I’ve mentioned on this blog before that I believe it’s highly unlikely I’ll ever have children and how much that has truly broken my heart. For any newbie readers, it’s only an HPS issue indirectly. Lots of women with HPS have children (although it’s one of those reasons it’s a good idea to be tested – best not to find out the hard way that you’ve got a bleeding disorder). Doctors can safely plan for any bleeding problems if they know what could happen.
For me, however, the picture is more complicated. Besides the usual problem of being 30-something and not even in a serious relationship, let alone married, I’m participating in a drug trial for an experimental medication to treat pulmonary fibrosis. One of the rules for participating in such a trial is that you don’t get pregnant. I knew this and gladly signed on anyway. After all, should I ever figure out a way to have kids, it would be nice to be around for them.
But my practical nature is taking a look at the facts and finding the whole idea of motherhood highly unlikely. First, there’s my age and lack of attachment – I’m 34. There’s the fact that we haven’t yet recruited the minimum number of people for this drug trial, so it will drag on another three years, if not more. The drug is not actually a cure, so there will likely be other trials in my future when this one ends. I think drug trials are going to be a way of life for me.
And then there are the realities of my health and my finances. I know several single women that have adopted kids, or had their own kids via the help of science, and who are doing quite well. But, I just don’t have the energy to parent kids alone. My health issues aren’t exactly cheap (I’ve spent $550 on doctors and medications in October alone, with insurance). Right now it seems highly unlikely I’ll have the resources, physical and financial, to pull off parenthood single-handed. At least I can’t imagine it right now.
There are times when I think I’m “over” this issue. And then there are times when out of no where it smacks me in the face and completely throws me off.
A few weeks ago I was at lunch with several women. We were all there because one of us had just had a baby. I love babies. I’m happy that other people are having them. I thought I was up to this. But as the meal progressed, I felt like a complete alien. They traded stories about pregnancy, about child birth, about babies and baby accessories and cooed over the newest arrival.
Often in such situations the baby gets passed around, and I get offended because it’s never passed to me – usually because people don’t think a woman with a cane can somehow balance an infant, even sitting down. (Always makes me wonder how they think the thousands of totally blind parents out there manage – and they do manage.) But this time, the women, all of whom know me pretty well, didn’t think twice about passing me the baby, only a few weeks old.
I looked down at her sweet face, her little lacy bonnet and cute, frilly pink outfit, felt the warmth of her little body in my arms – and I quickly passed her to the next lady. I couldn’t take it anymore.
“Don’t you want to hold her?” the proud mother asked.
“Maybe not today,” I answered.
“Ahh…you’ve probably got a cold,” someone else suggested.
“I’m not sure, but I don’t want to risk making her sick,” I muttered. Yeah, sick, that’s it. Had I really been sick, I would have never taken her in the first place. But I played along. I didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to tell them how I was feeling. I didn’t want to tell them that I wasn’t just another woman waiting for admittance to “the club” one day – I would never belong.
So, lately I’ve been having a “mommywannabe pity party.” It’s just one of those phases. Maybe in a few weeks I’ll be “over it” again.
Then this weekend I was blog surfing and found the following blog entry. I sobbed. (Read the blog here.)
Okay, if you don’t have time to read it right now, here’s a summary. This blog entry is a letter of recommendation that was written for a woman wanting to adopt. Several years before she had been sort of “adopted” by a newly single-parent family. The mom was overwhelmed, and this woman needing a place to vent her motherly instincts, just sort of stepped in and helped.
I used to get my “kid fix” by taking care of my godchildren. I’d take them for a weekend a month, and we’d have a ball! My other single friends seemed dumbstruck at my eagerness to sign on for this duty. But to me, it wasn’t work. I had just as much fun as the kids. Now, however, my Godkids live further away and I only get to see them a few times a year.
About a year ago I was sitting next to the parents of four small kids at church. We were having a brown bag dinner before a Bible study was supposed to start. They proudly announced that one of the grandparents was coming down to take care of the kids for a week and they were getting away. They said they hadn’t had even a night out without children in five years! This particular family has a lot of financial issues, can’t afford a sitter, and lives a long way from family that could help out.
I peeped up that I’d gladly come and stay with their kids for an evening so they could have a date night. I meant it, although I’m not sure if they didn’t think I was serious about the offer, or if it was something else. I’ve never been taken up on the offer.
Now that I don’t volunteer with Camp Fire (HPS work and fatigue make that too much for me these days), I hardly ever get to spend time with kids.
I read that blog entry and was struck by what an impact a single person had made on a family – perhaps in a way that only a single person could. I know there must be hundreds of thousands of families like that one that could really use someone just to help out a few hours now and then.
Yet it feels as if you reach a certain age as a single woman and suddenly people make all kinds of assumptions about you. They assume that you must not want children, or that you don’t like them, or wouldn’t know how to relate to them. They assume you’re all about your career or hobbies or something. Unfortunately, in this day and age, as the single person it’s hard to reach out and prove them wrong. There have been so many stories of abuse and such by “single adults that just seemed too interested in kids…” that you have to be careful. What a shame. What a shame that there’s not some way to match up people that need one another.
For me, however, the picture is more complicated. Besides the usual problem of being 30-something and not even in a serious relationship, let alone married, I’m participating in a drug trial for an experimental medication to treat pulmonary fibrosis. One of the rules for participating in such a trial is that you don’t get pregnant. I knew this and gladly signed on anyway. After all, should I ever figure out a way to have kids, it would be nice to be around for them.
But my practical nature is taking a look at the facts and finding the whole idea of motherhood highly unlikely. First, there’s my age and lack of attachment – I’m 34. There’s the fact that we haven’t yet recruited the minimum number of people for this drug trial, so it will drag on another three years, if not more. The drug is not actually a cure, so there will likely be other trials in my future when this one ends. I think drug trials are going to be a way of life for me.
And then there are the realities of my health and my finances. I know several single women that have adopted kids, or had their own kids via the help of science, and who are doing quite well. But, I just don’t have the energy to parent kids alone. My health issues aren’t exactly cheap (I’ve spent $550 on doctors and medications in October alone, with insurance). Right now it seems highly unlikely I’ll have the resources, physical and financial, to pull off parenthood single-handed. At least I can’t imagine it right now.
There are times when I think I’m “over” this issue. And then there are times when out of no where it smacks me in the face and completely throws me off.
A few weeks ago I was at lunch with several women. We were all there because one of us had just had a baby. I love babies. I’m happy that other people are having them. I thought I was up to this. But as the meal progressed, I felt like a complete alien. They traded stories about pregnancy, about child birth, about babies and baby accessories and cooed over the newest arrival.
Often in such situations the baby gets passed around, and I get offended because it’s never passed to me – usually because people don’t think a woman with a cane can somehow balance an infant, even sitting down. (Always makes me wonder how they think the thousands of totally blind parents out there manage – and they do manage.) But this time, the women, all of whom know me pretty well, didn’t think twice about passing me the baby, only a few weeks old.
I looked down at her sweet face, her little lacy bonnet and cute, frilly pink outfit, felt the warmth of her little body in my arms – and I quickly passed her to the next lady. I couldn’t take it anymore.
“Don’t you want to hold her?” the proud mother asked.
“Maybe not today,” I answered.
“Ahh…you’ve probably got a cold,” someone else suggested.
“I’m not sure, but I don’t want to risk making her sick,” I muttered. Yeah, sick, that’s it. Had I really been sick, I would have never taken her in the first place. But I played along. I didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to tell them how I was feeling. I didn’t want to tell them that I wasn’t just another woman waiting for admittance to “the club” one day – I would never belong.
So, lately I’ve been having a “mommywannabe pity party.” It’s just one of those phases. Maybe in a few weeks I’ll be “over it” again.
Then this weekend I was blog surfing and found the following blog entry. I sobbed. (Read the blog here.)
Okay, if you don’t have time to read it right now, here’s a summary. This blog entry is a letter of recommendation that was written for a woman wanting to adopt. Several years before she had been sort of “adopted” by a newly single-parent family. The mom was overwhelmed, and this woman needing a place to vent her motherly instincts, just sort of stepped in and helped.
I used to get my “kid fix” by taking care of my godchildren. I’d take them for a weekend a month, and we’d have a ball! My other single friends seemed dumbstruck at my eagerness to sign on for this duty. But to me, it wasn’t work. I had just as much fun as the kids. Now, however, my Godkids live further away and I only get to see them a few times a year.
About a year ago I was sitting next to the parents of four small kids at church. We were having a brown bag dinner before a Bible study was supposed to start. They proudly announced that one of the grandparents was coming down to take care of the kids for a week and they were getting away. They said they hadn’t had even a night out without children in five years! This particular family has a lot of financial issues, can’t afford a sitter, and lives a long way from family that could help out.
I peeped up that I’d gladly come and stay with their kids for an evening so they could have a date night. I meant it, although I’m not sure if they didn’t think I was serious about the offer, or if it was something else. I’ve never been taken up on the offer.
Now that I don’t volunteer with Camp Fire (HPS work and fatigue make that too much for me these days), I hardly ever get to spend time with kids.
I read that blog entry and was struck by what an impact a single person had made on a family – perhaps in a way that only a single person could. I know there must be hundreds of thousands of families like that one that could really use someone just to help out a few hours now and then.
Yet it feels as if you reach a certain age as a single woman and suddenly people make all kinds of assumptions about you. They assume that you must not want children, or that you don’t like them, or wouldn’t know how to relate to them. They assume you’re all about your career or hobbies or something. Unfortunately, in this day and age, as the single person it’s hard to reach out and prove them wrong. There have been so many stories of abuse and such by “single adults that just seemed too interested in kids…” that you have to be careful. What a shame. What a shame that there’s not some way to match up people that need one another.
Comments
I hope you find a family! I understand that need to connect with a kid even for just a few hours. I'm childless by choice and I still need a little dose of kid-silliness every once in a while. My "mom friends" can't understand why I'd want to just go spend an hour or two with their little heathen, but kids are so magical in their thirst for knowledge and fantasy... everyone needs that.
I had never heard of HPS before. Thank you for sharing your story and good luck to you with your study! I hope there are enough people participating soon!
Happy Posting!