Life Without Baby

filling the silence in the motherhood discussion

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.

New “Finding Peace” Mentorship Program Starts May 21st

Japanese Tearoom 2A new session of the “Finding Peace” Mentorship Program begins May 21st. This is the third session of this program and past participants have found incredible support through working with an intimate group of peers and having a safe space to discuss issues that most of our friends and family can’t even begin to understand.

Registration is open now and you can take advantage of early bird pricing by signing up by next Friday, May 17th.

Over the eight weeks of the program, you will:

  • Acknowledge your loss and learn techniques to deal with grief
  • Create ways to work through, not avoid, emotions
  • Gain tools to deal with issues of family, friends, coworkers, and even strangers
  • Find a way to move through this difficult transition and into a new and fulfilling life, even it’s one that doesn’t include children
  • Meet other women who understand you and get ongoing support from a sympathetic group of peers in a safe and protected environment
  • Be guided by a compassionate mentor who’s already walked plenty of miles in your shoes and speaks your language (that’s me!)

You might be surprised to learn that we even find room for laughter in these workshop and support sessions. It’s one of the many perks of sharing even the most difficult experience with people who’ve been there, too.

You can find all the details and registration information here.

Whiny Wednesday: Equality

Whiny_WednesdayI don’t usually get political on this blog, but the recent Marriage Equality discussions have been pushing my buttons. I am strongly pro-gay marriage and am often dumbfounded by the arguments cited by opponents.

 

One morning last week, I heard someone on the radio saying (and I’m paraphrasing) that the constitution supported equality for like situations, and gay marriage and heterosexual marriage could never be equal because of the inability for gay couples to reproduce.

 

This pushes two of my buttons:

 

1)   As part of a straight couple who cannot reproduce, I take extreme exception to this suggestion that a marriage is only acceptable when it produces children.

2)   I know several gay couples who have reproduced via sperm donor, surrogate, or adoption. Is this person then suggesting that any marriage—gay or straight—that doesn’t produce children “naturally” falls into the category of unacceptable? Surely not.

 

It’s Whiny Wednesday. I’m on fire this week. What’s pushing your buttons?

Giving a Voice to Infertility

Producer, Irina Vodar

Filed under F for “Forces to be Reckoned With” I guarantee you’ll find Pamela Mahoney Tsigdinos. In case you’ve never come across Pamela, she’s the dynamo behind the award-winning book Silent Sorority and the newly revamped blog of the same name.

 

And now she’s part of the advisory board behind a new documentary about infertility that hopes to lift the stigma around that topic.

 

Pamela writes:

 

“How can we talk about infertility, how can we help someone process infertility if we lack a common language or socialized behavior to do so?”

 

You can read an interview with the documentary’s producer, Irina Vodar, in Pamela’s recent blog post.

 

This project needs support, so please also take a moment to leave a comment on Pamela’s post and answer this question:

 

What’s been your experience with infertility, and why do you think this documentary needs to be made?

 

I’ll look forward to seeing this project come to life and giving a voice to what so many of us have dealt with in silence.

 

Hunting for the Old Me

thoughtsI’m doing really well at being at peace with not having children. But some days the darkness comes over me. Do you know what I mean?

Ordinarily, the darkness is a tiny ball. I carry it around with me wherever I go, and usually it’s safely tucked away and I don’t even notice it. Then something happens to flip the lid and suddenly the darkness has crept into every open space within me.

I’m tired of carrying the darkness around and I’m ready to let it go. I don’t want to feel bitter or sad about not having children, because honestly, I’m okay. But sometimes I can’t remember who I am any more. When I look in the mirror I don’t see me. I see a woman who looks tired and overweight, and very, very serious about life. She doesn’t laugh easily or live with abandon, like the real me used to. She’s cautious and unwilling to let herself go. She feels like a square peg in a world full of round holes and it’s lonely sometimes.

Our experiences make us who we are, but what happens to who we were? In a universe where energy remains constant, the old me — the laughing, carefree joyous me — must still be around. I catch glimpses of her sometimes, and like a huntress, I follow her into the woods. And yet, so often, she manages to evade me.

So, all I can do is be patient, keep an eye on her and keep moving towards her. I know she still exists, and one day, if I keep hunting her, I know I’ll catch up with her again. Then maybe we can stand together again and let the darkness go.

Decluttering Baby Stuff

releaseIn her blog Baptism By Fire, Wolfers wrote a wonderful post about our emotional attachment to clutter, and how she wasn’t yet ready to let go of her baby-related items.

It’s been a couple of years already since I reached the point of being ready to let go of my baby clutter, so I was surprised by the emotions that stirred up when I read her post.

As I never actually became pregnant, I accumulated only a few baby items. It took me several years before I had the courage to say goodbye to them, but when I did let them go, it was sad, but not difficult. I was ready.

The things that brought on the strongest wave of emotions were all the books I’d bought over the years as I’d tried to uncover the magic formula to my fertility. I had books on Chinese medicine, diet, mindfulness, you name it, and I can remember feeling so angry when I put them in the donation box. I felt as if I’d been taken for a ride by these authors who had promised me a miracle. I felt duped and cheated—and really, really mad.

They’re out of my life now and largely out of my mind, but even though they’re gone, they’ve still left a mark where they used to be. And sometimes that mark gets sore again.

What have you held onto and what have you been able to let go?

It Got Me Thinking…About Parental Complaints

By Kathleen Guthrie Woods

“I have to spend all day Saturday at soccer games. Gag!”

“I hate wasting weekends at my kid’s swim meets.”

“Wanna trade places with me?”

I’ve heard every variation of the above from friends who for whatever reason think it’s okay to complain to me about the “burdens” of being a parent. My responses have ranged from “Sounds like fun to me!” to “Dogs are so the way to go.” to “I’d trade places with you in a heartbeat.”

I don’t use that last one very often because it pretty much shuts down the conversation, but when I do, I hope it makes them think. It’s bad enough that this person is complaining about something s/he had to know about before signing up for the whole parental gig, and don’t even get me started if this ding-dong complains in front of their sweet child. Most of all, I wish they’d think for a moment about their chosen audience: childfree-not-by-choice woman who loves kids.

I loved playing sports as a kid, I was thrilled when my parents were on the sidelines cheering me on, I have great memories of those years, and I looked forward to the day when I could create similar memories with children of my own. Girl Scout leader, Team Mom, 3rd base coach—I woulda been all over it!

Maybe I don’t understand because I’m not a busy mom, but I do understand how much it hurts to be on the receiving end of a busy mom’s thoughtless complaints.

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

Meeting People Locally

world handsAfter my recent post about finding help, Maria asked about meeting people locally, and how to find other LWB readers who live close by.

She mentioned regional groups on the community forums, which reminded me to remind you that if you’re looking for people in your region, that’s a good place to start.

In case you’re not familiar with the private community, you can find Groups on the drop-down menu or here. The community is password-protected, so it’s a safe place to share information about where you live and you can also “friend” people to exchange messages.

There are already groups formed by readers in Canada, Austin, TX, Massachusetts, Washington, D.C., Washington State, San Francisco, Southern California, and Australia. If you’d like to find people in your region, feel free to create a group of your own.  You can do that by clicking the Add Group button at the top right.

I’ve had the good fortune to meet face-to-face with several people that I’ve got to know through this site, and there’s much to be said for chatting in person over coffee or wine. Please report back if you do manage to connect with someone near you.

Learning to Ask for Help

Help“Ancora imparo. [I am still learning.]”

― Michelangelo, at age 87 in 1562

I am still learning. And thank goodness, too. If all I had to go on for the rest of my life was all I know now, I think I’d be in a lot of trouble down the road. That’s the beauty of age, experience, and wisdom, I suppose. It takes life experience to gain knowledge, and life experience only comes with checking off the years.

Last year, I learned an important lesson that I wish I’d learned much sooner. I learned to ask for help.

Near the end of last year, I was working through where I wanted to take this site, while trying to keep my freelance writing jobs going, and thinking about the novel I’m supposed to be writing. I was trying to write blog posts, maintain the website, fix tech issues, run a workshop, and keep a marriage ticking along. Finally, I threw up my hands and said what equated to, “I can’t do this all by myself, so I’m not going to do any of it.” I really was ready to throw in the towel.

Fortunately I have a wise group of peers and an amazing mentor who talked me through my angst and convinced me to ask for help. I found an assistant to help with the blog and found a web designer to take care of the site properly. Their help freed me up to do the work I really wanted to do, which is writing posts and developing this community. What’s more, the other work got done quicker and better than if I’d struggled along as usual trying to figure it all out for myself.

The experience gave me pause and caused me to look back at my past and take a close look at myself. Turns out I have never been a person who asks for help. It’s not so much pride that stops me from asking, but more a sense of toughness. “I can do this on my own. I don’t need help.” Now I’m writing it here, it sounds an awful lot like stubbornness, but there you go.

I was also tough (or stubborn) when I was going through the grinder of infertility and later, when I was trying to figure out how to ever make peace with my situation. I never asked for help, even though I needed it. In part I believed it was pointless to ask for help because no one else could really understand what I was going through. I also didn’t want to upset people I knew and cared about, and I didn’t want to put myself in the position of comforting them.

In hindsight, I wish I’d asked for help. I wish I’d taking the chance of confiding in a friend. I wish I’d thought to look for a support group or hired the professional help of a therapist. I would have arrived at my place on peace a lot sooner than I did. But hindsight is 20/20 as they say, and I hadn’t yet learned the value of asking for help.

How about you? Have you asked for help? If so, where have you found it?

Because I Don’t Have Kids

face and hands of beautiful womanStocking up on some Christmas cheer last week, I was asked to show I.D. for my purchases. Never one to begrudge being carded, I pulled out my driver’s license and showed it to the young assistant.

She gave it a quick look, did some math, and said, “Wow, you look good for 42.”

Even as my ego puffed up faster than an inflatable Santa lawn ornament, a quip sprung to my lips.

“That’s because I don’t have kids,” I almost said.

It’s true I only have a few errant gray hairs and my worry lines are small and faint, and it’s also true that friends my age who do have kids generally have a lot more gray than me under their highlights.

So, I wonder, is it genes that have kept the gray away, or was the young woman just a bad judge of age, or could looking younger be a perk of not having kids? What do you think?