Sarah Jane Smith

I was having my hair cut by a friend who owns a salon in our small town.

Another friend was having her hair dyed, and we were all chatting.

There was a lull in the conversation, and the other woman asked me THE question …

'So, do you have kids?'

I say 'no.'

The salon owner says, 'Well, no, you have a kid. You have Arthur.'

She then turns to her friend and says, 'Her stepson,'

Her friend rightfully looks confused, and I feel, well, frozen. I don't feel like explaining or defending my childlessness. So, I don't say anything. There is an awkward silence, and the salon owner fills the void by talking about her daughter.

I know the salon owner's intentions were good, but the impact wasn't aligned with her intentions. Her attempt to include me as another mum who could join the conversation about their kids left me feeling invisible.

Being a childless stepmom is a no (wo) man's land. It's a shape-shifting identity without a solid place to anchor, to ground. I have a foot in both the childless and parent worlds, but I often don't feel I belong or am fully accepted in either.

I have enough experience with my stepson to join 'mum' conversations and pass myself off as a legitimate group member. In the deep grief of infertility, this was a coping mechanism I sank into; this was my denial stage. Pretending in this way allowed me to join in and feel included. This strategy served me a bit, but I frequently felt like I was lying, intentionally misleading people into thinking I was Arthur's mum.

This felt wrong on several levels:

1. I'm not his mother, so it is actually a lie.

2. It erases and makes invisible his mother, who carried, birthed and also parents him.

3. It denied me my experience of wanting desperately to have a child with my husband and being unable to.

4. I had pretended so well that a few people thought I was his mother; I didn't correct them at the time but eventually had to come clean with a few very awkward conversations.

They were graceful and brushed it off with well-meaning but misguided comments.

When I identify as childless to others, I feel I am erasing my stepson and our important roles in each other's lives. Like I have to make him invisible for me to be fully seen, as if there isn't enough room for us both and our experiences. In addition, childless friends have said that they don't consider me childless because of my relationship with Arthur. But, again, this denies my experience of trying and failing to have a child of my own and the profound sense of loss that I feel because of it.

I am a big believer in the 'AND.' That we are multi-dimensional. We can occupy multiple identities, and one doesn't diminish the other.

I identify as childless, not by choice; however, I feel there must be an 'AND.' I'm childless and a step mum. Hopefully, these three letters, A, N, D, will inspire others to pause and think about why they need to be there in the first place.

I say need because I need to feel a sense of belonging, and I often don't. So perhaps those three letters can begin to carve out a space for myself and others, a place where our whole experience is welcomed.

Photo by Martin Martz on Unsplash