The world is made of communities – some larger than others, some better understood than others. There’s one community, though, that is harder to find than most, and more than a little misunderstood. It’s made up of women without children who, unlike their sisters (childfree by choice), didn’t set out to be non-moms.
I received what amounts to my membership kit to the non-mom club a few years ago after my fertility treatments failed to result in pregnancy.
I had been a secret member of the “trying to conceive” (or TTC) club for more than a decade, at a time when blogs didn’t exist and when the only support I could find was a soft-spoken counselor recommended by RESOLVE. My infertility secret made me feel like an outsider amid the boisterous and ever growing mommy-to-be community. While they openly rubbed their swelling bellies in anticipation of the birth of their child, I cringed and looked away. Their brazen stroking seemed mocking, insidious even. Yes, through the lens of infertility, that’s how what might seem a nonchalant, innocent gesture appears to a woman whose womb will be forever empty.
After a few years of wandering alone in a forest of naturally-occurring families, trying to reconcile the cruel fate that was my infertility, I found a compassionate community tucked away in a thicket. There amid the thorny underbrush was a population of women fighting various forms of infertility, freely offering support and good wishes. Amazed, I took a seat at the table and tentatively joined in the emotion-laden, sometimes rancorous discussions. It was a comforting echo chamber of sorts - familiar thoughts and experiences came at me from all sides. It allowed me to tap into and share some complex and long-suppressed ideas and emotions. I felt accepted and understood in a way that was lacking in my real life.
The dreamy state was interrupted when some fertility-challenged women joined the mother community after all – through successful treatment or adoption. It should not have been a surprise as many were pursuing aggressive treatments or were working through the mountain of paperwork and bureaucracy associated with adoption. A strangely familiar exclusion slowly made itself known. It wasn’t overt and it wasn’t uniformly in place, but it was there.
Women who themselves once railed against ostracism when no one was calling them “mom” became shape shifters. They reveled in their newfound motherhood, seemingly oblivious to their virtual belly stroking. They made it hard to read their posts, and made mewonder how they could forget so easily those still reminded, painfully, each month that children weren’t necessarily in the cards.
Still others who made their way toward parenthood noticeably pulled away from the never-to-be-moms. They still provided encouragement to those TTC, but their comments and support all but stopped coming once it was clear that the pursuit of parenthood was no longer the goal. It was as if those looking to pick up the pieces and carve out a life without once sought after children had a different form of cooties.
Some mothers after infertility simply didn’t seem to know what to make of their sisters. Do we scare them, I wonder? Do we embody a life they couldn’t bear to imagine? Or do we simply remind them of days they’d rather forget ever happened?
Infertile women who remain non-moms are a minority of a minority. What I do know is that we aren’t going away. Our voices, muted as they are among the more vocal mommy bloggers, still matter.
I also know that hard as it was to have the people in my real life put my infertility in the rear view mirror, it’s stranger still to feel abandoned by those who move on to mommy hood after hanging out in infertility land. We’ve never had any rules, no police enforcing the “do no harm” philosophy, but perhaps it’s worth a reminder to those who enter the infertility community looking for acceptance that they need to think about what sort of legacy they’ll leave as well.
That’s not to say all leave IF land for greener pastures. There are many terrific examples of those whose compassion knows no bounds and they’re the best role models of all – moms and non-moms alike.