The last few weeks have flown by in organised and unorganised chaos. After the excitement of Fertility Fest I desperately wanted to get online and reach out to everyone who I’d met but I couldn’t. Hubby had a week off work so the days were spent on little trips out, the odd pub meal and generally enjoying a few days of rest and relaxation. As much as I loved spending time with him I was biting the bullet to get back on the computer when he returned to work on the Monday.
Sunday morning I woke up and “ouch” I got hit with a bug. It felt like a nightmare of bad timing. I wanted to organise things but my body was weak and my brain felt like it was stuck in a washing machine on a permanent slow spin for days.
Eventually the room stopped spinning, hubby was at work and I could get on the desktop. Now the problem was where to start and what should I prioritise? Panic was sitting in the sidelines but I decided that everything would have to wait its turn and everything would get sorted in time.
First on the list was the boring reality of GDPR. Yes, I was late to the game but it had to be done. Next I had to catch up on emails and the support groups I administrated on Facebook. I really wanted to get my teeth into World Childless Week 2018 but suddenly the opportunity to represent the childless to a local health authority appeared. So that led to starting a survey and supporting a petition that linked in.
I’ve managed to add a few events to the World Childless Week that were time sensitive but I still have groups to add, people to contact, projects to start and articles to write. I have made a small dent in my to do list but it is only small. So should I start to panic now?
I’m sure there are plenty of times that I could panic, should panic and would panic but today is not one of those times. So what has changed? The simple answer is, you. When I decided to start World Childless Week I felt very much on my own, but now I don’t. I was overwhelmed by how many of you supported me last year and how many people are still coming forward to say they want to participate this year. I am no longer alone at the starting point of the race and I grateful to you all for that feeling of support.
Today I started to add the World Childless Week forget-me-not logo to the Facebook groups and pages I admin. It felt good to start adding a visual representation that is significant of our community and the support that we give to each other.
I hope that over time the forget-me-not will be added to more pages and more websites. That the image will spread across the internet in the same way that the flower spreads through gardens. That each forget-me-not symbol on each website is sowing the seeds of change.
We are getting stronger, we are getting louder and we are being heard. If you’d like to join me and add the World Childless Week forget-me-not to your page or website please download it here. Just like those forget-me-nots we will not forget our children, we will not forget our dreams and we will not allow society to forget us.