2024 - Gateway Women

Solo Elderhood: Fireside Wisdom with Childless Elderwomen. [Recorded December 2024]

December 16, 2024 Jody Day 0

CLICK HERE TO VIEW AND/OR DOWNLOAD THE CLICKABLE RESOURCE SHEET FROM THE WEBINAR In my December 2024 essay ‘The 3am Bag Lady Blues’ I wrote of the archetypal figure of the ‘bag lady’ who haunts the bad dreams of so many women, regardless of their financial and familial support systems. For those of us ageing without children, and perhaps also without a partner, these fears can be very loud. And this is why it’s so important that we hear from older women without children living this reality, and finding ways to navigate it, rather than listening only to our 3am […]

[WATCH NOW] ‘FRIENDSHIPS ACROSS LIFE’, A WORLD CHILDLESS WEEK SESSION OF FIRESIDE WISDOM WITH CHILDLESS ELDERWOMEN

August 26, 2024 Jody Day 0

Recorded live on Thursday 19th September for World Childless Week 2024 Issues with female friendships (particularly with those who become mothers when we do not) are such a common part of the childless experience that I termed it ‘the friendship apocalypse’ of childlessness. And although I wouldn’t wish this painful experience on anyone else, it did come as a huge relief to me when I discovered that it’s something many of us can identify with – I thought I just must be a rubbish friend! The friendship issues that get stirred up can take us into deep waters that can […]

Jody Day interviewed by Civilla Morgan on the Childless Not By Choice Podcast [August 2024]

August 22, 2024 Jody Day 0

You can listen here or search ‘Childless Not By Choice’ on your preferred podcast platform. I’m proud to be a returning guest on Civilla Morgan’s ‘Childless Not By Choice‘ podcast. Our last discussion was in 2018 (episode 90) and so much has changed in both our lives (and our world) since then. Some of the things we touch on in this episode 166: Being involved in the care of our olders and, after their deaths, the feeling of being both childless AND parentless. About how getting older doesn’t necessarily lead to emotional maturation (and how integrating loss, such as childlessness, […]

[WATCH NOW] GATEWAY WOMEN MASTERCLASS WEBINAR: AN INTERVIEW & BOOK GIVEAWAY WITH AUTHOR, SUE FAGALDE LICK

June 29, 2024 Jody Day 0

Watch Jody Day, the founder of Gateway Women (and Gateway Elderwomen) interviewing Sue Fagalde Lick, the author of No Way Out of This: Loving a Partner with Alzheimer’s, published June 25th 2024 by SheWritesPress and available online and in bookstores. More info on Sue’s website and she’s also on Instagram @suefagaldelick and on Substack as @suelick Sue is 72 and the author of the memoir & blog Childless by Marriage, the collection Love or Children: When You Can’t Have Both, and a wonderful series of novels (beginning with Up Beaver Creek) featuring her inspiring and relatable childless heroine, ‘P.D.’, as well […]

[Father’s Day Guest Blog] ‘Time for Men to Speak Up’ by Robert Nurden

June 13, 2024 Jody Day 0

A guest blog for Father’s Day 2024 by Robert Nurden, author of I Always Wanted to Be a Dad: Men without Children I was recently interviewed by BBC Radio 5 about my book I Always Wanted To Be A Dad: Men without Children and what it was like being a childless man. It went quite well and afterwards, I posted a short message about it on Facebook. I chose three childless Facebook groups – Childless not by Choice, Childless over 50 and Ageing without Children (AWOC). I received great support – a total of 198 likes and lots of lovely […]

[WATCH NOW] Fireside Wisdom with Childless Elderwomen on ‘Courageous Conversations’ (Recorded 19 June 2024)

June 3, 2024 Jody Day 0

For the June 2024 Solstice, Jody Day, founder of Gateway Women brought together a panel of #NomoCrones (nomo=not-mother + crone is not an insult!) to explore the topic of ‘Courageous Conversations’. As all women grow up (and exist within) a patriarchal culture that valorizes female silence and compliance, this is no small task. Although some of us may have grown up in families and cultures that role-modelled and supported some freedom around speaking up for your needs, correcting misunderstandings and seeking to redress injustices, we are often encouraged by the overculture to become more compliant as move through puberty and […]

[WATCH NOW] Fireside Wisdom with Childless Elderwomen: Caring for the Caregiver – Recorded 20th March 2024

March 17, 2024 Jody Day 0

For the March 2024 Equinox session of ‘Fireside Wisdom with Childless Elderwomen,’ we focused on the topic of caregiving; both the care we give to others, and thinking too about the care we might need ourselves as we age without children… It’s often the case that childless women are expected to be the ‘natural’ caregivers for vulnerable family members, although our own potential care needs for the future are often hard to talk about or plan for. This is a topic I explored in some depth in my Substack essay ‘It’s not like she’s got anything else to do, is […]

[WATCH NOW] Free Gateway Women Masterclass: ‘Navigating Friendships, Old and New’. (Recorded Feb 2024)

February 3, 2024 Jody Day 0

Childlessness can be experienced as a relational wound and can ask a lot of us and our friendships – Sometimes more than they can bear. As many of our friends move into parenting, coupling and families, we can find ourselves increasingly isolated and feeling like outsiders in family-centred relationships, social spaces and workplaces. Yet childless people have much to give as friends, and we deserve relationships with others who can be authentic, empathetic and available. In this free Gateway Women Masterclass, Sarah Roberts, Judy Graham and myself explored the different types, purpose and contexts of friendships in our lives, and […]