WE ARE CHILDFREE

I just had surgery to be permanently sterile, a salpingectomy, a few days ago. It is the culmination of years spent being sure that I would not want children, the realization that I no longer want to be part of this social group imposed by society of “women who can/must give birth”.

I always knew that I did not identify with the role that is sold to us when we are born with two X chromosomes. I was attracted to jobs that are rather reserved for men – I am a sailor, a mechanic – but I do not present myself to the world in a masculine way. I think I am rather feminine in my appearance itself.

Not wanting to start a family, not wanting children, allowed me not to limit myself in my dreams and in my life choices.

I have been working for 7 years on rescue boats in the central Mediterranean. I meet people fleeing lives of misery, pregnant women after rape, children who live unspeakable things.

I have in me the gentleness and listening that we expect from mothers, and I concentrate these energies on my friends, my family, and the survivors.

Living without children allows me to have an immense horizon, to concentrate on my personal achievements .. I would be afraid of centring my life on small human beings and forgetting to live what I have to live. I love children, I find them touching, adorable, resilient.

My twin sister does want kids, and I would love them once she would have them. But I do not want one from my own uterus.