BlogHer have featured my post "It gets easier" this week. You can see it here. I've even signed up properly to Twitter, though I don't use it so don't expect to see me there much! (@MaliNZ)
The article I flagged last month (interviewed for and quoted in) is now available on-line. Overall, I am okay with the quotes taken from our interview. I'm glad they decided to write something on the lives of women who live No Kidding lives, and that they noted the pressure to have children, the questions about "when" not "if" you will have children, the loaded assumptions about a woman without children.
In the original interview, the writer told me that the other women she had interviewed had been pressured to have children, with the argument that they should do so, because many women would love to have children but can't. We infertiles had been used as a guilt-trip on those women who chose not to have children. As if one group's ability or inability to have children affected the other. How ridiculous! So I liked that one of the other women commented that:
"women who consciously choose not to have children might make it easier for women who can’t have children by highlighting a range of possibilities for living a meaningful life without kids."
That's what I choose to do here. Regardless of which group we're in, all women who don't have children are subjected to the same pressures and judgements. So hopefully this article might have made even one or two people think differently. As the article says, it is about "opening dialogue about women’s right to choose what is best for them," and that we don't judge each other's lives, whether we are childfree by choice or not, whether we adopt or try IVF or not, whether we have children or not, we are all still women. And even in 2016, surely that is enough of a daily battle.
Great article, Mali! I agree that while there are distinctions between being childfree by choice or otherwise (which tend to get overlooked by "outsiders"), we do have much in common and can learn from each other.
ReplyDeleteSo much to chew on here. I've decided to riff further in my own blog post. Writing shortly and will link back to yours. Stay tuned!
ReplyDeleteWow. I had honestly never considered that this would happen ("We infertiles had been used as a guilt-trip on those women who chose not to have children). I'm so glad your eloquent self addressed such a non sequitur and other No Kidding aspects.
ReplyDeleteGreat article! Like Lori Lavender Luz, I had never considered the idea that the existence of infertile people could be used as a guilt trip on those who choose not to have children. Good that you and the other women interviewed were able to talk about some of these issues.
ReplyDeleteI love this! So glad that you posted the link to the article! You might have also convinced me to sign up for Twitter. LOL!
ReplyDeleteGreat article!!! Thank you for sharing the link with us :) I think the points you made were great ones and it is lovely to see an article that gives a very thoughtful look at women without children.
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