i’m 52, childless and single. i terminated my only 2 pregnancies and only now know for sure that i did the right thing. i love children and i very much wanted my own children. it has taken me many years to know i made the right choice not to bring my pregnancies to term.

at the time, they were very difficult, painful decisions to make. then, i wondered for a very long time after if they were wrong decisions. i now believe that was mostly because of the societal stigma associated with terminating pregnancy.

with the wisdom of age, i now know that my choices were correct in a way i did not know with certainty when i was younger. i want to share some thoughts from the other side of menopause with young women still in the grip of the biological drive to reproduce.

our mothers and grandmothers had no choice. for countless generations, women have been bound to their reproductive destiny and are still enslaved by it in many parts of this world, unfortunately.

i’n very aware and grateful that i’m in the first generation of my family freed from a prescribed biological destiny. as a result, i have been enabled to explore my talents to contribute as an artist. both my mother and her mother had wanted to be artists before society made them mothers.

i can still remember the day i realized that as a female i had the power to reproduce. as a child, i was sure that was something i wanted to experience. but, i can also remember the day i promised myself i would never give my child a father like the one i had.

as the adult child of an alcoholic, i almost forgot that promise. at 23, i intentionally got pregnant out of wedlock, by an alcoholic, because i wanted a baby. my mom, who married my father because she was pregnant at 19, brought me back to reality and to the clinic. as a result, she has no grandchildren.

but, my mother and i are both environmentslists. frankly, more people is the last thing we need right now here on planet earth. that’s just a fact, but we are biologically driven to reproduce despite that reality.

the love of my life was also an alcoholic. i tried to get him sober for 10 years without success. but, now i reslize i was still being driven by my desire for children. when clearly our genes were not the best to pass on.

let’s talk about this dealing of genetic cards. of my siblings, i am clearly the most like my father, not least of all in addictive tendencies. so, any child of mine, particularly with the addicts to whom i was always attracted, would have been dealt addictive genes.

also, if i had not been focused on sobering up my beloved soul mate to make him a fit father, perhaps i could have better handled his disease. but, i failed, lost him and now he is dead. i got pregnant once more unintentionally by another alcoholic and terminated that pregnancy as well.

at some point, i faced the fact that if what i really wanted was to have a child in my life, i could adopt a child who needed me. if that does not appeal to you, i suspect it is because wanting a child in your life is not really what is driving you. but, i would argue that is the only reason to become a parent.

there is no shortage of orphans and children in need. so, if you aren’t just following biological urges, you can consciously choose parenthood and pass some other tests to be allowed to do it. if you come up with reasons not to do that, look very carefully at yourself and what is really driving you.

creating a new child is biologically driven, self satisfying and that’s why so many people don’t make great parents. reproduction is ultimately a selfish act which then demands more selflessness than people have ever experienced before, in parenthood.

now, i have friends who are exceptions to this, who are great parents raising great kids who i love. but, let’s be real.

in a world suffering from human over population, forcing women to have kids they can not afford or do not want is just crazy. based on what? the rights of the zygote?

fertilized eggs are not independent beings with rights. they are part of a woman’s body which may or may not result in a healthy, viable person many weeks, actually months, in the future.

a chicken egg is not called a chicken. a fertilized human egg is not a human. if i was a chicken, you would call it breakfast. a fertilized egg is not a child, it is a potential child.

every woman’s body discards the egg of a potential child every month for 25 years or more during menstation. just because some man’s sperm fertilized one of those eggs does not make it sacred. remember monty python’s “every sperm is sacred?” comedy, not public policy.

as women emerge from thousands of years of second class citizenship, we will transform this world. first and foremost, by not reproducing the genes of the rapist, the wife-beater and the deadbeat dad.

when women have full control over their own bodies and lives, we can choose to reproduce the genes of only the best of men and our species will evolve rapidly. think about it.

that is why reproductive rights are fought against by men who want to continue to have power over women. right now men can be biologically successful by reproducing without being true men and good fathers.

“bastards” are people who had fathers who did not take responsibility for impregnating their mothers, bad dads in other words. “sons of bitches” are men who had mothers who should not have been mothers, because they behaved like female dogs.

parenthood is the hardest and most important job on the planet. ideally, parenthood should only be entered into by aware adults ready to do the incredibly demanding selfless work of raising a child and only when they have the support they need, emotionally as well as financially, to do it right.

otherwise, the soul seeking entrance into the material world can be sent on to better parents, in my worldview. that is what i prayed to happen with the souls who approached me and what i believe did happen.

i once met a young man who had been given the uncommon name i had chosen during my first pregnancy. he was the right age, concieved just after my first abortion. he also looked as i once saw him in a dream i had of him as an adult while i was pregnant.

but, in my dream he was a very unhappy adult and i do not doubt it was because i was not happy as his mother. i was not really ready to be his mother. i choose to believe that his soul found another mother in a much better situation and a father who was truly there for him, which i could not have given him.

then, there is the freeing of human potential from the limitations imposed by parenthood. again, raising children is so demanding. when that demand is lifted, women can contribute in so many other ways to the life of the planet.

earth does not need you to reproduce. people are far from an endangered species. earth needs your love and your talents directed toward getting us to a better and brighter future for all of us.

finally, i now choose to believe my departed soul mate and i were brought together to create art not biological children. he recorded the music and i continue to write the words. so, even passionate, physical love can be souls coming together to create something other than just another human child.