World Childless Week

Underlying the chaos of life there is a strategic plan to be followed that borders on a compulsion, strangely if we saw our loved one’s behaving this way, we’d have them whipped off to therapy. We are structured souls at heart, as much as we would hate to admit it.  An old university lecture comes to mind right now, do we have free will or is our behaviour already mapped out in our genes and chemical makeup, that’s for another time.

But, what happens when the wider world plan is not yours, when you are the tiny minority that just won’t fit, not from that rebellious anti-establishment radical perspective but from circumstance.  What happens when you so want to be just that normal person, just like everyone else around you, but you can’t. I can imagine that everyone one of you reading this will know of a person that has made a quick exit from a group discussion when everyone begins to talk about their children or that friend who just spontaneously cries, but will never tell you why.

World Childless Week’s aim is to help bring some light and understanding to the world about those who are childless.  Being childless is very much like the debate around understanding mental health, if your ill or have a physical disability it is easy to garner sympathy from those around you, but when there this nothing physically to see, to evoke that sympathy, confusion and doubt reign.  One behaviour that the vast majority of childless couple’s experience is isolation, many stories are shared of how friends and family begin to back away, especially when their own family starts to grow.  Sadly, one of the most common coping mechanism that childless couples will use, is exactly the same, they will stop going to kid’s birthday parties, baby showers and the like, because it just too painful to be reminded of what they will never have.  I understand that those with, back off because they may not know what to do and those without need to survive, neither is wrong or right, but what is lacking is the understanding between the two.

I am supporting World Childless Week because my wife and I are one of this minority, we have travelled the infertility journey and know firsthand the isolation that it brings, just like our blog, WCW is trying to help break down barriers to understanding the behaviour of the childless and to show those that are struggling that you are not alone and there is a community here that understands you and can support you.

I’ve just come back from a funeral where we said goodbye to a mate’s father, like all funerals this was a time of reflection, within the eulogy something rang deep for me and I imagine for other people like my wife and I.  It went something like this “A few days ago, Dad and I were sitting out the back in the sun and he said to me, I can die happy, you and your sister are set up, you have both given me wonderful grandchildren, you are all good people, I’ve lived a full life, my work here is done.”  The church was packed, a wonderful testament to a person’s life, but the most important people sat down the front, his wife, children and grandchildren.  I looked at them as the eulogy was being read and in my mind’s eye I could imagine the content smile on my mate’s dad as he reflected over his life, full of these happy memories and love from his extended family.

This is the essence of that strategic plan, we come into this world with many expectations thrown on us, with each one reliant on the other.  As a child we learn to socialise, preparing us for when it time to make our partnership with a loved one.  There is of course the expectation that more children will be created by this partnership, with our childhood experiences used as the catalyst for our parenting style. Those children will then produce your grandchildren, you can see your legacy being left in all of them.  For the most part, this also becomes an ever-increasing support network as you age.  Those being the ones you ring when your computer won’t work the way you want it too, or your new phone totally bewilders you.

Our life will not be like that.

You may have made the mistake of saying to a childless person once, like has been said to me many times, “you are so luck you didn’t have child, they are hard work and give you nothing but grief”, thinking of course that you were showing sympathy, but what you got in return was the opposite reaction you expected. That family circle of support and comfort that exists and continues to grow tells us otherwise.  It reinforces to us that at the end of our days we will be lonely.

There will be no children sitting down the front of the church, our grandchild will not be reading passages out of the bible, our son in law will not be reading the eulogy.

You may be thinking how unfair is it of me to pull on your heart strings in this way. My intention however, is to really drive home that difference and how understanding is the key to helping and supporting a loved one who is childless.  Our life is different and so it would be unfair to be measured by the norm, we all need to listen to understand, not listen to reply.

This week, when you encounter that loved one that is childless, ask them to help you understand, hold their hand so they don’t feel alone and listen.