Shannon Vandermark explores the journey from feeling that infertility is a punishment to realising that life without children is a gift. Together with other inspirational men and women, we explore the grieving process of letting go of the dream of having children. The good news is that you can often get lost on your way to a dream and find yourself a better one.
In this episode I had the opportunity to visit Belgian-born writer Lief Achten, in her gorgeous home in the Southwest of England. Lief prepared a generous lunch, poured us coffees, piled biscuits on a plate and we climbed the narrow stairs to this cosy crow’s nest type room, where we had a chat about our lives…without children. I quickly realised that neither of us are particularly down with the whole typical fairy tale ending mirage. We covered a lot of ground: from letting friends look after us when we most need it, speaking openly of the pain that hits when you get the news that a close friend is expecting a baby, and to Lief’s painful struggle with endometriosis.