Here you are, in the midst of menopause, single and childless. While your monthly cycle was a nuisance and always come at the most inopportune time, now it is leaving or gone. With the exception of several times in our lives we looked forward getting rid of it. Now, something unexpected has happened, you are not as cheerful as you anticipated. You have apprehensions. Why? There suddenly are emotions that have surfaced that you did not predict. With menopause, you have lost that hidden desire to bear children. It had always been your decision not to have children. You now realize that you no longer have the option. Menopause has stripped this decision from you.

Now you mourn. You mourn the idea of not having the joys of motherhood. You will never have the joys of feeling movement in your womb. You will never witness your belly grow. You will never have the joy of holding your newborn. You will never have someone depend on you for food and changing. You will never have someone call you Mommy and want you over everyone else. And the pain is there, very vivid, very real. So you mourn alone, you cry and you have your wake, your funeral while you build a monument in the depth of your soul. And this pain is yours and yours alone.

And you wonder if your decision was correct. You have lost all options for at 50 you are not even considered a candidate for adoption of an infant. That camp is closed for good. This is a cry that cannot be explained except by the women that shares the same pain. There has been a demise that no one has recognized. The world continues as if there is nothing wrong. No one realizes there has been a great loss; you are isolated in your grief. No flowers, no condolences, no cards nor apologies. Only you know of this demise. No one else understands or possibly even cares. How do you explain to others that there has been a fatality and no wake, no funeral, no acknowledgement? Your grief is disenfranchised so you wipe your face, and you try to continue as if there is been no loss. You tell yourself, I am intact and all is well….but the pain continues. You are in the depth of pain and dissolution with feelings of disconnection during this season of menopause yet single and childless.

Your mourning will subside. It will get better as mourning always does. But you never forget. Every now and then you go back to the memorial in your heart and you metaphorically bring flowers, kneel at the grave site, you may even shed tears as you remember the loss of never baring children. You still have an opportunity to leave a contribution to the world by finding a vessel to deposit your emotional wealth. Where will you set the ashes of your lost children? You sprinkle the ashes among your nephews, nieces, your friends children and/or mentee’s. This will be the greatest way to spread the ashes of your loss. This will be your legacy and it will assist in easing your pain. In every loss there is a chance for creativity.

And you move on. You continue living. Realizing your opportunity is gone forever, in spite of being in menopause, single and childless.