Reading “Living the Life Unexpected” While Living the Life Unexpected!
Last night I dreamed I was gearing up for another round of IVF. I woke in a confused haze of hopeful energy and laughable self-realisation that at 56 years old, I’d not be self-injecting hormones any time soon but rather rubbing them on my skin in a menopausal attempt to retain my humanity!
It wasn’t until lunchtime, when the news re-ran an item that I’d seen last night about a groundbreaking innovation in IVF that helped certain genetic diseases, that I realised what had sparked the dream. The article interviewed a sixteen-year-old girl with the genetic condition. When she said she was looking forward now to motherhood, it made me immensely sad. Sad for her, in case other factors came into play that thwart her dreams of motherhood, and sad for me because I’d spend so many years chasing down that same dream only to have to let go of it.
It’s fourteen years since I gave up trying to be a mother, and I’m disappointed that there are moments when I still weep about it. Most of the time, I’m fine. Most of the time. But boy, when it snags – it hurts.
That’s why writing “Barren” has been so good for me. It gave me space to grieve, to reshape and rebuild. But better than that, something completely unexpected has happened because of “Barren”. Since the launch of the book, the response has been phenomenal. People, friends and strangers alike have contacted me to tell me how they’ve connected with the book and to share their stories– it’s been a privilege to hear them.
Because of “Barren”, I’ve also been introduced to a whole new world of non-mother women via the wonderful force of nature that is Jody Day. After she’d read a copy of “Barren” sent to her by my amazing publicist, Yvonne Reddin, Jody sent me an email with the subject heading, “Your book Barren – I loved it.” What a joy that email was to get, but even more exciting was that Jody wanted a Zoom meeting to talk about the possibility of my collaborating with the work she does for childless elderwomen or Nomo Crones, as Jody calls us. I was totally up for that, but first I wanted to read her book!
When I was back in the trenches of “trying to conceive” (TTC), we didn’t have social media as we know it now. But there were chat rooms, forums, and blogs that talked about infertility treatments and trying to become a mother, which, let’s face it, was great, since no one else seemed to want to talk about it. But I couldn’t bear to read the posts from women like me who were TTC. What I was dealing with was too hard to bear, to witness others’ pain at the same time. It was a case, too, of admitting to myself that I might not be a mother, ever, and I also knew that if any of the other people in those chat rooms did announce good news, I didn’t have it in me to be happy for them past my bulging sorrow and fear. I hated myself for that, on top of the long list of things I already had jotted down. Since then, I’d steered clear of self-help style writing, but something about Jody’s emails–the blend of pragmatism, warmth and sense of humour–led me to a safe place, and before we met on Zoom, I started reading her book – “Living the Life Unexpected”.
[image error]Straight away, I was gripped by hope in her opening chapters when she says, “…maybe there’s a life waiting for you that you haven’t met yet.” I loved that she invited me to “…forgive my body…”
It was like she’d read my mind – yes, she’d read my book, but she’d written her book in 2013. And of course, she’d not read my mind, but had gone through the same thing as me at the same time. In the years since I gave up on being a mother, I’ve found I have a higher proportion of Nomo friends than most women. Perhaps because I wasn’t making friends at the school gates, seeking out people I could have conversations with that weren’t children-centric, and who had time to spend with me (until my friend’s children grew up and they drifted back to our friendships again), but we share something deeper. Jody phrased it beautifully when she said, “For all the kindness and empathy we childless women show others around us; for all the understanding and support we give to the mothers in our lives and communities; for all the talk about children and childrearing we sit through politely, unable to contribute to– sometimes it seems that the only ones who have any concept of the compromises, difficulties and losses of our own lives are other involuntarily childless women.”
Jody’s book is a textbook on acceptance, grieving and healing. She’s brave, stating what needs to be aired in public, examined and held, regardless of how badly it hurts –– in fact, she gives us a permission to hurt that I feel has been denied to us. But goodness did this line hit home for me: “…we will never have children, never be a mother, never be a grandmother. That the millions of years of genetic feats of survival that created us stop here. That when we die, we die more absolutely than someone who knows that they ‘live on’ in their children.”
We all know someone who is childless. We all need to read this book. We all need to understand this taboo subject and drag it into the light. And not only that, but I love the way Jody encourages us all to value mothers and non-mothers alike – all women have value!
As the book moves the reader through various concepts and stages of accepting the life they have, and allowing us to feel our losses, it becomes a beacon of hope and a call to action to bring our own sense of meaning to our lives.
I was glad that I hadn’t read this before I wrote “Barren”, happy in the knowledge that “Barren” echoes a lot of the sentiments, but these ideas organically came from what I’d learned about my own situation in life. It’s validating to see them cited and proposed elsewhere. Jody encourages us to be “…ourselves, finding and creating a life of meaning is a gift to those around us and to the wider world.” When I read this next line, “They shine in a way that others don’t, and they give courage and hope to all they meet.’ I made a note beside it – This is what I want to be!
Creativity has been my salvation in facing a childless life, and I wasn’t surprised when Jody addressed it, reminding me of my favourite quote about writing from Frank McGuinness, “the joy of creating that which has never before existed.” But Jody said it better as, “Bringing into being something that would never have existed had you not been alive.” Those last five words being so utterly life-affirming as to spring tears of joy!
I finished “Living the Life Unexpected” by Jody Day, feeling uplifted, hopeful and mostly proud of myself for carrying infertility, laying it down and opening it up to the world in “Barren”. As this last quote suggests and grants us permission to do – “Talking about our childlessness and the impact it’s had on our lives without shame or apology. We have a right to be sad. We have a right to our stories…”
So if you are a Nomo, or know a Nomo (i.e pretty much everyone then) I recommend you read “Living the Life Unexpected” by Jody Day or look up her work on https://gateway-women.com/ and I promise you will be inspired but more importantly, fortified for those times when life creeps up and unexpectedly kicks you in the butt!
Byddi Lee
