I love this piece : What Women Without Kids Are Teaching This Mom (though the headline is horribly clumsy – we can ALL teach each other, learn from each other).
Having children is the overwhelming norm, because the vast majority of adults are parents (as it says in the piece, very often without making a choice at all), and therefore there are so many assumptions about how it is NOT to have children, so many people who think they know what it must be like for us.
People who are now parents sometimes assume they know what it is like to not to be a parent because at one time they were not parents.
In my experience the place of having wanted to be a mother (and it not happening) is NOTHING like the before-wanting time.
And … yes, we did want children (very much). No it didn’t happen (cancer, miscarriage, IVF with pre-chemo-embryos that all failed), and yes there are losses that are ongoing. As there are in ANY life. There are also great things and wonderful possibilities. As there are in EVERY life.
Being a parent doesn’t make anyone any more empathetic, any more generous, any less selfish than not. (I never understand when people say “I didn’t realise how selfish I was until I had children” – really? Did you really think the world revolved around you before you were a parent? That’s pretty sad if it’s true.) There are awful parents who are horribly selfish, and there are utterly unselfish non-parents. There are people who start every second phrase with “as a mum/dad etc” – as if a) it’s not common and most people aren’t one of those things and b) as if people without children don’t remember what it was like to be a child. We’ve ALL been children.
Most lives are parenting lives at some point. Some aren’t. Every life matters. We can all learn from each other.
(If you want more, here’s a lengthier version of the same, from a few years ago. I still think all of these points are valid, and it has a link to a great piece by my Mrs.)
Not Writing But Blogging 
Beautifully said. I have also found that parenting doesn’t make you a better person (it certainly had no effect on my parents); it challenges you to question yourself – the answers are up to you. I was lucky to have one child and mourned the fact I couldn’t have more. A wise doctor finally said to me,”There are many ways to be a mother.” That sentence changed my life.
LikeLike
And I heard the same, from a fellow Buddhist. There are many way to parent and to care. (Annoyingly, our world fixates on a couple! But yes, we can be more.) thank you. X
LikeLike
Thank you thank you thank you for writing this, and putting it so positively & non-angrily. I can still get upset, defensive and even angry at some of the assumptions people make about my apparent choices – which have never really been active choices, actually.
I think part of the problem is that there are very few stories about women who don’t bear children, and of the very few there are, most of them are about ugly, angry, wicked women – witches, indeed.
LikeLike
yes, the lack of stories about non-mothering women is def part of the problem. and why we need to create our own.
LikeLike
Thank you for writing this, it reflects the way I feel and was so refreshing to read. I haven’t had children and amongst other dismissive assumptions have been told I don’t understand because I’m not a parent. As you say, we have all been children…. I think facing my own demons has been one of the toughest challenges.
LikeLike
thank you for saying so, Anne.
LikeLike
What a poignant and important piece. I have so much to say on this. Living out here in Dar, as a diplomats’s wife ( a newly married wife at arhat!) The first question I’m always asked is do you have kids. I always think it’s such a personal question and it always erks me a bit, I never feel okay to answer it. The idea that I may not have children seems to be an alien concept, yet it really isn’t. Not in my heart anyway. Thank you again xx
LikeLike
thank you darling. so odd that anyone would think it ok to ask about something as huge and life-changing (life-making!) as having children, and yet it seems very common too … love to you both. xx
LikeLike