Life Without Baby

filling the silence in the motherhood discussion

Whiny Wednesday: MIA…Missing in Motherhood

Over the past two years of writing this blog I’ve crossed paths with lots of women trying to come to terms with being childfree. Some people find the blog and stay for the community; some come and post a comment or two, never to be heard from again.

I’ve also really connected  with a lot of readers. They’ve left insightful or funny comments and I’ve enjoyed getting to know them a little.

Some are still regular readers, however a couple have suddenly left, and I’ve thought, “Oh good for them; they’ve moved on. That’s great.”

For some reason, maybe feeling nostalgic about the early days of the blog, I was looking over some old posts this week and followed up on a couple of bloggers I hadn’t heard from in a while, just to see what’s going on with them.

Turns out, they’re busy having babies.

I’m not really complaining about this, so perhaps this doesn’t belong on Whiny Wednesday. But it’s left me feeling funny. I’m not sad and I’m not envious. I’m not hurt or feeling deserted. I’m happy for them, but not happy enough to send a note of congratulations. I just am. I’m here; they’re there; our paths crossed briefly, and then we went our separate ways. That’s life, I guess.

Whiny Wednesday: Charity Case

It’s happened again. I’ve been offered a child for adoption. Unfortunately, this “child” is the adult black sheep of the family, a young man who has so disappointed his own mother that she’s willing to give him away to a charitable cause, i.e., me.

I’m fairly sure (although not 100 percent certain) that this woman was kidding when she said, “You can have one of mine,” but even so, I can’t help being totally insulted by her suggestion that I am so desperate to be a mother that I’d take her seriously damaged goods.

It’s Whiny Wednesday. What’s rubbing you the wrong way this week?

Uncovering Grief: How Does Grief Feel to You?

By Shannon Calder

Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak whispers the o’er-fraught heart and bids it break.

~ William Shakespeare

What is grief?

First you have to decide that you have lost something. This is sometimes where people get stuck. A patient said to me, “I am losing my keys constantly.” Knowing this patient’s situation I asked, “What have you really lost?” This was a moment of realization for her. I saw it in the stunned way she looked at me. Her reply was “my hope.”

Sometimes loss is obvious and sometimes it is not.  Simply, you need to step out of your resistance and denial or simple unconsciousness, decide you have lost something, something you needed, something you need to grieve.

Paula D’Arcy, author of When People Grieve wrote, “Grief is the heart’s response to any deep loss.” I would argue that the most obvious home for grief is the heart but that grief is housed in our body, spirit, mind and soul. This is how someone can lose something and not be conscious of their need to grieve for it. Be mindful of your inside landscape and you will be mindful of what it needs.

For me grief feels like something inside of me is trying to drown me and the one thing that kept me from drowning is the thing I have just lost. Then, a sense of powerlessness pervades. I know that grief will not drown me literally and that I am not powerless literally however, my imagination knows what it knows.

How does grief feel to you?

I would like to suggest you not only use your words for this. Words are often where most of us feel quite comfortable and they also get us up in our brains. We’re looking for what gets us down in our gut, in our soul.

So I’m going to suggest you share your words here in the comment section but perhaps those words can describe your process of what your grief looks like, feels like, smells like, etc. You can look in magazines for pictures, on television for characters or movies that touch this deeper emotion in you, look for art work or artists, athletics, pieces of music and don’t forget pieces of music without words, those pieces that touch you in that guttural way.

If you become afraid, step out of the place you are in with these sensory triggers and breathe into a single breath of consciousness within you and do something comforting or even ritualistic like checking your email, something that gets you back into your brain. Then when you feel like working with grief again, go back to your senses.

And please, let us all know what you did and how it went.

Be Well,

Shannon

Resource:

Paula D’Arcy, author of When People Grieve, is an internationally known expert in grief counseling and pulls from her personal resources of having lost her husband and daughter

Happy Leap Day

It’s Leap Day, the day when tradition states that a woman can propose to a man…and he has to accept. If I wasn’t already married to Mr. Fab, I would snag him today. We’re going on for eight years (a record relationship for me, I might add) and despite his numerous flaws, I wouldn’t swap him for anyone, not even Leonardo DiCaprio (although I’d give it serious consideration before turning Leo down.)

We talked recently about how things might have worked out differently if we’d met sooner. Perhaps we might have been able to have children, then again, perhaps we wouldn’t. I’ll never know. But the time we spent before we met has made us the people we are today, and maybe if we’d met when we were younger, we wouldn’t have been ready for one another. Again, we’ll never know.

But my husband also acknowledges that if we’d met in a different time and place he wouldn’t have had his two children, and he wouldn’t change that for anything. So, I guess my whine for today is that I can’t begrudge him that…even if I really want to.

It is Whiny Wednesday. What’s irking you today?

Family Support

I talked to some of my family back in the UK this weekend, as I often do, and it struck me after I’d hung up how lucky I am to have the family I have.

I have two older brothers, both of whom have kids­­–my fabulous nieces and nephews. My mum is a good grandma, but I know she would have enjoyed playing the grandma role to the children of her only daughter.

I think there’s a bond that happens between a mother and daughter when the elder woman gets to pass along her knowledge and experience.  My mum didn’t get to do that, and it saddens me, even though I think she’s ok with the situation. My mother is nothing, if not pragmatic about the things life hands out.

I’m lucky because I’ve never felt pressure from my family with regards to children. I’ve heard the occasional insensitive comment, but I know those weren’t meant to hurt me, and probably said because of an uncomfortable situation where there really wasn’t anything better that could have been said.

But I know that other people aren’t so lucky, and that their families don’t understand at all why they don’t just keep trying to have a baby, why they can’t just put the failed attempts and losses behind them and try again.  It’s hard to explain to someone that you have to stop trying for the sake of your own sanity and that making the decision doesn’t lessen the desire for children.

So, I’m curious to hear how your families have handled your situation. Have they been supportive? Do they understand what you’ve been through and the decisions you’ve made? Or has your not having children caused a fissure in your family?  And how have you handled that? Let me know.

Whiny Wednesday

Forgive me for the sketchy details of this whine, but I’m trying to smudge the lines so that the guilty party doesn’t recognize herself is she passes this way.

When I tell people I don’t have children, why do some of them automatically assume that I never wanted kids, don’t like kids, and am therefore just not a very nice person? And why do they then go on to “educate” me about related subjects that it’s clear they know absolutely nothing about?

Perhaps it’s my fault for not spelling out my infertility for them, but frankly, that’s none of their business.

It’s Whiny Wednesday. Let it all hang out, sisters.

Uncovering Grief

This week, I’m very pleased to introduce a new Guest Blogger.

Shannon Calder is a psychotherapist, specializing in grief and loss. In this, her new column, she’ll be addressing some of the issues many of us are facing as we look towards a life without children. I hope you’ll find her guidance helpful.

Uncovering Grief

By Shannon Calder

“If we carry our storms like actors pretending to be brave, each swallowed tear will fill our hearts like a bag of stones.”

– Alison Asher

Grief is a sacred time, a sacred act and it is the way we honor the importance of what we lost. The amount of grief we feel is in direct proportion to the importance of the person or idea we have lost. It is an honor to grieve.

My name is Shannon and I am a psychotherapist and a survivor of grief. I phrase it that way because surviving something indicates that it is still with you, in you, but that you pulled through and gained strength and meaning from it. I am here to remind you that grief does not evaporate, but like the wind, it breezes in and then recedes, leaving you to respond in its wake. How fast it recedes and how much havoc it wreaks on your life is the result of how you respond to it. I am here to help you with that and to listen, because grief is with us no matter how long ago we lost something or someone.

I am all for moving on, moving up, moving around, being positive and letting go. Every now and then I may discuss these very ideas. However, my purpose, whether it is on this blog or in my profession, is to address where people are in the moment and to speak to who lives and breathes underneath the persona that we show the world. I think we can agree that we don’t always feel like moving on, letting go or being positive.

Frankly, I don’t think putting happy pants on everyone and sending them back out into the world does them, their spouses, or the drivers next to them any good. It leads to repressed, angry, sad, grief-filled folks running into or running over each other unconsciously.

Do not misunderstand me. In your life, away from this discussion, it is a brilliant idea to have a stiff upper lip in most situations. But in this discussion with me, or anyone else on this blog, and hopefully with the people you trust the most, invest in the emotions that come with grief and give them the attention they deserve. If you are honest with yourself and others about what you feel, they can give you what you deeply need.

This is my not so subtle call to arms to those of you who are grappling with grief. If you are having trouble deciding what you feel, figuring out if you’re grieving, then that is completely valid and we can address that. I want to encourage you to do as Alison Asher says and “soar straight into the storm,” but only do this if you have a lifeboat. I hope that this column, the resources discussed here and the exercises we try can be your lifeboat, along with the friends and family you find here on this blog and in your life. Rally your resources and bring them close to you.

Please write to me with questions and/or your stories. I will attempt to address many of them in this column.

Be well,

Shannon

Contact me at: Shannon [AT] lifewithoutbaby [DOT] com

Resource:

Alison Asher wrote Soaring into the Storm, a lovely book about anyone facing adversity. She interviewed people of all ages and backgrounds who endured tragedy and came out strong. She is an artist and a poet and she survived the loss of a child.

Whiny Wednesday: Parenting Radar

I’m whining at myself today and the bad attitude I’ve developed towards parents, or more precisely, towards parenting.

Listening to the radio on Sunday morning, I heard an interview with a author who’d written a book about parenting in France. She was saying how “amazed” she was to see French children sitting quietly at the dining room table, eating what was put in front of them, and entertaining themselves for hours with a simple toy.

In a second, my mind flashed through all the times I’d witnessed “bad American parents” and their out-of-control offspring, and before I knew it I was off, stomping around the house spitting vitriol at the radio and the poor unsuspecting author (who, fortunately couldn’t hear me.)

But my husband heard me, and gave me one of his, “Oh, no, where can I hide before she turns on me” looks. It was enough to cool my jets, stop for a while and listen quietly to what the (very nice) author had to say.

I apologized to my husband, and skulked off to have a talk with myself and try to figure out where this ire comes from, when it comes. It doesn’t come often, not any more, but it does come, boy, does it come with a vengeance.

I don’t hate parents (I’ve had two of my own and they were great) and I don’t resent parents, I don’t think, but this anger is hiding inside me somewhere, and when it bubbles up, it scares the heck out of me…not to  mention my poor husband.

Anyway, it’s Whiny Wednesday today, so now’s a good time to let your anger out to play for a while.

Awareness

I’m not sure if it’s the same where you live, but if you happen to be in the U.S., you’ll already be into several weeks of red and pink window displays and newspaper ads for romantic dinners, and great prices on jewelry and red roses. Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day, and like so many holidays, it’s become a huge commercial venture here.

Despite my somewhat curmudgeonly attitude towards Hallmark holidays, I would ordinarily be taking the opportunity to wish you a Happy Valentine’s Day.

But my resistance comes from somewhere deeper than a distaste for over-commercialism. Now that I am not going to be a mother, I have a more highly tuned awareness of the minefield of global holiday greetings. I know how hurtful it can be for a stranger to glibly wish me a happy Mother’s Day, not realizing what a painful thing that is for me to hear.

Because of this, I now appreciate that by wishing “Happy Valentine’s Day” to everyone I meet, I could inadvertently be reminding that person of what they don’t have. And I know how that feels. Shouldn’t Valentine’s Day, like Mother’s Day, be a personal exchange between the two involved parties?

So, I won’t be broadcasting a Happy Valentine’s Day message here. But instead, I wish you love and I wish you someone good to share your life with, whatever that means to you. If you have that love, cherish it. And if you don’t have it, I hope you find it soon.

Wishing you love today, in whatever form it comes.

With Eyes of Faith…Not Easily Offended

By Dorothy Williams

 

“Love is patient, love is kind…

it is not quick-tempered,

it does not brood over injury…”

 

1 Corinthians 13:4-5

Can you tell when someone is bragging about their kids versus just sharing joy and being amazed by life? I thought I could, until I visited with an old friend I had not seen in twenty years.

Our luncheon started innocently enough as we sipped drinks while waiting for a table. We caught up on what happened after leaving school and where we landed in our careers. When we spoke of children, I revealed how keenly I felt the loss of my dream to have a family. My friend seemed to understand and, after sharing her joy over having two children, turned the conversation to her husband and the dog.

Then we reached our table. And then her merlot kicked in.

As my companion launched into a monologue about her son­ – that would last our entire meal – waves of shock and panic washed over me. I was about to learn just how smart Junior is, the great Ivy League school he got into, their wonderful times together when she watched him play sports, the awards he won, the private jokes they shared – well, you can imagine the rest.

What part of my struggle did she not get?  I considered my choices. I could indulge in a range of emotions popping like hot kernels in my consciousness, or I could load them onto tiny boats in a cosmic river, and watch them slip away. I chose that, and relaxed into a Christian form of meditation, called Centering Prayer. With a deep, cleansing breath, I secretly called on the Lord for what I needed and then…just…let…go…to focus on a prayer word.

At some point, the momzilla took a breath and said, “I am so sorry to keep talking about my son like this, but I miss him so terribly since he left for school!”

Ah, there it was.  My long-lost friend was not intentionally trying to offend me, but instead grieving the loss of her best friend. When he left for the east coast, a huge void opened up in her life. Talking about him – remembering the good times – made it seem smaller.  It also explained why we were reconnecting after twenty years. If I had allowed my indignation to rise up, our reunion would not have been the gift God intended.

Is it getting easier for you to tell if a gabby friend is bragging or experiencing something else? What helps you get through tense situations like this?

Dorothy Williams lives near Chicago.  She met with her old friend for a second lunch and they had such a good time that they now plan to meet monthly for activities like walking and kayaking.