Maybe I was meant to be motherly but not a mother?

I want #children. I always have. At age 12 I used to practice on how to change diapers on my dolls – I was preparing for my sons and daughters I was going to have.  I dreamed to be a mother to one day.  My 30s came and went without any hope of having children.  Now I am in my 40s, I am still #unmarried and don't have a child. . #Motherhood was always a path I felt ready for but I guess motherhood was not ready for me.

The grief over not only not being a mother, but now also suffering from feeling 'less than' because I just simply hadn't found #love (or mutual love), was at times overwhelming. And as I saw couples younger than I getting sympathy for their #biological #infertility, I wondered why all I got were accusations of not doing enough, not trying hard enough. Trying too hard. Being too picky. Not being picky enough... And the hardest comment to defend: "You better hurry up!" (Hurry up and fall in love?)

While I have not suffered from biological infertility (as far as I know), I imagined my #grief was at least as deep as couples trying to conceive as I didn't have a love who shared the grief. Heck, I often didn't even have a date to get closer to trying! Every month that passed, I grieved a loss. But I grieved alone. I have no husband (or male partner) to grieve with me. And lamenting my infertility to close friends who are parents or to family was never well-received.

My generation is the first generation of women who have a choice to wait for love. Unlike many of our mothers, we earn enough to take care of ourselves (please don't call us 'career women' as careers are as much a choice for women as they are for men.) But still, the assumption is that all women who don't have children don't want children. There is a place between motherhood and choosing not to be a mother. And tens of millions of American women are there.

I'm still single and I have come to acknowledge the truth: it's very possible I won't have children of my own. I've grieved and have found my happiness on the other side. There are days that are still hard for me (Mother's Day, the day a friend announces her pregnancy, my birthdays, my monthly reminder...) but most days I'm happy. Very happy. I'm not in the wrong life being the wrong wife and trying to get out. I have no regrets.

My circumstances have left me #infertile but they have not left me non-maternal. I love the children in my life with boundless adoration. If I was not meant to be a mother, then perhaps I was meant to be motherly to many more. From girls and boys in my neighborhood, and of course to my amazing nephews and nieces by relation, I am an aunt.

I'm not childless, I'm childlike. I'm not a mother but I am maternal.

My infertility is circumstantial but my life is not barren. And to the women, who are on the other side of hope, know that you are more powerful than your womb. You are maternal whether or not maternity ever comes. You are a woman and your love and how you choose to offer and receive it, is a gift.

And you're not alone.