We Are Worthy
Saturday 15th September is about our feelings of worth. Self doubt is a hard thing to shake and we can all be our own worse critics. Life can be full of many reasons to doubt our worth but despite our own judgements on our childlessness "we are all worthy". We were delighted to launch this theme last year and look forward to revisiting in 2018.
Read the contents below as we release it through the day. Your Facebook Live World Childless Week Champions are Michael Hughes at 11am BST from Australia and at 7pm it’s Berenice Smith. Join them here at Facebook Live. Get social and share using our hashtag #worldchildlessweek
Last year in the lead up to the first ever World Childless Week I remember Stephanie mentioned there was one day generating the least amount of written contributions. Volunteers were struggling with the “We Are Worthy” theme. It came as no great surprise to me.
How dare she do that? I still regret that I never had the chance to tell her what a bitch she was.
When I received Paula’s book The Facts Of Life I was not sure how I felt. Could I get to grips with a life story in the form of a comic book, because that was how I first perceived it? Could the storyline be as engrossing as a fully scripted book?
It’s finally time to share my story. Life has thrown many challenges at me- ruptured tubal pregnancy at 27 and almost died, kidney cancer at age 29 (almost always fatal but I’m still here) and then a diagnosis of Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. More about that last one later.
I recall a silly meme on social media a few years ago portraying a handsome pink flamingo giving a "side eye" glance toward a swank peacock and his dazzling tail in full fan. The caption read something like this... "Appreciating the beauty of another doesn't discount your own."
When Linda sent me her #IamME photo I was linked back to her website No Kidding in NZ and found her amazing blog "Who I Am" (2012). It held such a strong link with #IamME that I asked her permission to share it with you today.
I really believe that childlessness, regardless of why a person experiences it, hurts worst because it negatively impacts our sense of self-worth. We all want to believe that we can achieve anything we set our minds to, including parenthood, and when it turns out we can’t, the resulting emotional trauma can be devastating.
Am I childless or childfree? Or am I neither? Am I somewhere in between?
I was born with Cerebral Palsy. Some people with her disability can have kids, I cannot.
I might not be a Mum, but I am still worthy. I contribute to the world in many ways, and these are just some of them:
It’s taken me many weeks to reconcile with myself that it’s ok to take part in World Childless Week ..... many arguments have played out in my mind.
On Thursday for Men Matter Too Michael Hughes did a Facebook live and talked about how we need to own the word childless. I agree.
Throughout the weeks to come and starting from today, we've compiled the links to sites who are also sharing content that the team and Champions think you'll love to read because the creator writes to our daily theme.