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Life Without Baby Workbook 1: Letting Go of the Dream of Motherhood
We live in a goal-driven culture, where we’re taught to dream big, set goals, and never, never give up hope. But when it comes to dreams of a family, the playing field changes dramatically. Wanting a baby goes way beyond setting a goal and striving to reach it, and the factors that push us towards that goal are numerous and complicated.
In the first of a four-part Life Without Baby series, author and blogger Lisa Manterfield guides you through what may be one of the most difficult decisions you will ever have to make: choosing to let go of the dream of motherhood and moving towards accepting a life without children. Sharing her own story and wisdom gained from the worldwide Life Without Baby community, Manterfield gently guides you to discover when it’s time to let go, how to create a meaningful ending to an indefinite journey, and how to begin making peace with a life without children. Most of all, she offers hope, support, and the affirmation that you are not going through this alone.
“Page by page, Lisa holds your hand with gentle, unflinching support, openly sharing her story with you, and giving you permission, guidance, and gentle queries that help in your journey of healing. I only wish that when people called their reproductive endocrinologists’ offices to tell them that they were “drawing a line in the sand” that the doctors were honor-bound by the Hippocratic Oath to send their patients a copy of this wonderful guidebook.”
~Tracey Cleantis, author of
The Next Happy: Let Go of the Life You Planned and Find a New Way Forward
“Many women end fertility workups and failed treatments lost in a maze of murky what ifs and lacking a sense of direction. With a calm, clear voice Lisa Manterfield distills hard-won knowledge into a much needed framework. Readers will take away valuable insights and—through useful exercises—find a way to put competing desires and raw emotions into context and construct a path forward.”
~Pamela Mahoney Tsigdinos, author Silent Sorority
In the first of a four-part Life Without Baby series, author and blogger Lisa Manterfield guides you through what may be one of the most difficult decisions you will ever have to make: choosing to let go of the dream of motherhood and moving towards accepting a life without children. Sharing her own story and wisdom gained from the worldwide Life Without Baby community, Manterfield gently guides you to discover when it’s time to let go, how to create a meaningful ending to an indefinite journey, and how to begin making peace with a life without children. Most of all, she offers hope, support, and the affirmation that you are not going through this alone.
“Page by page, Lisa holds your hand with gentle, unflinching support, openly sharing her story with you, and giving you permission, guidance, and gentle queries that help in your journey of healing. I only wish that when people called their reproductive endocrinologists’ offices to tell them that they were “drawing a line in the sand” that the doctors were honor-bound by the Hippocratic Oath to send their patients a copy of this wonderful guidebook.”
~Tracey Cleantis, author of
The Next Happy: Let Go of the Life You Planned and Find a New Way Forward
“Many women end fertility workups and failed treatments lost in a maze of murky what ifs and lacking a sense of direction. With a calm, clear voice Lisa Manterfield distills hard-won knowledge into a much needed framework. Readers will take away valuable insights and—through useful exercises—find a way to put competing desires and raw emotions into context and construct a path forward.”
~Pamela Mahoney Tsigdinos, author Silent Sorority
49 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 6, 2014
About the author
Lisa Manterfield
12 books153 followersI’m Lisa Manterfield and I love telling stories.
I’m a curious cat and I’m fascinated by human behavior and what makes people tick.
I love fish-out-of-water stories of ordinary people in extraordinary situations, especially if those situations delve into the unexplained.
I love digging up nuggets of history—not the vast sweeping stories of events that changed the world, but the personal stories of people making their way through life while history happened around them.
Like many of my characters, I grew up in the north of England. Although my hometown of Sheffield is a big city, I fell head-over-heels in love with the surrounding countryside and spent most of my early years outdoors.
In school, I became my county’s orienteering champion, which means I was a whizz at navigating with a map and compass, and thrashing my way through mud and brambles.
These days, you’re more likely to find me riding my bike at the beach or running (slowly) the trails near my home in California.
I’ve always loved adventure. My first expedition happened when I was two years old and I escaped through a gap in the fence around my family’s house. Ever since, I’ve loved exploring, whether that means heading into the woods for a hike, traveling to new countries, learning a new skill, or escaping into a great book.
Some of my favorite adventures include hiking the Inca Trail in Peru, climbing a via ferrata in Italy, feeding a rhinoceros at the zoo, seeing elephants in the wild, performing in a play, teaching myself to play the bagpipes, learning to cook Indian food, canoeing down a river, and bicycling around Ireland.
Despite my love of adventure, most days you’ll find me in slippers, writing.
In my house, I am the fixer of all things broken and guardian of the bathtub spiders. I’m lucky enough to share my home with my lovely husband, and Felicity, my seriously over-indulged (and very curious) cat.
I’m a curious cat and I’m fascinated by human behavior and what makes people tick.
I love fish-out-of-water stories of ordinary people in extraordinary situations, especially if those situations delve into the unexplained.
I love digging up nuggets of history—not the vast sweeping stories of events that changed the world, but the personal stories of people making their way through life while history happened around them.
Like many of my characters, I grew up in the north of England. Although my hometown of Sheffield is a big city, I fell head-over-heels in love with the surrounding countryside and spent most of my early years outdoors.
In school, I became my county’s orienteering champion, which means I was a whizz at navigating with a map and compass, and thrashing my way through mud and brambles.
These days, you’re more likely to find me riding my bike at the beach or running (slowly) the trails near my home in California.
I’ve always loved adventure. My first expedition happened when I was two years old and I escaped through a gap in the fence around my family’s house. Ever since, I’ve loved exploring, whether that means heading into the woods for a hike, traveling to new countries, learning a new skill, or escaping into a great book.
Some of my favorite adventures include hiking the Inca Trail in Peru, climbing a via ferrata in Italy, feeding a rhinoceros at the zoo, seeing elephants in the wild, performing in a play, teaching myself to play the bagpipes, learning to cook Indian food, canoeing down a river, and bicycling around Ireland.
Despite my love of adventure, most days you’ll find me in slippers, writing.
In my house, I am the fixer of all things broken and guardian of the bathtub spiders. I’m lucky enough to share my home with my lovely husband, and Felicity, my seriously over-indulged (and very curious) cat.
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