I know I only have about 3 readers, but if you read this and know someone that it would pertain to, please pass this info along.
On November 15th a group called Purple Women and Friends is asking child free women to blog about being child free in a child centric world. You can go to their site to learn more about the group and the 11/15 event.
So, even if you plan on being a parent some day, support someone that you know that's making a different choice!
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3 comments:
I just got a chance to read that link. PRE-PREGNANT?! Seriously? WTF? I didn't know that my only job in life was to pop out kids! I am with PBF on this one - wasn't there some movement back in the day to encourage women to be viewed more than as an incubation chamber?
There is another side to the "Child Atheist" and "Rabid Childmongers" debate that you're missing, Ms. J. I commend you on your blog and your views, but childrearing isn't nearly as black-and-white as you portray on your blog.
Hi, my name is Ken. I am a 35-year-old Systems Administrator from Virginia. I have not fathered any children with any women. Like you, I had no real desire to.
My wife is Victoria. She is a 37-year-old critical care nurse, born in Manila, but now an ACLS/PACU nurse at George Washington Hospital in DC and Kaiser Permanente in Virginia.
We married 7 years ago, we've known each other 9. Pursuing our careers, our house, our cars, and our lives, children weren't the horrible miscarriages of life you depict, but not something either of us wanted right away either. I used prophylactics. Vicky used contraceptives.
Here we are now, now in our mid/late 30's, and we'd like to have children. We're established, we're doing well, and we feel we'd make good parents (better than some that had children early). We both honestly want and desire children. We'd like a family. We'd like to share ourselves, our knowledge, and our desires with the continuation of our family.
After a decade of contraceptives and aging, health and reproductivity are not nearly so kind. "Popping out children" might be mindlessly easy for those in their teens and twenties, but nature is a harsh mistress to those in their 30's and 40's.
At parties and family gatherings, like you, we get harangued by those to whom children have come so easily. We see parents ignore their children, who seem to think that having another will be as easy as their first. We understand your feelings of "loin-fruit" and ignorant parents.
Besides us, one of your part-time readers had a difficult time too, but he's remaining silent. Everyone our age (30's/40's) has had multiple miscarriages and multiple needs for medical assistance. More friends of Mebbie than she might know has had difficulty.
I won't go into any more detail. You're welcome to email me. Meb knows a little more detail, but not much. Another of your readers knows far more. In short, we've seen doctors for over 5 years, gone through multiple medical procedures, and we refinanced our house to spend the TENS-of-THOUSANDS of dollars necessary to finance invitro fertilization (IVF).
God is neither cruel nor kind... for some people, it comes easily, for others it is heartbreaking. Don't be so glib about children just because you see a few A*HOLES who think that children come cheaply and easily.
We respect you for your decision not to have children. Please respect that there are people who sincerely try, who sincerely care, and who honor the decisions you make in life.
Kenneth & Victoria Foreman
Ummm, Ken? I think you misinterpreted the Childfree movement. I don't think that they are trying to reverse-discriminate against those who want kids, they merely want to eliminate some of the cultural assumptions that rattle around the mid-30's-and-up childless.
As someone in their mid-30's, with a conservative white-collar job, I feel this "discrimination" when I hang around my friends and colleagues. There's an assumption that to be without child is to be slightly less joined with the community. I understand it, but I wish people would question that assumption from time to time.
Whether or not you have difficulty conceiving a child has very little to do with the people who don't want to conceive one. I'm not sure how those people are disrespecting your intention to bring another human into the world. Next time, take a deep breath and can the diatribe, or at least divert it to your own blog, where it won't appear so much to be an attack on this blog. To date, you've always been polite in responses, but this one is a bit over the top.
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