Introduction
World Childless Week is now nearing its end.
To those of you who are childless. I hope that something within this week has touched your heart. I hope you realise that you are not alone. I hope that Friday helped you to find a little of your own self worth.
To those of you who are parents. I hope you understand that we don’t want your pity. We just want you to get a glimpse of how the world can sometimes appear, through our eyes. We want a little understanding and recognition that our grief is real.
Read Steph's full introduction to Sunday 17th September 2017 when we talked about moving forward
We also heard from Not So Mommy and Lesley Pyne. Walk In Our Shoes shared the inspiring story of Robert who talks about ageing without children and spoke about the legacy of World Childless Week.
Moving Forwards (acceptance)
The day arrived when it was time to stop trying for the family my husband and I had always planned. We were sat in the car outside the hospital where we had just seen a re-occurring miscarriage specialist. It happened again and there was no way I could face another loss. Further health implications would follow but that was the moment I resigned myself to a whole new world of grief. It was far from acceptance. It felt more like a door slammed shut in our faces.
Read this article on moving forwards here
Losing Hope and Finding Hope
For years I had the diagnosis of Unexplained Infertility. No doctor or specialist could give me an explanation as to why I could not conceive, thus landing me in the "Unexplained" basket. What they were basically saying to me was that something was wrong with me that meant I couldn't reproduce but they weren't really sure what. I felt as though they had put me in the "too hard" basket, and that I should just go away so that they could spend their precious time fixing all the women who had something concretely wrong with them, something that could actually be fixed. I felt like they were saying "there's something broken and it's too hard for us to find out what, so shove off now please".
Read the rest of this article here
Reaching acceptance
I finally feel I’ve reached acceptance. But the realization has happened under unexpected circumstances, and is now helping in unexpected ways.
Read this inspiring article on reaching acceptance here
Moving Forward discussion
Steph spoke to members of the support groups that she founded or administrates to ask the community for their advice on moving forward. Here's their response.
Thank you Infertility
This letter was written to thank infertility for the life lessons it gave this writer. Read the letter here.
Thank you
On the last day of World Childless Week 2017, Steph thanked the community and all those who participated in, shared or supported this rather unique and first of many awareness weeks. Read her thanks here.