About four years ago, I was standing in my school friend Mary’s kitchen at her 40th birthday party. A woman I was at school with came to talk to me. Naomi is a psychiatrist, and the last time we had spoken I had rung her for some advice. At the time, my husband and I were going through the adoption process and as part of the assessment process; I had to see a psychiatrist to be assessed. Naomi had kindly given me some advice about what to expect. Without the psychiatrist’s approval, we could not have continued. It was a very pleasing moment when he told me he couldn’t see any reason why I couldn’t adopt.
Back in the kitchen, and it was clear that Naomi was more drunk than me and was “heartbroken” that I had “been told that I couldn’t have kids”. I tried to explain that I had come to the decision not to have children after careful consideration. A large part of this was because I didn’t feel I had the extra support I would need to cope with a newborn. Having lived my whole adult life with bi-polar disorder, I knew that not sleeping could make me extremely ill – to the extent that I might well end up back in psychiatric hospital and be unable to care for my child.
My mum made it clear she couldn’t provide the hands-on care that a young baby needs. My husband didn’t want to be a single parent and hated the idea of me getting ill. For the first time in my life, I was faced with a decision about my future that could not be undone. Fertility doesn’t last forever, and if I was going to have kids, as a woman in my mid-30s, I knew time was not on my side.
So having ruled out trying to conceive naturally, we looked into adoption. And I concluded – after an incredibly painful and stressful period – that adoption wasn’t the right path either. All of this took several years and many trips to a therapist to process. I also took part in an excellent Gateway Women Reignite Weekend, which was incredibly helpful.
Naomi, it transpired, had decided to try for children of her own after being ambivalent about being a parent. She now had a son that she adored. She looked at me with pity at one point, saying “we would have got you through”. When I told her that my mum had flat out refused to help with a newborn, she said: “well, my mum would”.
It was an extremely upsetting conversation that I wish I had walked away from. I was furious that however well-meaning Naomi had been, she had spoken to me in a judgmental and unkind way.
It is incredibly tough living with a severe mental illness. There are many things I haven’t done because I knew it would risk triggering what is, ultimately, a life-threatening illness. I may not have ever tried to take my own life, but I have had suicidal thoughts.
Most people are utterly oblivious to the work that goes into the ordinary stuff of life for those with any kind of invisible disability. It takes us more effort to get through the stuff that many other people take for granted: the stressful work meeting, the tiring day of dealing with family or the trials of ordinary life like heartache that we all must face.
Nearly four years on from that party, I feel pride in how far I’ve come in my journey with childlessness. I no longer feel the need to justify my choices to anyone. My people pleasing tendencies have been tempered with age and experience. It may distress mums to meet a kind and warm woman who’s good with kids but doesn’t have any of her own. But their distress is heir business, not mine.
Over time, I have realised how much of my guilt about having children stems from societal pressure. Sure, I really wanted to have kids, but not at any price. And while the grief of not having them never entirely goes, it gets much easier to live with.
My life without children of my own has meaning and purpose, joy and delight. And most importantly for me, plenty of sleep at a time of my choosing. I look back and I feel compassion for my younger self and the pain she went through to get me here. And gratitude that I have a good quality of life, and choices about how to live it.
Joan Philips