Rachel Ries—Minneapolis, MN
over the past 9 months i’ve been gestating a new and unexpected notion. adjusting to a foreign reality. this one: i don’t think i’m going to have children. and – please know – i’m the one who who was ALWAYS unquestionably gonna have a family.
ask friends, ask family, ask the gaggle of well-loved children i’ve looked after over the years. i’ve got the hips and the patience and the nurturing and the all-that. unwaveringly, i knew i’d be Mom. and then, very quietly, that knowing disintegrated and … much to my surprise, i was still quite fully intact, alive, loved, purposeful, calm, satisfied. perhaps, dare i say it, even more so?
it’s been a slow dawning and i didn’t see it coming until it had already come; until i was already living in its light. one day i realized the coloring of my world was a bit different and this difference came from knowing i likely wouldn’t bring new life into it.
so what happened? what could make a healthy age-appropriate lady decide to step clearly away from the Mom trajectory? well, a handful of things (some of which i need to keep quietly holding). but the one reason i do want to voice – because it’s a conversation that NEEDS to get louder – is the one of our earth. i have no confidence i’d leave my daydream children or grandchildren with a hospitable home on this planet. and i can’t abide that. and if my not bearing children tips the sustainability scales in favor of other children already here – even a teensy bit – then may it be so.
the climate conversation trucks along: bleak and blue in the face. the brave scientists and the bendable politicians and everyone at the helms of power in between. but the voice i don’t hear often is a woman saying “I want to be a mom, but how can i?” or a man saying “i wanted to be a dad but i’m scared shitless.” the fallout of climate change isn’t somewhere out there it’s somewhere RIGHT HERE. it’s right here in my body with my clock ticking and me quietly shutting the door. and it’s right here in my top dresser drawer where for years i’ve kept a few bits of baby clothes hidden in the back, hoping one day to use them.
this is such a tender scary conversation and JUDGEMENT HAS NO PLACE here among us. whether or not you have children, whether or not you want children, whether or not you’re as “we’re doooomed!” as i am, whether or not you’re brimming with optimism or have decided to adopt or be a happy auntie. bless you for trying to do what’s best.
but let’s talk about this. please. it’s tender it’s visceral it’s dire it’s real and there’s POWER in that.
last month, out of nowhere, i was contacted by Conceivable Future, a budding organization who believes the “climate crisis is a reproductive crisis” and they “demand that the US end fossil fuel subsidies as an act of commitment toward our generation and those that follow.”
they’ve put out a call for testimonies and this is mine. and perhaps your voice is needed here too? steadily, then exponentially, it can get louder.
