Life Without Baby

filling the silence in the motherhood discussion

Learning to be Childless

It’s been a funny week this week and I’ve learned a lot about myself. The main thing I’ve learned is that I’m not yet completely comfortable with this whole childless thing. Oh yeah, I talk a good talk, but put me in a conversation where the subject comes up of my status with regards to children, and there I am squirming in my seat, averting my eyes, and deftly changing the subject.

This has happened twice to me this week, both times in the company of other women who are also childless. You’d think I’d be comfortable in that situation, and able to talk openly about my childless status and my story, you know, the one I’m so happy to put in writing for complete strangers? But I’m not. Not quite.

I’m still a little raw about the education I received this week and I still haven’t had time to think it over, to scratch away at my own veneer and try to figure out what’s going to underneath. Maybe I don’t want to risk getting one of those sympathetic looks, one of those, “Oh, you poor thing. I completely understand” looks. Maybe I don’t want to feel I have to explain my childlessness. Or maybe I don’t want my childlessness to define me and so I just don’t want to talk about it any more.

All I know is that if I’m going to tout myself as some kind of advocate for childlessness, I’ve got a lot of work to do on myself first.

Life Without Baby Handbook

Reader Lynne posted a comment recently about responding, or rather being unable to adequately respond, to a colleague’s pregnancy announcement. Her story got me thinking that what we need is a Handbook that we can refer to in sticky situations, and let’s face it, there’s never a shortage of those.

The idea is that we can all chip in with our best responses to situations and questions we’ve all faced and I’ll compile the answers, maybe on a new Handbook page. This shouldn’t be taken too seriously, but you never know, your witty response to someone’s thoughtless question might just save someone else.

So, let’s kick off with Lynne’s conundrum:

A colleague announces that she’s pregnant with twins. How do you respond?

Answers below, please.

Not Exactly Lonely

 

My young nephew has no qualms about asking the most personal questions, and he’s so earnest and compassionate that usually I can’t help but give him an honest response. He’s asked why I don’t have any children, and also what happened to my first husband. I’ve told him the truth in both cases and he’s appreciated that, as far as I can tell.

Recently he asked, “Don’t you and Jose get lonely without any children.”

“No,” I told him. “We have lots of friends, and we have Felicity, our cat, plus we have lots of nieces and nephews.”

Somehow though, this response didn’t seem to satisfy him. Perhaps because it doesn’t satisfy me either. Do I get lonely because I don’t have children? Not really. Most of the time I wish I had more time alone with my own thoughts, rather than less, but do I feel a sense of loneliness sometimes, even when I’m around other people? I do. Sometimes.

Sometimes I feel that the connections I have with others are more tenuous than they would be with a child. My brothers have their own children and, while we’re still close, our connections have weakened as the bond with their children has grown. Somewhere inside me is a tiny empty hole that nothing can fill. Most of the time I’m not even aware of it, it’s so small. But every now and then I’ll experience a melancholy sensation that feels like loneliness and feels as if it could only be filled with children.

Does This Make Me Look Pregnant?

 

I went shopping for clothes yesterday. It doesn’t happen very often, but I was in the mood and in need of some warmer weather things. These days, my primary concern when shopping for clothes is: does this make me look pregnant?

I once made the mistake of wearing this fabulous African print mu-mu. Jose and I went out wine-tasting one hot summer night and I slipped into it for comfort. A woman (albeit a very drunk one) took one look at me sipping on my fruity red and said, “Should you be drinking?” I was confused at first, until she helped me out by looking down at my belly (which, granted could have used a few hundred crunches) and saying, “You know, in your condition.” That was a truly awful moment in so many ways, and even though the woman was TOTALLY out of line (even if I was pregnant, it’s no business of hers if I chose to have a glass of wine) since then I’ve been very careful about what I wear.

There’s been a trend lately in those little baby doll tops that poof out from just below the bra line. What were those designers thinking? Who can actually wear those without looking pregnant? Not me, that’s for sure. So I picked out from pants, flat fronted, of course and a couple of tops with no gathers, frills, or bunches that could cause them to be mistaken for maternity wear. Because even though I have no problem answering, “No, I’m just fat!” if someone is tactless enough to ask, I don’t even want to crack open the door on that conversation.

Guilty of Prejudice Against the Childless

A friend recently announced her engagement. At 44 she is getting married at last. I know this woman’s story intimately. She is someone who dreamed of motherhood, but never met the right man. She seriously considered having a baby alone using a sperm donor, but realized that it wouldn’t be the responsible thing to do in her situation. So she started making peace with her childlessness. Then she met a wonderful man—and realized that what she really wanted was a loving adult relationship and time with him, and that children were no longer her priority. And he didn’t want children anyway.

When she announced her engagement to me, she speculated as to how long it would be before some tactless bozo raised the subject of kids. To my absolute horror, I realized that during our entire conversation I was wondering if the engagement had changed their attitude about having children. The tactless bozo was very nearly me!!!

So, despite my thoroughly modern, feminist attitude to living child-free, deep inside of me lurks a traditionalist, who at some subconscious level still believes that first comes love, then comes marriage, then comes a baby in a baby carriage. Yikes!

Our natural instinct is to reproduce and continue the survival of the species, so it’s no wonder that so many people can’t get their heads around someone’s decision to not reproduce. Maybe we need to cut those people some slack after all.

Or maybe not. Because, while man cannot fight his natural instinct, evolved man can learn when to voice his opinions and when to keep his (or her) big mouth shut.

Issues for Childless Men

My husband’s cousin recently commented that she would never become a grandmother because her only surviving son was gay. Her comment then prompted my husband to ask me if this website included gay men in its audience. The whole interchange inspired several threads of discussion regarding potential grandparents, modern families, and whether this site was a place that childless men would come, or if the female readers would be as open if men were lingering around. All this is material for future posts, but the thought that bubbled to the surface this time was: What about childless men? Which of the same issues do men and women face and are there other issues that are unique to men?

My husband has grown children from his previous marriage, so I’m not able to ask him about being childless, although he’s more than able to talk about the frustrations of infertility and of having a wife who is unable to have the children she wants. So, for those of you with male partners, what issues do you think men face? Do they feel the same pressure from family? Do their friends (and complete strangers) ask the same tactless questions? Do men feel the same sense of loss that we women sometimes feel. And is it easier for a man to make the decision to be childless?

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this subject.

Guest Blogger: Carrie Friedman

Excerpt from PREGNANT PAUSE, by Carrie Friedman

 

During my first three years of marriage, everywhere I went, people’s eyes migrated to my unchanging waistline. And it was everyone. Not just friends and family, but the eye doctor, the dental assistant, the bagger at the grocery store. And all of them felt entitled to ask.

The strangest inquiry had to have been from my yoga teacher: I drove across town once a week to take this class because I loved the teacher, a hip young German woman with a thick accent who’d play Tina Turner music during the sun salutations. She was the kind of funky that made you wish you had a tattoo. Something small and tasteful but a little bit bad. Because she hadn’t fully grasped the language yet, she was often unintentionally poetic when speaking to all of us. My favorite was, “you are lifting the Springtime of your heart to the flowers in your skull.”

I was resting in savasana pose, on my back, when she knelt down near my ear and whispered: “Your ovaries are ripe, yes?”

I opened my eyes and looked up at her. “My who?” Surely she meant something else. Eggs? Omelettes? Oranges? Or maybe this was some sort of German lesbian come-on line?

She whispered again: “Your ovaries, they are bright and ready for the babies.”

I pulled my legs to my chest, as if this could somehow block her x-ray vision into my pelvis, and stared at her, confused. Who was this woman and why was she tracking my ovulation better than I was? How could she tell? Was I bloated? And did she have to interrupt my peaceful resting pose, the one chance I had per week to fully relax and reflect?

I didn’t stick around after class to clarify, and my ovaries and I never went back.

On our first Thanksgiving as a married couple, a mere month after Stephen and I tied the knot, my Great-Uncle Marvin focused on the area just below my waistline and said, “Oh Carrie! I see a little paunch! Is somebody expecting?” His eyes became googly and he sounded like he was talking to a puppy. He didn’t go so far as to poke my paunch, which was fortunate since I would have broken his fingers.

“No, Marv,” I said. “I just finished eating Thanksgiving dinner, just like you.” I stopped short of asking him when he was due.

Why do people feel entitled to ask? Did they see the wedding band and connect marriage with procreation? It was obnoxious: For all he knew, I couldn’t have kids. For all I knew I couldn’t have kids, as I had not yet tried. But imagine if I had submitted to all kinds of treatments, only to come up empty-wombed. Imagine how painful this line of interrogation would be. Stephen thinks some people ask because it helps them validate their own choices. But he doesn’t truly understand how infuriating it is, and that’s no doubt because nobody badgers men about procreativity with the same frequency.

Was there a more personal question than the equivalent to: “So! You and the hubby having lots of unprotected sex lately?” How would they feel if I looked at their wrinkles and grey hair and said: “You look older every time I see you. You planning for your funeral yet?” or “You’re menopausal, right? How’s the dryness?” Sure, maybe they were just making conversation, but when I thought of ice-breakers, birth control didn’t spring to mind.

Perhaps childfree couples should all carry a printed card in their wallets, with this list of possible responses to the dreaded “when are you having babies?” question:

  • “I had two this morning. They were delicious.”
  • “Actually, I can’t have kids. I’d managed to go a few hours without thinking about it, but thanks for reminding me.”
  • “Well, we had one. You must not have read about it, but long story short, don’t hire an English nanny.”
  • “We’re not. We’ve decided to clone.”

Hopefully that will shut them up.

 

Carrie Friedman lives and writes in Los Angeles. She has been published in several publications, including Newsweek, and in a couple of anthologies, including Cassette From My Ex. Her website is www.carriefriedmania.com.

 

Win a copy of Carrie’s brilliant book, PREGNANT PAUSE. Just leave a comment on this post and we’ll draw a random winner next Saturday. The book is also available on Amazon.

Whiny Wednesday

When I tell people about my decision to not have children, and tell them the story of how I got here, a common response I hear is: “Don’t give up hope; it could still happen.” They don’t seem to understand that my situation isn’t hopeless; I’ve made an intelligent and considered decision and “hope” is no longer involved.

Here’s the reality: I have bum ovaries that kick out half-baked eggs. I’m 40 years old and am therefore well into the danger zone for birth defects. My husband is almost 55, meaning he’ll be well into his 70’s before our miracle baby makes it into college. We wrestled with the pros and cons of continuing a quest to have children and we’ve made an informed decision to stop. This is now what is best for us. So, if you’re thinking that I’m just saying I don’t want kids, but I’m secretly hoping I’ll get knocked up, I’m not. Please give me credit for my decision and for being strong enough to tell you the truth.

Oh, and Happy Cinco de Mayo.

When Choice is Not an Option

Last night I performed at a spoken word show here in Santa Monica. I got up in front of about 100 total strangers and told the story of how my husband, Jose, and I came to make the decision to give up on having children, and be a happy family of two. As I’m sure you can imagine, it was a very intimate story and I think I told it frankly, maybe even matter-of-factly, but I aired our dirty laundry all the same.

My husband was in the  audience and, as he’d never heard or read the story before, I was a little worried about his reaction, but he was 100% supportive. After the show, a number of people came up to me and thanked me for sharing my story. A couple of women told me how they had related to the story because of their own experiences. It was very touching and encouraging to know that I had reached people.

But more than one person came up to me during the post-show reception and asked the inevitable question, some version of: “So are you guys still thinking of adopting?” I want you to know that I was the model of composure. I answered calmly and politely, that no, we weren’t, and that we were lucky to have the kind of relationship that many people never have, and that was enough for us.

But I guess some people just can’t take, “No,” for an answer. People want a Hollywood ending to their stories,  and for many, the idea of choosing not to have children is, dare I say it, inconceivable.

My Bah Humbug to Mother’s Day, But Not to Mother

Due to circumstances that give no cause for celebration, I will find myself away from home next Sunday, in a country that has already celebrated Mother’s Day, back in March. I’m very glad for the reprieve from the unavoidable Mother’s Day festivities here. Usually on that day I avoid restaurants that might be handing out flowers to all the mothers, and steer clear of stores festooned with gifts I might have liked, had I been a mother. Pretty much I avoid anywhere where I might be at risk of some unsuspecting person innocently wishing me “Happy Mother’s Day” and forcing me to again face the fact that I am not a mother.

But just because I don’t care to celebrate Mother’s Day as a kind of national holiday, doesn’t mean I don’t celebrate my mother on that day, or in my case, in March. I send her a homemade card (because it’s impossible to find a Mother’s Day card in U.S. stores in March), give her a gift that I’ll know she’ll appreciate more than flowers—new cycling gear, or something practical for her garden. If I could choose my mother again from a catalog of all mothers, I’d still pick the same model (maybe with an added “chocolate cake baking” feature), and I wouldn’t dream of not honoring her on Mother’s Day.

But I want to do it in my own way. I want to call her and wish her a happy Mother’s Day, as a private celebration between mother and daughter, and let my brothers celebrate her in their own way, too. To me, Mother’s Day has never been a universal holiday where everything stops to revolve around mothers. It shouldn’t be a day when complete strangers wish me a Happy Mother’s Day. But it is, and I so can’t help feeling like a famous, though unlikable, Dickensian character, when I think: “You keep Mother’s Day in your own way, and let me keep it in mine.”