage to fill it without waking me up.

Being the youngest of three, I’d be the first up on Christmas morning, and usually get sent back to bed at least twice for getting up too early. My parents would bring up tea and cookies and we’d all pile into their bed to open the gifts. No matter what else we got, we always got pajamas, a sweater, and chocolate.

We’d often go out for a walk on Christmas morning while the turkey was cooking, especially if it was one of those crisp, sunny days, and sometimes we’d go over to my Grandma’s for a short visit, but we’d always get on the phone to all the relatives to wish them a Merry Christmas and thank them for our gifts.

It was usually just the five of us for Christmas dinner. I don’t remember having relatives join us. We’d have the traditional Christmas dinner – turkey, sage and onion stuffing, roast potatoes, Brussels sprouts, etc., followed by sherry trifle and/or Christmas pudding with brandy sauce. We’d pull Christmas crackers, tell the jokes, and wear the paper hats all through dinner. Then we’d do the dishes and be all done in time for the Queen’s speech at 3:00. After that, there’d be a family movie (this was pre-video, and when the UK still only had three TV channels), something big like The Wizard of Oz, or new, such as Superman.

In the evening we’d play a game – cards or whichever board game was hot that year – and snack on cheese and crackers and all the goodies we only ever got at Christmas. My parents would have a beer or two and make me a shandy (a mix of beer and 7Up) and we’d watch our favorite Christmas specials until it was bedtime. So, for me, Christmas was always a quiet family time spent at home.

Why am I droning on about this? Because if I had children, I would pass these traditions on to them. I’d want to create the kind of Christmas memories for them that I have from my childhood. As it’s just the two of us, we have the freedom to spend Christmas however we choose, but without traditions of our own, it doesn’t feel as special.

So, I’m looking for some new traditions to start that fit our life now. I’d love it if you’d share some of yours – old family ones, and new ones that you’ve adopted as an adult. How do you make the holidays special and family-orientated when your family is just one or two?

Hey Advertisers, You Talkin’ To Me?

I was browsing a magazine this morning, drinking tea and eating some excellent toast with almond butter and blueberry jam, when an ad caught my eye. It might have been the two very handsome cats that first stopped my eye, but it was the words that really caught my attention.

“New and improved Blue cat food is cat-preferred and mom-preferred.”

Eh? Mom-preferred? What was that supposed to mean? I’ve become so accustomed to advertisers talking over the heads of non-moms that my first thought was that moms liked the food because the natural ingredients would do no harm to Little Johnny if he decided to help himself to the cat’s dinner. But reading on I realized that the advertisers were speaking to “moms and their furry family members” – i.e. pet moms.

This struck me as smart advertising. As a cat-mom (but not a human-mom) this ad spoke directly to me and I appreciated that. On taking a closer look I also realized that human-moms weren’t excluded either. Very smart advertising. Of course the cat-dads were excluded, but as the magazine is geared to women, I doubt there would be many complaints.

Did the ad cause me to run out and buy this brand of food? Well no. My furry family member is a cat after all, and I can’t just go around changing things on a whim, but I appreciated the advertisers thinking outside of the mommy box and including those of us with only furry family members. Maybe they’re starting to realize that just because you’re a woman of a particular age, doesn’t automatically mean you’re a mom.

A Culture of Blame

I came across this article on Childless.com.au, an Australian site. The author, Jane Blakely, is an Australian living temporarily in Malaysia. I found her experience fascinating.

While sitting in a doctor’s waiting room she got pulled into a conversation with a Malaysian man, Raj, who asked her if she had children. When she replied that she didn’t, here’s what happened:

“In my culture, it is expected a couple will have their first child within the first year of being married,” he said. Continuing the family lineage through childbirth is of utmost importance in his culture, Raj said, and the “suitability” of a wife will be called into question by the groom’s family if she hasn’t had a child within the first year of marriage.

The suitability of the wife? There are no male fertility issues in Malaysia? How very Henry VIII!

My initial thought after reading this way, “Boy, I’m glad I don’t live in a culture like that.” But to a lesser extent, I do.

When you don’t have children, you are not the norm, and while people may not openly point fingers of blame, you know they’re speculating as to where the problem lies. “Is it her?” “Is he firing blanks?” And we too often hear stories of marriages that don’t survive infertility, and of spouses who left because they needed to have a family.

Jane’s article was a really eye-opener for me – not because it educated me about other cultures, but because it caused me to take a closer look at my own.