Jody, what an excellent, insightful post that I think all mothers and childless people should read. I loved your poignant The Guardian article, too. (BTW, I think JD Vance is horrible, believing that a woman's job is to solely to have children.)
As you know, I am a mom through adoption of a girl from China. I think moms who abandon their …
Jody, what an excellent, insightful post that I think all mothers and childless people should read. I loved your poignant The Guardian article, too. (BTW, I think JD Vance is horrible, believing that a woman's job is to solely to have children.)
As you know, I am a mom through adoption of a girl from China. I think moms who abandon their childless friends are not true friends. Many of my friends -- male and female -- don't have children, and I have had strong, continued friendships with them.
In an interesting twist of fate, I belonged to a breast cancer survivor support group of childless women and am no longer friends with them. Here's the ironic part: when I announced I was planning to adopt, each one rejected me. One woman told me that my dream for a child was not meant to come true. Another woman agreed.
Childless people should not be ostracized. Our society does so much damage when it deems that motherhood is the be-all and end-all for everyone. It is not. All we each can do is live our lives to the fullest and try our best to understand each other.
Oh my, the rejection from your breast cancer survivor group made me gasp with pain! An old colleague of mine, who also lost her fertilty to cancer at a young age, said that she found so much empathy and support for her cancer and post-cancer journey, and absolutely zero for her childlessness... but things can change... 50 years ago cancer was a big taboo in society. Perhaps that has changed as treatments have evolved and so there is some 'hope' (damn, humans are addicted to hope, but that's for another post!) but permenent involuntary childlessness is not 'fixable'... perhaps your rejection was in part based on their unconsicous anger that you had 'found a way' out of that, although I know from many adoptive mothers that adoption does not 'fix' biological childlessness, but rather offers a different route to parenthood... but that adoptive parents aren't 'allowed' to talk about that. (Yet more disenfranchised grief!) xx
Thank you so much for your kindness. Of course, adoption has its own set of complexities that I could write a book about! Yes, the empathy and support your colleague experienced for her cancer, but not her childlessness was really unfair.
It's interesting that hope and cancer are often intertwined. I get annoyed at the trope of the brave, smiling breast cancer warrior. In the U.S. October is breast cancer awareness month and it sucks. We are all aware but where's the cure?
Jody, what an excellent, insightful post that I think all mothers and childless people should read. I loved your poignant The Guardian article, too. (BTW, I think JD Vance is horrible, believing that a woman's job is to solely to have children.)
As you know, I am a mom through adoption of a girl from China. I think moms who abandon their childless friends are not true friends. Many of my friends -- male and female -- don't have children, and I have had strong, continued friendships with them.
In an interesting twist of fate, I belonged to a breast cancer survivor support group of childless women and am no longer friends with them. Here's the ironic part: when I announced I was planning to adopt, each one rejected me. One woman told me that my dream for a child was not meant to come true. Another woman agreed.
Childless people should not be ostracized. Our society does so much damage when it deems that motherhood is the be-all and end-all for everyone. It is not. All we each can do is live our lives to the fullest and try our best to understand each other.
Thank you for another thought-provoking article.
Oh my, the rejection from your breast cancer survivor group made me gasp with pain! An old colleague of mine, who also lost her fertilty to cancer at a young age, said that she found so much empathy and support for her cancer and post-cancer journey, and absolutely zero for her childlessness... but things can change... 50 years ago cancer was a big taboo in society. Perhaps that has changed as treatments have evolved and so there is some 'hope' (damn, humans are addicted to hope, but that's for another post!) but permenent involuntary childlessness is not 'fixable'... perhaps your rejection was in part based on their unconsicous anger that you had 'found a way' out of that, although I know from many adoptive mothers that adoption does not 'fix' biological childlessness, but rather offers a different route to parenthood... but that adoptive parents aren't 'allowed' to talk about that. (Yet more disenfranchised grief!) xx
Thank you so much for your kindness. Of course, adoption has its own set of complexities that I could write a book about! Yes, the empathy and support your colleague experienced for her cancer, but not her childlessness was really unfair.
It's interesting that hope and cancer are often intertwined. I get annoyed at the trope of the brave, smiling breast cancer warrior. In the U.S. October is breast cancer awareness month and it sucks. We are all aware but where's the cure?