Why is it such an important day to me?  For a good part of my adult life, I wanted to be a mother, but as the years went by, I worried that it might not happen for me.  I hadn’t met the right man for me to marry, so how could I become a mom?  But then, one day, I realized that even though I hadn’t found my life-partner, I could be a single mother by choice.  There was even an organization that provided support and information to women like me: mature, ready for motherhood, but single.  It WAS possible.  Months later, I had made my dream a reality.  I was a mother.

Motherhood was the center of my life for many, many years.  I had enjoyed my career and had a pretty satisfying life, both before becoming a mom and throughout my mothering years.  But there was something about being a mother that was different.  Corny as it sounds, the intense bond of  motherhood satisfied a need deep within me that nothing else had met.

As my son grew up and started to become more independent, of course I encouraged that.  I wanted to be a good parent and wanted him to be an independent, capable, separate person.  But, while I enjoyed seeing his growing separateness, I felt sad too.  Our relationship was clearly changing.

Although I was a bit reluctant to give up the wonderfulness of the early intensity, of being the most important person in my son’s world, fortunately, he had no such problems.  “Mom,” he said to me once, “You and I are the two most different people in the Universe.”  Wow, I thought.  He’s definitely trying to tell me that he needs to be independent.  And I need to respect that.

The teen years were pretty difficult, as they often can be.  The push-pull of his struggle for independence taxed my patience at times.  At one point during the summer before he left for college, he said to me, “You have no idea how much I’m looking forward to being away from home.”  But actually, I did.  By that point I had started to feel exactly the same way.  The teen years had done their job…. we were separating.  So what would be next?

I assumed that once my son’s growing-up years were over, I would no longer feel like a mother.  My relationship with my own mother was not great when I was an adult, and I was very worried about that happening with my son.  But I was wrong.  We wanted to stay connected, and we managed to find a way to relate to one another in a more adult way.  We get along well and have good times  together.  What is different is that now our relationship is a mutual one.  We care about and help each other.

Even when he was very young, my son (with a little help from friends and family) always gave me something for Mother’s Day.  Those early hand-made gifts, the mugs that said, “I Love Mom” and the cards he made in school were treasures to me, worth their weight in gold.  This year I will be spending Mother’s Day with someone who is not only my son, but who is a funny, interesting, and thoughtful person.  Although my role has changed, I’m still his mother and we still have a special connection.  And I know now that we always will.  Especially on Mother’s Day, my favorite day of the year.

Maria

As I sit here writing, my house is filled with baby items from friends and freecycle. All I need is a baby. At least now I have hope—I’m on an adoption waiting list. But what a long journey it has been…

I became a thinker and joined SMC at age 39. People encouraged me to move forward, but I was stuck. I wanted a husband, then kids—the traditional family. At 40, I met someone I hoped could be Mr. Right, who turned out to be Mr. Autonomy Issues. At 41, I broke it off. I was devastated. I went into a depression, sought counseling and was stuck—I wanted biological kids, but I also wanted a traditional family. I kept thinking.

Looking back, I see how uneducated I was about fertility for women in their 40s. Despite the many women in the news having children well into their 40s, I didn’t know these women used donor eggs—not their own. So, with my eggs growing older by the day, I continued thinking.

Finally at 42 (and 10 months), I made what I thought was the most difficult decision of my life—to try to conceive on my own. I passed fertility tests with flying colors, but after seven tries—IUIs and IVFs—I had low egg quantity/quality. I had another difficult decision to make: Should I keep trying with my eggs? I had to think about finances, my age (43 and a half) and my desire to be a mom—how would I feel if I found myself six months later, age 44, still not pregnant?

I went to the counselor and grieved and grieved. All my dreams down the drain—my desire for a husband with three biological kids. All those years of envisioning my children, who they would take after—my mom, my sister, my brother? My connection to my heritage. It was one of my darkest hours.

But my desire to be a mom pushed me forward. I weighed donor egg vs. adoption. Donor egg seemed like an easier route. I picked a donor and did my first cycle at 44. Cut to me a year and a half later—three miscarriages and an inability to carry to term due to an immune issue. The first two miscarriages were devastating. By the third, I’d selected an adoption agency and knew if the pregnancy didn’t take, I’d immediately move on.

Last July, after learning my final pregnancy wasn’t viable, but before the actual miscarriage, I contact the adoption agency. They were enthusiastic at a time I needed enthusiasm. I was exhausted—2.5 years of fertility treatments, disappointments, miscarriages, poking/prodding and money out the door—all for nothing.

I did my home study and got on the waiting list in September 2009. I’m excited about adopting. With adoption I will be a mom. With fertility treatments, it was a crapshoot. Moving to adoption was a relief—no more needles, doctor appointments, miscarriages, disappointments, hormones. I could live my life more normally while I waited, although I have moments of grief that sneak up on me.

I try not to be bitter. Everyone has her own journey. I just never thought I’d have such a long road to motherhood. I believe God has a plan for me, even if I can’t see it. I date, trying to find someone to share my life with and be a father to my children. I keep busy while I wait for my match. I’m now 46 and, although I sometimes can’t believe it, this circuitous route to motherhood is my story.

Leslie C

Sometimes I call Jamie our “daycare provider” but over the years she has become so much more than that. She is a friend, an advice giver, a consultant, a teacher, a partner in crime, and very frequently a therapist and rescuer. Sam calls her family. I call her Wonder Woman. When she closed the daycare earlier in the week because she was “in no shape to watch kids” we all knew it had to be something nasty. Jamie never gets sick. Jamie is the one that takes care of all of us — children and parents. After a day of rest she was back on her feet and the daycare was open and all of the parents breathed a sigh of relief. Whew.

I texted Jamie at 5am that I was puking, and she volunteered to drive out to the country in the dark to gather my children before all her other kids arrived. She came to my door and I handed her my sleepy children, still in their pajamas. She soothed them both and tucked them in her van and waved as she pulled away, planning to give me twelve hours to rest and medicate. And when I asked her later in the day if she could keep them overnight, she said what she always says, “No problem.”

I often wish I had the time and energy to write an impassioned letter to one of those home makeover shows about this woman and the way she cares for her community without ever asking for anything in return. She is the reason I am able to manage two children on my own. I’m not on my own. I have Jamie.

In the Lazy-Boy I sit up and answer the phone and say “This can’t be good” before I even say hello.

Jamie asks if I saw her earlier messages, and I see now that she texted twice while I was taking hot baths number 3 and 4 as I attempted to soothe my aching body.

Sam has thrown up. Sam has it too.

I say a little prayer of thanks that I didn’t actually take the Tylenol with codeine, and I line the inside of the car with blankets and towels and a bucket. When I arrive at Jamie’s Sam is curled up under a blanket on the bathroom floor, sound asleep. He is a four-year-old boy so he is seldom this still. Even in his sleep he moves and kicks and squirms and talks about diggers and bad guys. I lift him, and Jamie follows behind me to open my car door and hand me a Target bag filled with vomit-covered clothes, and I thank God once again for this woman who makes my life possible.

When I get Sam home I bundle him with blankets and turn on Nick Jr. He asks for apple juice and I sit with him while he sips it. And I’m in the laundry room piling his coat and hat and pants from that morning into the washing machine when he tells me he’s going to puke just before he sprays corn all over the bathroom rug. I tell him it’s okay and I help him back to the couch before cleaning up the mess and realizing that having a sick kid makes you forget all your own aches and pains.

People often ask me how I do it, how I manage to be a sole parent of two kids. And I usually tell them that it really isn’t that extraordinary, that our family isn’t any different than any two-parent family. We have logistical challenges that other families might not have, but I also don’t have to find time to balance a relationship with the demands of a family. Every family has to find balance, and for the most part I feel like our family is just like any other.

Until I’m sick.

And then we have Wonder Woman.

Barb Matousek

Barb Matousek writes about her life as a single mother on her blog, barbsproject.blogspot.com and this essay originally appeared on thenextfamily.com.

Well, you know where this is going by now.  I found myself knocked up at 44!!  I could NOT believe it. It took me MONTHS to figure out why my boobs were killing me and I felt so blah.  I never had morning sickness.  I just woke up one morning and wondered if I was getting my period….hey wait, when was the last time I had my period…..umm…..HOLY CRAP!  I ran to the CVS, bought a pregnancy test, and there it was.

Did I want to have a child?  It was a question that I hadn’t asked myself in many years.  When I was younger I had always assumed I would be a mom, but when I was married, it never seemed like a good idea (it would have been an AWFUL idea), and when I got divorced at 36, I just seemed to give that idea away as “not meant to be” along with everything else. I had so much: great family and friends, work I loved, freedom to do as I pleased….I just didn’t think that I was lucky enough to add “happy marriage and kids” to that list, and was ok with that, not everyone gets to have everything they want.  At best I thought I might find a partner with kids of his own and be a great stepmom.  Single motherhood was NEVER something I considered, really not even for a moment.  It seemed impossibly hard.

The first thing I did after reading the stick, was walk to my computer and look up the closest Planned Parenthood.  I can still see the Google Maps page showing me how close it was to my house.  Ultimately I never went there, or even called them,  but knowing that I had that option kept me calm.

And that is why, though my journey here is different from many others, I do think of myself as a single mother by CHOICE.  I and I alone had a choice to make, and I chose to be a single mom.  When I was pregnant a friend told me about SMC (she knew a member), and I looked at the website.  I immediately decided it wasn’t for me, that I would not be welcome.  The stories I read and continue to read today are so beautiful, women who have had a lifelong yearning for motherhood and who overcome huge obstacles to find their children – but that was not me.  For much of my pregnancy I was still somewhat ambivalent about what was about to happen.  But once that kid arrived…well, you all know.  One stressed out, exhausted night I dipped back into the SMC blog and newsletters and knew that these women were my sisters.

So here’s the rest of the story, after I took that home pregnancy test.  I took deep breaths.  I talked … to friends with kids, friends without kids, friends who had chosen not to keep babies and friend who struggled to have babies.  I kept telling myself, well, just take the next step (go to the doctor), and the next step (get the initial tests), and the next step (get the sonogram).

Everything kept pointing in the right direction. I told my sister (who was thrilled and realistic and supportive) and told my parents (who were freaked out and appalled – that has changed and they love my son like he is the second coming.  Seriously.)  I told the father (who wanted nothing to do with it and remains completely out of our lives, hopefully forever).  I found out I didn’t have maternity coverage on my health insurance (I had declined it when I started my company and got individual insurance) and figured out how to get it.  I kept an eye out for reasons not to have this baby, and didn’t find any.

I remember saying to God (who I don’t really know if I believe in, but (S)He is still good to talk to) “OK, looks like I might do this thing, but you BETTER give me an easy baby! OK? Deal?”  (S)He held up his (her?) end of the bargain.  After an easy pregnancy and an easy birth, my sweet, healthy, chill baby boy was here.  (Of course, God is now laughing, because now that I love the kid more than my own life, we have hit the terrible twos WITH A VENGEANCE!)

Many people say they can’t imagine their life without kids.  Well, I don’t have to imagine it, I had a big full life without kids for 45 years, and it was a good life and I sometimes miss it.  But I chose to change it, chose to try something new, and am very, very happy with that choice.

Patricia

Some of it is simply that who you are is changing. The version of you who could afford this vacation, and that fancy dinner, and whatever else – that woman is changing. She is planning for her future differently. So if you were saving for a down payment on a house, or saving vacation time so you could go spend a month in Australia next year, or other major investments of time and/or money, who we are and how we allocate our resources changes. You may be looking at your social life, realizing that all those dinners out are pretty expensive, and choosing to eat out less to save money. That can happen for lots of reasons, not just TTC. It happens with married people, not just singles. It happens at different stages of life, and for many of us, these changes happen more than once in life. So you haven’t actually lost who you are. You are simply focusing on different financial objectives at the moment.

For planning, some of it falls under the same reasoning as above. It might be time or money. If you were helping a sick family member you might hesitate to plan vacations because you had promised rides to physical therapy, or chemo treatments, or whatever. Looking at TTC as a health project, in this case yours, may give you better perspective on the decisions you’re making. If you usually vacation with certain friends, and you are not sharing your TTC plans, you just need a simple answer. It might be “I have some health things going on right now that have made my schedule less predictable. I don’t really want to talk about it, but it’s not life-threatening, so please don’t worry about me. It just means I can’t plan a trip for August in April.”

But if you haven’t actually started TTC, you really don’t know how long or hard the journey will be. You do know that you are more than a womb. You are a person who is valuable in her own right. You are a friend, and a daughter, maybe a sister and an aunt. And there may very well be times when there is something else that is actually more important than TTC. So you take a month off, because it is more important to be there for your brother’s wedding, or your grandmother’s funeral, or your best friend’s _______, than to be home for an insemination that month. And that is 100% a valid, and often life affirming, choice.

In some ways, this may be the hardest part. The times when you are pulled in 2 directions over how to allocate your time or financial resources. And while yes, TTC can get expensive, and you may be smart to not be too cavalier spending money on vacations, this is where sometimes, especially on a longer journey, it’s key to go back and remind yourself, again, that you are more than a womb. More than a mommy-to-be. You are a person who is valuable in her own right. And yes, if you are facing injectible IUIs out-of-pocket, or IVF, or more, your financial resources may be tight. But if you are facing some of those expenses you probably also need the reminder of your own value more than someone with a shorter, less expensive journey. So don’t discount the value of spending some of your resources on something other than TTC.

The longer it takes, the more it feels like it takes over your life. And of course, your personality will be a factor in that as well. But you are heading into this aware that it can take over your head. And that also means you know you may need to step back at times to remind yourself of who you are.

Good luck.

Jess

I am taking the leap because I don’t want to miss out on all these things and because I don’t want to be a bitter woman 10 years from now!

by: IthinkIcanIthinkIcan

I’m pregnant but don’t know if I’m having a boy or a girl. I have to admit that one little part of me, deep deep inside, has hoped Honey Badger is a boy. Someone to carry on the family “name,” which is an absolutely archaic conceit that I’m ashamed to admit that I even give any credence. But, there it is. And of course, I would love a girl too — any baby is a blessing.

But I’ve just been feeling so much pressure now of what it means to possibly be bringing up a black boy in this world. And I am so pre-emptively afraid. What if I don’t teach this kid about how to act in front of police officers? How do I help him understand that he needs to be compliant around people who would find him “suspicious,” even if he’s done nothing wrong, without breaking his little spirit?

This is really the first time I have felt the huge responsibility of doing this without a man in the house who may be able to explain life in a way that I simply cannot. Because although I am black, I’m not a black MAN, facing the unique concerns that exist for black men.

I imagine that it’s the pregnancy hormones that are getting to me right about now, but I just can’t think about Trayvon and his family without wanting to cry. I’m not going to go into what I think about the shooter’s guilt or innocence — there is a lot that is not known, and that’s a different topic. I’m just thinking, how do you keep your kids SAFE? I have wondered recently whether I’m actually brave enough to do this. Bad time to suddenly develop misgivings….

Here are a few of the things about her that I’m enjoying now:

I loved taking my nephews to see my alma mater and taking them to museums and zoos and shows and can’t wait to do that with my own child.

I want to share my world view and life philosophies. I want inspire my child to imagine and do great things. I want to hold my child in my arms and stare into his or her face and sing it lullubies (I sing badly and off-key, but he/she won’t complain, I bet). I want to be surprised by the crazy things he or she says.

I want to see the joy on the face of my child and my mother as they play together. I want to see my nephews and my brother be the older gentlemen looking out for the well being of my daughter or teaching my son about “manly things”. I want to have my child look at me and know that no matter what I will do everything in my power and maybe more to love and care for and protect him or her.

I want surround my child with an extended “family” of friends with different races, incomes, beliefs and types of families. I want my child to know that love comes in many forms and that my love for him or her is unconditional. That I loved my child before I conceived him or her.

I want to rock my child to sleep in the rocking chair my mother has passed down to me from her grandfather. I want teach my child to swim. I want to come home from work to make dinner, bath my child and then read bedtime stories as he or she falls to sleep.

I know I will gain so much from being a mother and I am so anxious to get there.

I want to integrate them into my very large, loving family–they have numerous cousins waiting for them!

I want to teach them my native language, and pass on our rich Indian heritage to them. I want them to meet their great-grandmother, one of the greatest ladies I know. I want them to feel the love of their grandparents, my parents, who are more generous with their love and indulgence to their grandchildren than anyone I know. I want my nieces, who currently fill my heart every time I see them, to jump for joy at hearing that they’re getting a cousin/cousins. I want my oldest niece, who is quite maternal at 8, to take my son’s hand and lead him to the monkey bars, the jump rope, and basketball hoop.

I want to watch them blossom with the best education I can provide. Our life together itself is going to be an education. I want to live overseas for one or two tours, as my profession allows for living “in the field”. It will enrich us as a family, and them intellectually, spiritually, culturally and emotionally.

I want to watch them choose a passion/hobby, an instrument, dancing, sports, and feel the satisfaction of learning it, of overcoming obstacles, of learning to be an effective team member, whether on a sports team, dance troupe, or band/orchestra.

I want to share laughter, and be there for the tears. I want to show them that the tears always clear.

I want us as a family to take healthy food, and healthy sleeping habits that nourish the mind and soul, as a matter of course. I want to provide the security of boundaries and loving discipline that allow them to spend their energy on spiritual, emotional and intellectual growth.

I want to watch them graduate from high school, choose a college, fall in love, build circles of friends that carry them through early adulthood, and on into the later years (for however many of them I am here to see it).

In 20 years, I want them to be visiting their cousins wherever they are in the world. I want all of us parents in my family to know that we have given our children the most important foundation we can–a loving, interconnected, supportive family.

I want to teach them about unconditional love–but I suspect that I will be the student in this, after my child/children and I are united.