progress
by rantywoman
Today I found out a 42-year-old friend is currently pregnant with her second baby, and it made me feel (once again) that damn it, I deserve this “me time” I’m currently enjoying. I’ve had to deal with so many blows over being childless, and now I’m reaping at least one of the benefits– time off and to myself.
Here’s another podcast of a fantastic panel discussion on childless women:
http://wow.southbankcentre.co.uk/events/so-you-dont-have-kids-now-what/
It’s amazing to me that a little over a year ago, when I started this blog, there wasn’t much out there in cyberspace on childless women. Gateway Women was one of the few sites I had was able to find, and it was just getting off the ground, with about ten blog posts.
Now there are a number of blogs and at least two public panel discussions of the issue. I like Jody Day’s comment that she doesn’t want subsequent generations of women to have to keep reinventing the wheel on this issue. Certainly this generation has had to do so, but it is great to see such progress.
thebitterbabe 
thanks for being one of the clearest voices out there on the topic.
Thanks for listening to the panel debate and sharing it. It felt like a really important conversation to be having out loud, and in public. It was great fun too! Thanks for being a champion of Gateway Women and, I concur with tidewater, as one of the clearest voices out there on the topic. Also, definitely the widest read. I learn so much from you! Jody x
Thank you, Jody. I feel like my readership has been declining but that may be because lots of other voices are coming forward, which is a good thing!
Still reading, or at least checking for updates every day. I assume readership must be a difficult thing to judge, since not all readers write a comment afterwards.
There’s actually a behind-the-scenes graph that gives you your numbers. WordPress has a bunch of nifty figures like that!
Ranty and Jody – you both rock ! 🙂 Just finished listening to the podcast – so nice to put a voice to Jody’s words….
I forgot to add – reading these blogs and listening to these conversations has been a bit of an initiatory experience for me these past few months.I mean that in an almost esoteric/sacred sense – lots of internal growth. I’ve mentioned my readings and musings to a friend of mine, but I found it hard to express the nourishment I was getting out of this experience without it sounding like I was fishing for sympathy (and maybe there was a bit of that too, who knows?)
I am not technically incapable yet of having kids, but the horizon is fast approaching and the finality of it all is really starting to sink in. And I’m coming to realize that I’m fine with it, that I may be more on the childfree than the childless side of the equation. This is not exactly news (in fact I do not think it would surprise any of my family or friends, as I’ve been openly ambivalent about motherhood since my teens) but until now I’ve been taking more of a fear/disappointment/low-self esteem approach to the issue (“I wouldn’t make a good Mom”, “no one loves me enough to partner and create a family”, I’ll die alone and barren” ) and not stopped to fully embrace what I ENJOY about the life I am leading as captain of my own ship, and what opportunities could lie ahead. And that I was perhaps just simply born this way! So much more to say, but I’ll stop my rant here…..:-)
Thanks for writing– I enjoyed hearing your thoughts about your journey. I’m glad that the blog is helping– writing it and hearing from readers has certainly helped me, and it’s so great that there are some podcasts out there on this issue now.