Rachel Cordon
Well, it’s been a big year. In my personal childless healing process and as part of my CNBC campaigning, and honestly I’m not sure where to start….
From a ‘Personal’ perspective, a few months ago I became an aunt for the first time. Wow can I tell you that this experience brought me an abundance of opportunities to heal. So many choice points over the last year, from the pregnancy announcement onwards, of either feeling my feelings and moving through them or ‘running away’ and choosing avoidance (which in the moment sure felt like the easier option).
Ultimately, I love my family very much and I made the decision to;
Consciously breathe breathe breathe my feelings, and move through my grief
Remain self responsible, whilst being in and communicating from my authentic moment to moment truth
Strongly hold the vision throughout of being an amazing, involved, present and loving aunt whilst continuing to operate as part of the family system that I love.
Although the above felt incredibly hard at times, I chose to trust the process and the result has been life changing in the most surprising and wonderful ways. My nephew is beautiful and is a fantastic addition to our family, and it’s a pleasure to support my brother and sister-in law as they tread this new adventure together.
Interestingly, in parallel to this, every group that I am a part of has also had pregnancy announcements and births. It’s like the universe suddenly decided to put my healing on fast forward ha ha.
Things I’ve found particularly supportive during this time have been my Breathwork Therapy / Breathwork community. I had one particular breathe where I actually came out feeling like a totally different person and able to really ground in to feeling grateful for my life exactly as it is! I’ve also found a lot of personal healing through supporting others in their Breathwork journey. At this point in my journey I’m finding that as I help others to move forwards, it is also helping me to continue to reflect on my own process and support me to also continue moving forwards. It’s a win-win!
Something else I’ve found super supportive this last year is the Jody Day book (particularly the exercises in it, leading me to rediscover some of my childhood hobbies - I’ve even started having fun making crystal jewellery!). So much info and so many insights in 1 small book – amazing.
From a ‘Campaigning’ perspective, I’ve taken some big steps both in my Corporate job and in other personal and professional ventures. I truly feel incredibly passionate about raising up our community and supporting us to move forwards together.
In my Corporate role (in a company of ~40k employees globally) during the last year, I’ve reached out and questioned the lack of support, awareness and company policies around infertility and childlessness. I’m excited to tell you that I was quickly invited to join one of our Diversity & Inclusion alliances (the ‘Family & Carers’ alliance) as the ‘involuntary childlessness representative for the company (and since have been made co-chair of the alliance).
As a part of my role in the alliance, I’ve developed and agreed a 2024 CNBC strategy for the company and we are well underway with it, starting with me sharing a ‘People like me’ story (a bit about my story and how it is to work in the company as an involuntarily childless woman) which is scheduled to be published on the first day of World Childless Week (WCW) 2024, as a launch to me then sharing the WCW weeks topics.
I’ve also in general been raising awareness for our childless community in my working day to day activities, for example actively speaking up in female leadership meetings (I’m middle management level) about infertility and childlessness and how it is to be an involuntarily childless woman in a sea of ‘Mums at work’. Speaking up isn’t easy and doesn’t seem to be comfortable for anyone involved (yet), but part of my mission is to remove the stigma around this topic, so the more we speak up the better! Something I’ve found useful to begin these types of childless conversations in my personal and professional life is using/wearing ‘childless merchandise’ (e.g bags’ T shirts, pins etc). People tend to ask about it when they see it, so it opens up many great opportunities to speak up and out for us all – Perfect conversation starters!
I’m excited (and a little nervous – but trusting the process!) to see where this journey takes me next and as I close here, I just want to say thank-you for letting me share in this space in this way. Reflecting on 2024 like this has given me a real opportunity to see just how much has happened during the last year, both for myself and for those around me.
I’m grateful for the journey, thank you for taking it with me.
Love & Breath everyone, for WCW 2024 and beyond.
