“By my childlessness I made it statistically possible for a woman who wanted a child to have one.”
I am another who never felt ‘googly’ about babies. An only child of an emotionally unstable mother and a distant father, who decided by age 10 that I would not have a child myself until I was certain that I could be a loving one, not passing along the rageaholic behavior I had been subjected to.
I did enjoy caring for a newborn for 6 months, a part time job while I was in college, but otherwise mostly preferred children who had grown enough for me to interact with them in thoughtful conversation. Maybe age 10 and up?
Then my body made its own decisions, and by age 28 I was no longer able to carry a child. When questioned, I usually answered that by my childlessness I made it statistically possible for a woman who wanted a child to have one.
After a long marriage to a man who himself had no interest in children, I late in life remarried a much younger man, father to three boys who live with their mother, and am now helping parent them. They are all above 10 years old, their characters forming, interesting people in their own ways, and I am enjoying getting to know them, free of parental expectations, more in the role of a mentor. Or maybe a grandma?
It feels like I have come up with the best of all options.
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