Life Without Baby

filling the silence in the motherhood discussion

It Got Me Thinking…About The Brighter Side

Last week I wrote about “The Dark Side,” so it seems only right that this week I flip the coin. Doesn’t that always seem to be the case? The good comes with the bad, the happy with the sad, the dark with the light. But frequently during the past several years I’ve caught myself thinking that I’ve had more than my share of the dark, often brought on by the not-nice-people (NNPs) who have crossed my rocky path:

  • the client who just decided not to pay me after I sacrificed my Christmas to help her with a big project
  • the “friend” who kept sharing posts about how you can’t understand “real” love until you’re a mom
  • the doctor who continued to ask (year after year) if I have children (Read the damn file!)

Recently I’ve become better about practicing a way to flip this. In the midst of the hating and wishing them ill (I’m being honest here), I stop myself, take a deep breath, release the NNP, and focus my attention the 99.9% of people who are doing good in the world, who are generous, thoughtful, helpful, and kind. Some of the recent bright lights in my life include:

  • the former work colleagues I bumped into at a restaurant who surprised me by paying for my lunch
  • the angel who fed my parking meter seconds before I would have gotten a pricey ticket
  • the longtime friend who called out of the blue just to say “Hi” then really listened when she asked how I was doing

You know who else falls into this camp? The men and women of LWB. The people who candidly share their stories of loss and healing. The commenters who support, commiserate, and encourage. The members of the forums and groups. The many quiet readers who see themselves in the stories on our pages and offer up prayers for healing and peace.

For a few moments this week, I hope you’ll think about who has lifted you up lately, who has held, helped, comforted, or sustained you. If you’re facing hard times, stop, take a deep breath, and hold one of those angels close in your heart. For, yes, there is darkness in our world, and it comes in many forms. But, oh, the joy of finding the light!

 

Kathleen Guthrie Woods is mostly at peace with her childfree status.

“Celebrating” Nine Years of Childlessness

By Lisa Manterfield

This month marks eight years since I wrote the first post for Life Without Baby. It will be nine years since I acknowledged that I would not be a mother by any means.

Nine years sounds like a really long time, doesn’t it? But I have passed so many milestones on the way to getting where I am now.

First there was the decision to get off the fertility crazy train. I passed that milestone several times, each time hopping back onboard for one more try. Eventually, I passed it for the last time. I cancelled my next doctor appointment and never went back.

I passed another milestone when I stopped envying/hating/coveting every pregnant belly I saw. I have since held other people’s babies, made it through Mother’s Days without tears, and gone shopping for baby shower gifts. Each was a significant milestone.

Eventually, after a number of years, I stopped being so sad about all I’d missed out on. I started building a new life and taking advantage of the benefits of not having children.

Nine years ago, I could never have imagined I’d look at my life, see how completely different it would have been with children, and feel satisfied that things worked out well after all. I hadn’t even known that milestone would be there until I passed it one day about a year ago.

None of this came easily. I went through dark periods of grief, of feeling angry and resentful. I’ve felt horribly lonely and alienated from people with “normal” lives. I’ve been in turns bitter, embarrassed, defiant, even vengeful about being infertile and childless. I’ve also felt relief and even slightly smug.

And after these nine years, I feel acceptance of my life that way it is, an understanding that when the motherhood door closed for me, others opened (although I sometimes didn’t see them at first.) I like my life just the way it is.

Maybe you can see yourself at one of these milestones. Maybe you’re making peace with the hand you’ve been dealt, maybe you’re moving on with a different kind of life, too.

If you see yourself all the way at the beginning of this post, wondering how on earth you’re ever going to be okay again, hang in there. You’re not alone. I, and many other readers on this site, are here to tell you that it does get better in time. Most likely, it will take longer than you ever imagined, but from my experience, the end result will also be better than you could have possibly foreseen.

***

Now for the Celebration

The other surprise outcome of my infertility is that I have written books about it. That was never part of my plan either. (I had always hoped to write fiction someday, which I have, but writing about infertility was an unexpected and rewarding detour.)

I wrote about my infertility journey and my decision to stop trying to be a mother in my first book, I’m Taking My Eggs and Going Home: How One Woman Dared to Say No the Motherhood.  Then, after blogging my way through coming-to-terms with that decision and dealing with the loss, I wrote a guidebook to help other navigate their way. That book is Life Without Baby: Surviving and Thriving When Motherhood Doesn’t Happen.

To celebrate this blog-i-versary, both books are on sale in ebook format for only $2.99 (and a comparable price in other currencies) for the entire month of March.

AmazonKobo
Add to Goodreads

 

AmazonKobo
Add to Goodreads

 

And now I’d like to ask a small favor. If you’ve read either of these books and found them helpful, would you take a minute and leave a review on your bookseller site of choice? It need only be a couple of sentences about what you liked (or what you didn’t, if that’s the case), but it will really help others looking for this sort of book, and of course, it would be a huge help to me. You can click on the links above and they’ll take you where you need to go.

It Got Me Thinking…About Half-Truths

My friend Kim* is an amazing pediatric dentist. Not only is she highly skilled, but she is passionate about what she feels is her calling. I have always admired her and, quite honestly, have at times been envious as I see her in action, see how her patients L-O-V-E her, see how energized she is by her work. In fact, it doesn’t seem appropriate to call it “work” because she glows when she is in her element and even outside when she talks about it.

So I was stunned when she announced she was letting go of her practice.

“What?! Why?”

“It sucks the life out of me, it takes too much energy, and I’m exhausted,” she said.

“I’m so sorry to hear that,” I said. But that wasn’t entirely what I was thinking. See, Kim now also has a one-year-old daughter. Her job hadn’t changed. She’d never found it life-sucking before, quite the contrary. No, it is being a parent that is sapping her energy and making her too tired to continue to enjoy her job. I was saddened to hear that she was choosing to sacrifice her first great love, and also to hear that she was misplacing the blame.

But while I was quick to judge, once I took a step back and looked at the big picture, what I felt was compassion. I realized this was perhaps her way—consciously or unconsciously—of making peace with her sacrifice in her own mind. I do the same thing when people ask me why I don’t want kids and I respond by joking that my dogs take all the parenting urges out of me. Oh, I wanted kids, but I didn’t get to have them, and rather than have a complete meltdown in public, I deliver a half-baked “excuse.” I could easily imagine myself telling one of those strangers, “I just don’t have the energy to be a parent” versus revealing the fully honest and painful reasons for my childlessness.

When I think about it from my heart, I realize Kim and I aren’t all that different. We’ve both lost something we wanted, we’ve both sacrificed big dreams, and we’ve both lied to ourselves in an effort to salve the wounds. It makes me think that if we could be more honest with ourselves, and if we could then better communicate our real feelings with each other, there would be a smaller divide between the moms and non-moms.

We’re all women, doing the best we can with the paths we’ve been given. I hope that by being aware of this, the next time I am at the receiving end of a half-truth, I will bypass judgment and instead model understanding and compassion.

*Her name and details have been changed to protect her privacy.

Kathleen Guthrie Woods, truth be told, continues to struggle with making peace with being childless.

How We Heal Our Emotional Scars

Woman walking alone on beach

By Lisa Manterfield

I have a large scar on my left knee. It has black lines of grit in it, and smooth patches of scar tissue that catch the light on an otherwise rough patch of skin.

My scar is 30 years old and I don’t think about it very often anymore. It doesn’t hurt, even when I poke it, and the wound that caused it healed long ago.

But if I think back to the day I got my scar, all the memories and the pain come flooding back. I remember the bike accident. I remember riding through the trees on a gorgeous sunny day, laughing with my friends and flirting with a boy I liked. I remember trying to get his attention and catching my front wheel on his back tire. I don’t recall sailing through the air, but I must have done, because I do remember skidding along the trail, trading bits of knee for bits of trail.

I remember sitting in the bath at home and crying as my mum tried to clean the wound. And I remember my older brother—a bit of an expert on injuries and scars—gently coaxing me to scrub out the grit or be left with a terrible scar.

I also have a vague recollection of a discussion among adults (not my parents) about plastic surgery and what a shame it would be if a “pretty girl” was disfigured by an ugly scar.

It all happened so long ago, but dredging up these memories can bring back all that pain, my embarrassment, the tenderness of my brother, the feeling that my scar would make me “less than” I could have been. I can feel all of it again as if it had happened in more recent memory.

I feel this way about my infertility and childlessness, too. Most days, I don’t think about it anymore. But lately I’ve been writing about grief and loss, and some of those awful feelings of sadness, anger, and deep, deep loss have been coming back to me.

It’s taught me that the healing process for emotional scars is much the same as for physical scars.

You have to suffer some terrible pain to clean the wound. You have to struggle through the initial all-consuming grief. You have to ask for support from people who might not know how to give it. You have to walk again, even if every step is agony. You’ll meet people who will see you as damaged and less than you could have been, because you no longer fit into their ideal of perfect.

But over time the healing begins. You’ll knock your healing wound a few times and break it open again. In one particularly unfortunate incident, you’ll fall on the same wound and end up with a double scar. But you’ll remember how much you loved riding a bike and you’ll take it up again. And you’ll meet new people, who don’t care whether you have one ugly knee, because they’re more interested in some other facet of who you are. And you’ll realize that being a “pretty girl” wasn’t what you were destined to be anyway, and you’re happy being an outdoorsy girl who’s accumulated a multitude of scars since then.

And when you’re shaving your legs (which is trickier because of the scar) you might sometimes recall how you got the scar and the pain you went through. But most days, you won’t even think about.

Having a big scar on my knee means I never got the opportunity to be a leg model, but I got to be so many other things instead, things that have made my life journey quite interesting. My infertility scar is much newer than my knee scar, but I can already see it healing in a way I couldn’t have imagined when it was new and raw. I am starting to wonder about what new destiny it’s leading me to.

For more about hiding and revealing our scars, check out this guest post from Quasi-Momma. 

Our Stories: Infertility Around the World

By Kathleen Guthrie Woods

I’m fudging things a little bit today, as the writer of the article linked below, Amy McTighe, is not (to my knowledge) a member of our Life Without Baby community. She is, however, one of us.

“War and Infertility: How Losing a Pregnancy in Iraq Changed My Approach to Miscarriage” by Amy McTighe

I invite you to read her story. We can relate to many of her struggles with infertility, while at the same time have our eyes opened to how being childless-not-by-choice is dealt with in different cultures, different generations.

Because Lisa hails from the UK and I am in the USA, we tend to focus on how things work in our cultures. But there’s so much more we need to learn about and understand. We each have a story to tell, and I’d again like to encourage you all to share yours. Check out the Our Stories link for how to do this.

In response to Amy’s last line, today I hope she—and you—can begin to release any self-blame you are carrying. Today I hope you experience some new beauty in your world.

Kathleen Guthrie Woods continues to look for guidance toward healing in her own story, The Mother of All Dilemmas. Coming soon!

 

Our Stories: Teresa

As told to Kathleen Guthrie Woods

Oh, how I want to offer you HOPE as we embark on fresh starts in this new year! I want to tell you everything will be okay, that you will be happy again, that everything will work out for the best.

But here at Life Without Baby, we’re about being real, and sometimes reality sucks. Some days we feel numb from our losses and grief, or we feel that our partners would be better off without us (because we’ve “let them down”), or we give up on ever experiencing any kind of miracle.

Teresa articulates these raw truths so well. At 34, married to a “wonderfully loving and strong husband”, she is struggling to come to terms with the end of her dream of motherhood. She’s also got some ideas about how she might start healing and moving forward in life.

Here’s her story.

LWB: Describe your dream of motherhood.

Teresa: At first, my dream of motherhood was to make reparations for the parents I had, I wanted to be a better parent than my own. I wanted to build children that would step into the world as self-assured, confident, wacky, loving individuals. My children were named, spoken of, talked about. We’d send them to this school, or that school. We’d introduce them to this or that; we’d teach them this or that. Our nonexistent children were loved in every way.

LWB: Are you childfree by choice, chance, or circumstance?

Teresa: I am childless by circumstance. Even though my husband and I knew I had PCOS [polycystic ovary syndrome], I thoroughly believed that I would get pregnant. I thought the medications and procedures would work for me, and we both thought kids were in our future. A few months ago, we chose to stop fertility treatments. We were not interested in IVF [in vitro fertilization], and the doctors told us that my body was not responding to anything else. There was nothing more they could do for us.

LWB: Where are you on your journey now?

Teresa: I am numb. My little sister will bring the first grandchild into my side of the family early in 2018. My heart and soul jump with joy for her, but at the same time, they battle the sadness that strikes me to my core. I thought the treatments would work, and when I visited her in the spring to see my new nephew, I would be able to share that my own baby is on his or her way. This is no longer the case. I do not understand why this is my path. I have given up on God. There will be no miracle, just this emptiness. I need to find a new purpose; the only thing I ever wanted will not come to pass. I am directionless.

LWB: What’s the hardest part for you about not having children?

Teresa: The knowledge that I am disappointing my husband. Now, this isn’t how it really is, but it is how I feel. He frequently repeats that he loves our life together. He is here for me. What he doesn’t realize is that I watch him when he cares for his sister’s children. I watch him around babies, toddlers, with kids in junior high. He’s amazing. He would be a perfectly imperfect dad. I am unable to give him this.

LWB: How do you answer “Do you have kids?”

Teresa: A long time ago, I decided to stop skirting the issue. Infertility is often taboo because it has to deal with sex and emotions. No one knows what to say or how to act when they speak with an infertile couple. People feel uncomfortable when I say “My husband and I cannot have kids.” As soon as those words come out, people feel like assholes to have asked a question that is none of their business. In my feeble attempt to raise awareness, I am honest. Hopefully, one day, we’ll all be able to have a real conversation about it and acknowledge that infertility is a tremendous loss.

LWB: What is the best advice you’d offer someone else like you?

Teresa: It’s going to hurt for a long time. You’ll find that as you age, you won’t fit into a group anywhere. You don’t fit in with parents with kids. You don’t fit in with 20-somethings. You’ll find that a lot of your friends are retirees. You’ll hang out with elderly people, especially if you live in small towns. Your family will not know what to say or do.

LWB: What’s is your hope for yourself this coming year?

Teresa: That my husband and I can heal together. He has been my rock, but I find myself pushing him away because I do not want him to be beholden to me. He can have children and should leave me and find a woman who can give him what he wants. My other hope is to stop all this silly thinking and embrace my wonderfully loving and strong husband.

LWB: How are you moving forward?

Teresa: I looked into my partner’s eyes. I wrapped his love around me. I breathed him in and asked him to never let go. I fight with myself daily over whether or not I should just leave him, give him the “out.” But he loves me, and he can handle this. So I let him love me, no matter how difficult.

Someone once told me to collect moments of joy. Everyone gets sad. Remember to count the moments of joy because they do come along. Then, after all the crying and disbelief, for a brief moment, your heart will be full. Hold on to that feeling because it will have to last you through the desert.

 

Won’t you share your story with us? The act of answering the questions itself can be very healing, plus we’d like to support you by telling you “You are not alone.” Please visit the Our Stories page to get more information and the questionnaire.

Kathleen Guthrie Woods is mostly at peace with her childlessness.

This Year, Aim for Progress Rather Than Perfection

Well, here we are in 2018, and I think it’s safe to say that most of us are ready to see the back of last year. Between political craziness, the loss of too many creative icons, and a general feeling of uneasiness in the world, I’m ready for a fresh start.

I do love the New Year for the potential it brings in terms of a clean slate and the chance to make big changes. And yet, in the past, I’ve ended up putting pressure on myself to fix all the things that are wrong with me. My goals have included losing weight, exercising more, doing a better job of keeping in touch with people, and on and on—a long list of things I’m doing wrong.

But a couple of years ago, I started to change my outlook. Instead of treating myself like something broken that needed fixing, I began looking for my potential and making progress with the things I’m doing right. I wrote a post about it a while back, Looking for Potential. Do take a look as I think you’ll find it a kinder, gentler way of approaching the New Year.

So, as we go into this year, I want to encourage you to be kind to yourself, too. Instead of trying to fix a laundry list of shortcomings, perhaps you could look for where you’ve made progress over the last year and focus your energy there.

For example, let’s say you have a friend who you’ve avoided because her children are the same ages yours would have been and you can’t bear to see her. Maybe you ran into her last year and realized you’ve missed her company. Could you set a goal to reach out to her, give her a call or send a quick email note, maybe broach the topic of getting together?

Or perhaps you’ve been reading this blog for a while or working your way through my, or someone else’s, book and you’ve hit a spot where you feel stuck. Maybe a goal would be to find a therapist, counsellor, or support group and get some additional help.

This healing process takes time. Oh, man, does it take time! But progress is made by inching forward a little at a time. So, don’t try to take giant steps forward. Instead, be kind to yourself and take the tiniest, most doable step possible, something you can actually accomplish and feel good about.

How could you inch forward on your journey this year? What’s the smallest, no-sweat step you could take? Let us know in the comments, and if you need a little encouragement to take it, just ask.

For now, I wish for you a genuinely happy new year.

Our Stories: Ann B.

 

As told to Kathleen Guthrie Woods

Grieving is not a rational act, although I sense many of us try to treat it as such. “If I act ‘as if’…if I will myself to…today will be different!” And then we get hit with a fresh wave of loss and feel as though all of our sanity is washed away.

Ann B.* understands this all to well. Even though she and her husband made very reasoned choices about why they are childfree, she continues to be knocked down by the weight of her lost dreams and to feel ashamed of her sadness.

I get that. I think you do too.

Ann’s hopes for the new year may sound a lot like yours. If you’ve been in her shoes, I hope you’ll share some of your journey with her in the Comments. If you’re in her shoes today, I hope Ann’s words remind you that you are not alone.

I want to wish you all a Happy New Year!, but that doesn’t feel quite right. Instead, my wish for you is that this new year comes with healing moments of gratitude, grace, and peace.

LWB: Describe your dream of motherhood.

Ann: I always wanted to be a mother. I work in elementary school education. I am surrounded by children in my personal and professional life. Most of all, I wanted to hold to my husband’s child in my arms. It was not to be.

LWB: Are you childfree by choice, chance, or circumstance?

Ann: Chance and choice. By chance: I have a medical condition, which, when well-controlled, does not interfere with my ability to live a full and happy life. By choice: I decided that the risk to my health (of pregnancy, which may exacerbate my condition), the risk to a fetus of birth defects (caused by medication I take for the condition), and the risk to my husband (of potentially caring for an unwell wife and a baby with special needs) was too great. We consulted many doctors and, ultimately, realized that having children was too risky.

LWB: Where are you on your journey now?

Ann: I am in denial about the need to grieve the loss of motherhood. I feel ashamed of my sadness, which comes in waves. I don’t believe I deserve to grieve because this was my decision, and life does not owe me anything. I know that life is full of hard choices and varying circumstances. I choose to stay busy to keep the depth of sadness at bay.

LWB: What’s the hardest part for you about not having children?

Ann: It changes. I go through phases of mourning losses. For example, never experiencing pregnancy or childbirth, never naming a baby, never seeing my husband’s character strengths passed on, never feeling pride at a concert, and the lack of rituals/milestones that accompany children. Other times, I feel less significant, less loving, less generous, and less deserving than women who balance the demands of motherhood. I find myself apologizing and downplaying my life experiences in conversation with mothers.

LWB: What have you learned about yourself?

Ann: I’ve learned that feelings are illogical and can’t be controlled by planning, research, or intellectual reasoning. It’s possible to feel guilt and shame about something that I still believe was the right and responsible decision. I’ve learned that feelings of loss will keep resurfacing until I am brave enough to face them and feel them.

LWB: What’s one thing you want other people to know about your being childfree?

Ann: “I have the humanity, compassion, and time to be your village. I have skills, experience, and knowledge to support your parenting journey. Don’t underestimate my capacity to love or serve your family. Please trust me and let me lighten your load.”

LWB: How do you answer “Do you have kids?”

Ann: “No”. Sometimes, this is followed by an awkward beat of silence because I haven’t prepared a short, socially appropriate 10-word explanation. I don’t want to make others feel that they have caused offense. I know it is a form of small talk; it is a friendly, genuine inquiry. I want to honor their intentions and guide the conversation to a place that is comfortable for all. However, I’m not there yet. I feel pain every time I hear the question.

LWB: What is your hope for yourself this coming year?

Ann: I would like to face my grief and stop denying the pain. I would like to use the grieving process to move towards healing.

 

*We allow each contributor to choose another name, if she wishes, to protect her privacy.

What are your hopes for yourself in this coming new year? We can all benefit from hearing about your experiences, plus we’d like to support you. Please visit the Our Stories page to get more information and the questionnaire, and consider sharing your story with women who truly understand what you’re going through.

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

 

 

Resetting Holiday Expectations

By Lisa Manterfield

“Are you the adult you dreamed of becoming?”

I laughed when I read this question on Facebook. No! Of course I’m not. The adult I dreamed of was an international engineering consultant, living in a large house with a circular driveway, with a fabulous husband and four beautiful children, including one set of twins.

Aside from the fabulous husband, that adult is almost the polar opposite of the adult I am now. I’m a writer, who works from my very small rented beach cottage, and of course, there are no children in my picture. And yet, once I stop to consider my friend’s question, I realize that I’m a lot happier as this adult than I would have been had my expectations been met. I’ve met the person I’d once dreamed of becoming; she wasn’t a very happy person and she definitely had more grey hairs than me.

Half the battle of coming-to-terms with a life without children is letting go of our expectations—and creating new ones. This is never more true than during the holiday season, one of the most difficult times of the year to be childless.

When I think of my expectations of what Christmas should be like as an adult, those four children are always there, gathered around the tree, gathered around the dinner table, and then gathered around me as the day comes to a close. Even when I realized that children wouldn’t be part of my life, I still strived to make Christmas live up to my expectations. Consequently, Christmastime was very sad time for a number of years. I knew there was no way my expectations could be met, and eventually I stopped making an effort to celebrate.

The worst year was when my husband and I found ourselves sitting at home, with no Christmas tree, no plans, no celebration, and we knew we’d allowed our lack of children to take over our lives. We also realized it was time to set new, more realistic expectations.

When I took a step back and looked at what I really wanted for Christmas, not on the surface of gifts, family, and decorations, but on a deeper emotional level, I discovered that my spiritual wish list included love, peacefulness, companionship, and a good dose of silly fun. I needed to explore new ways to get what I really wanted.

It took a couple of false starts to find a new way to celebrate Christmas, but a couple of years ago we nailed it. Mr. Fab and I rented an apartment for three days in a nearby beach town. We celebrated on Christmas Eve with a lovely dinner at an historic hotel with an enormous Christmas tree, roving carolers, and even an outdoor ice rink (in Southern California!). On Christmas Day, instead of sitting at home feeling sad about a pathetic Christmas for two, we went to the zoo, like a couple of big kids, and had a whale of a time. I even got to feed a rhino and have an ice cream. We both agreed it was the best Christmas we’ve had for a long time, plus there were no tantrums or mountains of dirty dishes to deal with.

It’s hard to let go of our expectations, especially when they’re often so deeply engrained, but if you’re struggling to find your holiday cheer this year, I encourage you to look beneath the obvious losses and examine what’s really missing for you. Even if you can’t meet your tangible expectations of what the holidays should be, you might be surprised to find you can satisfy your true needs in unconventional—and unexpected—ways.

Our Stories: Brandi

As told to Kathleen Guthrie Woods

I can always use a little bit of outside light as we head into the holidays and what for many of us who are childless-not-by-choice is a cold and dark season of the soul. Brandi gave me that light of hope when she shared her story with me. Forty years old and happily married for 16, Brandi endured over 10 years of the infertility nightmare. When her husband told her he couldn’t do it any more, she made the choice to build a new Plan B life with him, one that was childless.

 After “a long climb out of the pit of despair”, she is able to state (and here’s where she knocks my socks off): “I have accepted that I am a childless woman, but I do not identify as childfree.” Since her decision, she has filled her life with children, other people’s children, and has found what she calls the “bright side of infertility”.

Read her story below, then learn more about Brandi and her journey at her own website and blog, Not So Mommy.

LWB: Describe your dream of motherhood.

Brandi: I always thought I’d be just a good ol’ fashioned mom, with two kids, a husband, a dog, and a cat, living in my traditional house.  Even as a little girl, I toted my Cabbage Patch Kid around in a carrier on my chest. I didn’t dream of my wedding day, but I did dream about having a husband and kids.

LWB: Are you childfree by choice, chance, or circumstance?

Brandi: I am childless by chance. (Actually, I usually say I am childless-not-by-choice.) My husband and I suffer from severe infertility. I have endometriosis, and after seven failed IUIs [intrauterine insemination fertility treatments] and 10 years TTC [trying to conceive], my husband decided he didn’t want to keep trying. So, at the end of 2013, I began trying to accept my childless life.

LWB: Where are you on your journey now?

Brandi: I have accepted that I am a childless woman, but I do not identify as “childfree”. I have kids in my life (nieces, nephews, and an exchange daughter who has become family, plus our fur baby).

I started writing a blog, Not So Mommy, because I want to help others who are struggling in their childless journeys. I try very hard to focus on the good, so I write about the positive side of being infertile, childless, a dog mom, an aunt, a host mom, a wife, etc., and redefine what “momhood” means to me. When I was in the pit of despair and at my darkest moments, I never thought that I would come out of my infertility journey able to say that I am okay with being childless. But my life has turned out pretty well! I want others to know that there is hope, there is a light at the end of the struggle. I hope to continue to inspire others to embrace their authentic selves and live their imperfectly perfect lives.

LWB: What was the turning point for you?

Brandi: December 26, 2013. That was the day my husband told me he didn’t want to keep trying to have a baby, and he didn’t want to adopt either. He said he just wanted to enjoy our life like it was. Because I love my husband and could not imagine my life without him, I decided that I had to accept our childless life. So, I went into 2014 with the resolution to do just that. It was not an easy road, and I definitely had struggles (sometimes still do), but it was freeing to let go of one dream (having a baby) so that I could open myself up to other possibilities.

LWB: What’s the best part about not having children?

Brandi: The freedom to travel, the freedom to have spur-of-the-moment dates with my husband, the freedom to spoil our nieces and nephews because we don’t have to pay for college or braces or everyday expenses.

LWB: How do you answer “Do you have kids?”

Brandi: I’ve always been honest about my infertility. I never hid it even when we were going through our struggle and treatments, so, when people ask, I tell them that we can’t have children. I go on to explain that we have nieces, nephews, a fur baby, and have hosted an exchange student who has become family. We usually end up talking about dogs or they ask about our hosting experience. I hope it allows people to realize there are different ways to have children besides getting pregnant or adopting.

LWB: What is the best advice you’d offer someone else like you?

Brandi: Allow yourself to be open to a different dream. My husband and I never considered hosting a foreign exchange student until we met a student and her host mom at a cooking class. Deciding to host a student turned out to be the BEST thing that ever happened in our life! God answered our prayers, but His answer looked different than we expected.

 

Won’t you share your story with us? The act of answering the questions itself can be very healing, plus we’d like to support you by telling you “You are not alone.” Please visit the Our Stories page to get more information and the questionnaire.

Kathleen Guthrie Woods is mostly at peace with her childlessness.