Over a third of Australian women will never have children, however, womanhood continues to be equated with motherhood. Women’s experiences of childlessness or non-mothering are diverse but often the stories in the media only re -present the stereotypes. This essay included in a collection of essays and stories about the experience of mother and non-mothering explores the issues of childlessness from the perspective of an older woman and the challenge of articulating the way that women’s desire to have or not have children might shift and change over time.
Understandings of identity as multiple and shifting provide a starting point for this essay. Much of the literature on childlessness divides women without children into women who are childless
Understandings of identity as multiple and shifting provide a starting point for this essay. Much of the literature on childlessness divides women without children into women who are childless