Building a support network

Lately I have been hearing from women who would love for me to return to creating new podcasts. I took 2011 off from the work, but hope to return this year with new shows -- and perhaps a webinar series! I currently have 46 shows available, with more than 39,000 downloads. Here's what's available.

For many of us, simply having sex with someone we love to produce a child is a great idea. But life being what it is today, women like us, busy with goals and options, have many more choices than we used to. We can delay child-bearing a few more years, generally into our 30s, sometimes into our early 40s. But when things don't go as easily as we would like, and we see the many options to motherhood available to us, how do we choose?

This Wednesday, November 16, 7-8:30pm, a Family Building Network Support Group will meet with Choice Mom-friendly counselor Patricia Mendell in New York City.

I am happy to announce the launch of our regional e-guides -- compilations of resources and expert insight coming out of our Choice Mom Networking Events in particular cities. These e-guides will be of great help to women in those communities -- advice from local Choice Mom-friendly doctors, for example -- and some of the insights will certainly be of value to women everywhere, such as understanding what a doula might do for you.

I recently heard from this woman, in search of some outside insight. And it's no wonder, when you read her story. Yet, it's not an uncommon dilemma. Many of us have been in this place. Or have faced similar indecision about whether Choice Motherhood is the right step. What do you suggest for her?

After Holly shared her story with the Single Mother by Choice community, she received some wonderful feedback about dealing with the chaos of single parenthood.

This Mother's Day weekend I'm contemplating the good, the bad, and the ugly of Choice Motherhood.

Any of you who have been following Choice Mom resources over the years is likely acquainted with Cathi. She found the humor in the stress of trying to self-inseminate, in learning about her own fertility, in being pregnant, in being the mom of a newborn, and now in being simply, joyfully, Mom. Here is her story in a nutshell.

Two women from our 2010 Austin event have emerged to keep the conversations happening and the resources shared in that part of the U.S. Here's the story of one of them.

When it was time to start finding coordinators to help Choice Moms do the work we do with the community, the first person I thought of was Kali, who has quietly been offering suggestions and moderation help for several years. Now you, too, can meet her as she steps out of the shadows to help manage our vast East Coast resources.

I met Jessica at our Raleigh event. She had driven in from Atlanta with Cyndi. They met after I let them know both were traveling from the same area, so they made contact, drove together, became friends, and will now co-moderate our new Atlanta conversation board.

From new Choice Mom-friendly estate planner Chris Tymchuck, of Unique Family Law: When we saw a man on the side of the road asking for money, my 3-year-old daughter asked, "what is he doing with that sign?" I braced myself for a difficult conversation.

This Thinker shared her story on the Choice Mom discussion board after "lurking" for awhile, and there were so many good tidbits to share with the wider community that I asked for permission to excerpt it here.

My youngest turned 7 the other day. That means we're about to do his flower, representing the important people in his life right now. It's a favorite new tradition we created when the "family tree" assignments started five years ago, when my daughter was his age.

This new-and-improved website has been in operation now for nearly a year. I'd like to share some interesting new data about where we tend to be living, the stages we are in, and what we prefer to read on this website.

Here it is! For a limited time, the special new baby for our Choice Mom community. Our Choice of ChoiceMoms.org tips from 2010, featuring everything from Organization to Building a Support Network, Q&A to Commentary.

This arrived as a comment to another post, and I thought it was a great conversation starter as a blog. "As a Thinker I tend to over-think everything. I believe learning to ask for help is a good philosophy for life. But what if all your plans fail and you have to do it ALL alone?

A Choice Mom had to terminate at 17 weeks because of chromosomal issues with a baby who was conceived after seven IUI attempts. She was heartbroken, and turned to the discussion board for support. Stacy is one who responded with her story of how she coped after loss.

I went to a talk by a well-respected neighbor of mine, Dan Buettner, whose latest book, Thrive: Finding Happiness the Blue Zones Way, is about tips he gleaned from worldwide research, database correlations, and conversations with individuals in the happiest cities in the world.

It is always surprising to me how often I seem to be in a state of revising my plans. I meant to grow up, meet my prince, get married and have kids. I really did. It just didn't work out that way.

I've been reminded in the last week just how fragile life is. A Choice Mom friend unexpectedly lost her younger sister last week -- a mother of three -- in a tragic accident. And a neighbor couple are BOTH battling cancer, one of them terminal, with 7- and 9-year old daughters at home.

Arlene is a Seattle-based counselor and Choice Mom of a teenage daughter. I met her when she participated in one of my New York City networking events. She specializes in working with Choice Moms-in-the-making. Here are some of her thoughts:

I love getting "thank you" emails from women on the journey. I recently heard from Linda, who allowed me to share her story here.

Some years ago I had the pleasure of meeting Dan Buettner, a noted explorer with a special interest in healthy living and a particular gift for making things happen.

Tis the season. There is fun in Halloween tricks and treats with our kids. But for many, also the conflicts that come from the community time of Thanksgiving, Chanukkah, Christmas, New Year's. Feelings of isolation as summer frolicking turns into the more contemplative Fall and reclusive Winter seasons.

Krista Post, who launched a series of support group discussions for Minneapolis Thinkers and Tryers, is starting another group.

When you are feeling isolated, angry, depressed or confused about the Choice Mom path, the discussion boards have become a good place to vent and share. But sometimes we need someone who not only understands the Thinking to Being stages, but is specifically trained to talk with us about our emotions.

I am frequently asked by reporters how big the Choice Mom community is. While there is no census-taking data that reveals the answer, I can use our discussion boards as a way to gauge growth -- and the types of things we are most interested in talking about.

I've had two experiences recently where I've definitely felt the difficulties of being a single mom.

This priceless -- and honest -- gem from Cathi about new motherhood comes from the archives of the Choice Moms blog, and I wanted to re-offer it to our new moms.

A new Choice Mom admitted her exhaustion with the first months of motherhood. Women in the community chimed in with support. Here are two of the responses.

These mental health therapists have an interest in working with single women about grief, fertility, adoption, and other aspects of the Choice Mom journey. They have been recommended by Choice Moms.

I met Vanessa at the Choice Mom networking event in London (July 2010). She is developing community connections for Choice Moms in her area, and had these tips to share about the pros and cons of Belgium as a fertility treatment option for single women.

One great New York City-area resource for is the Infertility and Adoption Counseling Center, run by Joni Mantell. Here are its workshops planned for Fall 2010.

By now I hope you've had a chance to explore the "support_network" keyword on ChoiceMoms.org, because I think this is the most important and valuable information any parent needs. But if you haven't seen everything we've offered here from fellow moms and experts, here's a shortlist of some of my favorite items in it.

I've been hearing more lately from women (and men) who don't have the easier community acceptance that many of us have grown accustomed to in North America. Here is one woman who reached out from South Africa, looking for community.

After a single dad wrote in who was feeling isolated with his young child, ChoiceMom.org readers chimed in with their own insights. One of the comments was about something we've talked about here before -- your support network often won't be what you expect it will be -- and is worthy of new discussion here.

There is no 1-2-3 formula to deciding whether the Choice Motherhood lifestyle is right for you. But there are a lot of ways to try to figure it out. This is a good place to start.

This excellent Choice Mom-in-the-making blog and post came to my attention when the author, Shannon, posted it on the discussion board. Anyone in the trying-to-conceive stage should read it.

My blog about pivot points having more impact on our kids than a "lack" of something in their life prompted a comment from a single dad. His comment was long, and I thought it was good fodder for a new post on the "support network" theme of the month on ChoiceMoms.org, so I'm using it here.

There are many things I like about Stacey MacGlashan's Choice Mom memoir "Just you and me, kid." One of them is the wonderful, honest detail she offers about the delivery process.

The latest addition to the regional guides now being offered on ChoiceMoms.org is for Choice Moms in the Washington D.C. area. Click here for the guide-to-date. I welcome your contributions to the service providers and experts in that area who you think Choice Moms should be aware of.

We had a wonderful Choice Moms Expo in Minneapolis in April 2010. Here are notes that grew out of that session.

It's hard for self-sufficient women to ask for help -- or even acknowledge to ourselves that we need it. But we do. Even more than we care to admit, because we tend to be so hard on ourselves. This month I'm thinking about the kinds of support Choice Moms need, and how we can get and give it as a community.

Thanks to the generosity of Choice Mom Emily, I've been able to spend a wonderful 10-day holiday in London with my kids and parents. While here I met in Coram's Field with 14 women, including Moms, Thinkers and Tryers from Belfast, Dublin, Belgium and many others in the United Kingdom. I also met with a large group of Ph.D. students in Cambridge, who were interested in the Choice Mom story.

I’m on the Amtrak from D.C. to NYC, having finished the first of back-to-back Choice Mom networking events. In D.C. we shared stories, tips and insight about:

At the Choice Moms networking event in D.C., Birthing Hands doula Claudia Booker offered many great tips for women about how to build a support network. She reiterated the importance of preparing for this well before the baby arrives. Some of her suggestions:

Stress is natural. No matter how much we might put into place to avoid it, stress comes -- daily. According to Caylie See, of Acupuncture Kitchen (San Francisco), "It’s important to focus not only on what causes us stress, but on how we deal with it." Here are her seven tips, courtesy of her affiliation with Choice Mom sponsor Laurel Fertility Care.

One of the best gifts of Choice Mom networking events is when small groups of women on similar paths find each other to discuss their joys and concerns. Here's what women in the Trying stage talked about with counselor Krista Post.

A group of women at a Choice Mom networking event discussed, with the help of counselor Krista Post, the nuances of talking about taking this path with close friends, family and colleagues.

At a Choice Mom networking event in 2008, I had the pleasure of meeting Anne Catherine Hundhausen. Since then, she has told her Choice Mom journey in a highly recommended documentary, about the grays of the donor conception process for her. Here's her personal story.

I returned from a great primitive island camping trip with another Choice Mom, two dads, and the seven kids we have who have known each other for years. And one of the 30 emails waiting for me from the long weekend was the link to a blog from Kat Wilder, who is trying to understand who Choice Moms are, and why we do what we do.

In this week's tips from Choice Mom sponsor Laurel Fertility Center (San Francisco) we discuss the importance, and methods, of building a fertility support team for yourself.

I am happy to report that we have a new option to create five informal coffeeshop gatherings in a few cities in 2011. I'm reinvigorating an inquiry into which cities have women most interested in contact that they're not otherwise getting.

There were a lot of new and pending parents at the San Francisco event in May 2010. Here are some of the great resources that were suggested by attendees.

At the recent San Francisco event -- as was the case in Austin and Atlanta -- women spoke to me individually, or with the group, about the intense emotions they felt in not being able to yet BECOME Choice Moms.

At our recent Choice Moms networking event in Minneapolis, participants brought donations for the many single moms who are served by a local homeless shelter. If you'd like to do something like this in your community of women, or with your family, here's what we collected.

We had a wonderful first-ever Choice Moms Expo in Minneapolis (April 2010), with more than 60 adults mingling with insight and support -- as well as great childcare fun for 20 Choice Kids. Here are some of the tips and connections made.

Well here it is...the public debate between a Glenn Sacks father's rights crony (Robert Franklin) and myself on PublicSquare.net. Read, laugh, seethe, comment. I actually love the opportunity to offer a rational perspective, even if my opponent has a decidedly different viewpoint. Such as Franklin's view that Choice Moms often trick men into having kids and then lie to keep them out of the child's life. Here's a synopsis, with links to the full debate.

An Australian woman who is going to college in the U.S. while raising a newborn, and a firefighter with two young children, share their tips about how to survive baby boot camp as a single parent.

A woman wrote to say that her friends were sharing the news of her Choice pregnancy with others, including the fact that she conceived with an anonymous sperm donor, even though she asked them not to. She turned to the community to get advice.

At the Austin Choice Moms event we started to talk about ways to simplify, and add flexibility to our work life, so that we can enjoy more time with our kids. How do we do it?

Are you thinking that life is unfair? That you might not be worthy of having a child? That Choice Motherhood is a path of defeat? That no one has chosen you? That you are an oddball for even considering this voyage? That your child would be branded as an outsider? Before you embark on this journey consider these words from Victoria Castle, author of The Trance of Scarcity.

It can seem off-putting when your fertility doctor asks you to do a psychological evaluation before embarking on Choice Motherhood. But it's common at many clinics.

submitted by Deirdre Fishel
I began filming "Sperm Donor X," a 54-minute documentary, when I was 40 and found myself at a precipice. I wanted to have a biological child, yet doing it alone with donor sperm felt bizarre and terrifying. I had no idea how my story would end and I wanted to find other women facing the same turning point.

A Choice Mom made a list of the pros and cons of nanny vs. childcare center, as she prepared to go back to work. Here is her list, and the comments elicited from other Choice Moms:

Long-time Choice Mom support Patricia Mendell hosts a monthly conversation to help families learn how to talk about non-traditional family-building with their kids. Dates: February 24, April 21, May 26.

One woman on the Choice Mom discussion board noticed a pattern -- that others have agreed with -- about who tends to disapprove of the Choice Mom path, and who does not:

Q: I am looking into having a child with donor insemination, but I am not sure where to begin, and what to expect about cost. What should I know?