Welcome! My guest today is Karen Wilmot, The Virtual Midwife.  She has assisted over 500 women in giving birth, but has never been pregnant or given birth herself.  Twice, she stepped away from her work when the desire to have her own baby overshadowed the joy she could feel at others’ birth experiences.  At age 47 now, Karen has found peace and a deep sense of purpose in her work.  She now says that NOT having children has been her greatest teacher and the driving force behind her work.

In this episode, you’ll learn the following about Karen’s journey:

• How Karen always thought she would have children;
• How the death of Karen’s mother while she was young made her lose her sense of family and live a rebellious life;
• After years of traveling and several relationships, Karen reached the point in her early 40’s when she said, “That was it.”  Her window of opportunity had closed;
• How she went through a relevant and acute grieving process;
• How one patient helped her recognize her “mothering of mothers” as an outpouring of nurturing and maternal instinct;
• How Karen uses yoga, breathing, and chanting to help ground her emotions;
• Karen shares details about her “Finding the Mother Within” workshops and how they have helped her heal;
• How women are often deceived into thinking that the only path to fulfilment involves motherhood;
• How Karen took the first steps of moving forward through her disappointment;
• How she can express herself creatively in several specific ways, all because she does NOT have children;
• The benefits of not having kids are the freedom to travel, a deeper level of compassion for others, and the ability to inspire others through your circumstances;
• How Karen has drawn inspiration from every woman she has ever assisted in childbirth;
• Karen’s advice to women going forward:  respect each other and the path each one travels.  Celebrate creativity and the ability to nurture and love.

Find Karen at www.expatsexpecting.com

Respect each other’s choices.  We’re all great in our own way, but we don’t all have to travel the same path.

For more episodes of "Unclassified Woman" see www.michellemariemcgrath.com

Beata Alfoldi is a teacher, workshop facilitator, Shamanic practitioner, healer, speaker, and see-er.  She has an intuitive gift for assisting individuals to move through deep transformation.  She holds private classes, sessions, workshops, and international retreats in Australia, Bali, Thailand and Mexico.  She created the Integral Woman program for the Awareness Institute in Sydney and co-facilitated a transformational group journey to Peru where she lived and studied with various healers and shamans of the Amazon and the Andes. 

Beata is passionate about inspiring others to find ways to live authentically with freedom and empowerment in life.  She is a dear friend of mine, and I’m thrilled to have her on the show today.  Join us! I'm sure you will find this conversation very moving and valuable. 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• How Beata, at age 45, is childless, not by choice, but through the unexpected tragedy and shock of her son’s stillbirth four years ago.
• How stillbirth, and death/loss in general, are topics that people find difficult to address.
• How a life-changing event, like Beata’s loss, brings up personal feelings of guilt and challenges your basic belief system.
• How Beata feels a soul-connection to her son, that assures her that death is not the end.
• How small rituals each day helped Beata grieve and heal from the loss of her son.
• How the support of friends, who allowed her space for her healing, helped her get through the painful loss and how she, in turn, can help others in grief.
• How Beata has insight and wisdom to help each of us be helpful in supporting those who are experiencing grief.
• Her experience as a Shamanic practitioner has given her a deeper understanding, compassion, and increased gratitude for life.
• How Beata finds ways to mentor and influence the lives of the children in her life even though she doesn’t have the opportunity to mother daily her own son.
• How Beata aspires to set up a children’s charity in the near future, and already donates a percentage of her profits to help the lives of children. 

“If we can set up more networks of grace, then we can build a better world where there is not ONE PERSON without access to clean water, food, and shelter.”  Andrew Harvey

• Beata advises others who have experienced the loss of a child to take the time to grieve and then look for opportunities to serve others who are also healing.
• How Beata’s experience has liberated her from basic fears and intensified her appreciation for the sacredness of life.

Thanks for joining me for Beata’s touching story.  I highly recommend her programs, workshops, and retreats.  Learn more at www.wildheartawakening.com.  

Please share this episode with any friends who are dealing with or have experienced similar situations of stillborn birth, miscarriage and loss.

My hope is that Beata's story will bring comfort and support as she's a wonderful role model of how we can gracefully and gently navigate these extremely challenging experiences. Thank you so much! 

For more episodes of "Unclassified Woman" see www.michellemariemcgrath.com

Randi Buckley writes and coaches emotionally aware, deeply contemplative women toward finding their truth, with depth and beauty, with life’s big questions and sticky situations.  She is the creator of “Maybe Baby" - When you hear this whisper of “maybe” in your heart”, “Healthy Boundaries for Kind People”, and “The Viking Woman Workshop”. Today we discuss the nature of ambivalence and our experiences with it. You can reach Randi at www.randibuckley.com. 

As Randi covers the following areas of ambivalence about having children, you can expect to hear:

• Randi knew as a 6-7-year-old girl that she didn’t want to have children because she equated having a child with NOT being a feminist.
• She never saw herself as a mother and was horrified when she heard the whisper of “maybe” in her late 30's.
• Randi found that many of her beliefs about motherhood and childbearing were not her own, but were society-driven.
• Randi had initially believed that motherhood would make her into all the things she didn’t want to be.
• It’s ok to be ambivalent, but some people (especially well-meaning mothers) will try to talk you out of your ambivalence.
• Each woman is the only one who can decide what’s right for her.  
• We have the responsibility to have compassion for the different roles women play and appreciate those roles.
• You can reserve the right to change your mind about what you want for your life - at any time.
• “Maybe Baby” is a 6-week self-study course in which several hundred women have participated.  The course teaches you how to find what’s true for you and how to be at peace with it.

Wise Words:  “What’s right for me probably isn’t right for you!”

I hope you enjoy this episode where we discuss in depth our experiences with ambivalence. Would love for you to comment on the post at michellemariemcgrath.com
If you enjoyed this episode please share. Thank you.

A very interesting interview today from a mother's perspective on the topic of being childfree.

Melanie Holmes is a mother of two sons and a teenage daughter.  She's also a writer and researcher, who has interviewed over 200 women and examined the cultural assumptions of motherhood within today’s society.  She received her BA degree in 2011, a degree that took 20 years to complete because she took time out from her education to raise three children. 

At age 51, she achieved her lifelong dream of becoming a writer with the publication of The Female Assumption: A Mother’s Story: Freeing Women from the View that Motherhood is a Mandate.  For this book, she won a Global Media Award.  You can find the book at http://www.melanieholmesauthor.com

Melanie has witnessed firsthand the pain of women who are viewed as dysfunctional or selfish for deciding to pursue something other than motherhood.  Her own daughter was the inspiration for her research and writing.  She wanted her daughter to know that there are many options besides motherhood for her within her female experience, as she grows into adulthood.  

In this episode, the listener can expect to hear the following:

• How many women never question or have a choice in having motherhood as part of their story;
• How the need exists to amplify this conversation among women—that womanhood does NOT equal motherhood for everyone;
• How people rudely assume they have the right to ask VERY personal questions about your intentions and your timeline concerning having children;
• How the need exists to raise consciousness publicly about people who choose to be “childfree” or “childless.”
• How we, as a society, still assume that motherhood is the ultimate goal for every woman, even though the number of women over 40 without children has doubled in the last ten years;
• How women are viewed as being naturally disposed to be nurturing and caring toward children, totally discounting the fact that men are just as capable of caring for children;
• How media influences our visions of ourselves—“We can’t aspire to be what we don’t see.”
• How double standards for the roles of men and women exist in today’s society and how very little progress has been made;
• How motherhood should be revered, but not presented as the panacea for all that might be wrong with someone’s life;
• How the “Parenting Partnership” doesn’t have to include merely a man and a woman.

Points to consider:

• “Motherhood should not be something to check off the to-do list.  Women are complete beings.”
• Respect each others’ boundaries.  We live in a diverse world, and we don’t all want the same things.
• We need more women in politics and high-level leadership positions.  There are 19 states in the US that have never sent a woman to the Senate!