Fertility statistics Archives

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: Fireside Wisdom with Childless Elderwomen. What does it mean to be a ‘Radical Old Woman?’ [Recorded 21 June 2023]

June 22, 2023 Jody Day 0

Sign up to Jody’s mailing list for future sessions here. CAPTIONS ARE AUTO-GENERATED AND NOT ALWAYS ACCURATE! In this session of ‘Fireside Wisdom with Childless Elderwomen’, Jody Day (founder of Gateway Women) and her #NomoCrone panel (Nomo=not mother + crone is not an insult!) discuss what it means to each of us to be and become ‘Radical Old Women’. What does the word radical actually mean? Recorded on the June 2023 Solstice; a powerful fulcrum moment in the year, whether you are in the Northern or Southern hemisphere, this was a conversation by turns powerful, tender, shocking and surprising. Featuring: […]

[Audio + Transcript] ‘Why is Policy Engagement Essential for People Without Children?’ Christine Erickson, Founder of the New Legacy Institute in conversation with NLI Advisors Jody Day, Dr Robin Hadley, Therese Shechter and Nandita Bajaj [Recorded Jan 2023]

January 26, 2023 Jody Day 0

Why is Policy Engagement Essential for People Without Children? on New Legacy Radio, a Voice America Show. [Episode recorded 23 January 2023]. Featuring Christine J. Erickson, founder of New Legacy Insititute in conversation with New Legacy Institute Advisors: Jody Day (founder of Gateway Women and author of ‘Living the Life Unexpected’), Dr Robin Hadley (adademic researcher and the author of ‘How Is a Man Supposed to be a Man? Male Childlessness – a Life Course Disrupted’), Therese Shechter (founder of female-led production house Trixie Films and director of ‘My So Called Selfish Life’) and Nandita Bajaj (Lecturer on pronatalism at […]

[Audio + Transcript] The Menstruality Podcast – Episode 54: Finding Hope and Meaning When You’re Childless-not-by-choice with Jody Day [15 September 2022]

September 22, 2022 Jody Day 0

The Menstruality Podcast – Episode 54: Finding Hope and Meaning When You’re Childless-not-by-choice (Jody Day) 15 September 2022. Sophie Jane Hardy from RedSchool.net interviews Jody Day, founder of Gateway Women. Click here to listen to episode or search ‘Menstruality’ wherever you get your podcasts. Full written transcript below. ABSTRACT Jody’s personal journey through grief, denial, hopelessness to real acceptance of her life as a childless woman. The creation of Gateway Women and Jody’s mission to make the world understand childless women, and help women who are childless-not-by-choice to understand themselves. The ‘bingos’ that childless women hear all the time. Preparing yourself to answer […]

‘Childless’: a new radio documentary. Download the podcast and/or watch the live Q&A with the Director, Hilary Fennell [Recording now available]

January 23, 2022 Jody Day 0

TO LISTEN TO THE DOCUMENTARY AS A PODCAST: On the Newstalk.com website: ‘Documentary on Newstalk’: episode ‘Childless’ Apple Podcasts: ‘Documentary on Newstalk’: episode ‘Childless’ Spotify Podcasts: ‘Documentary on Newstalk’: episode ‘Childless’ Hilary Fennell’s website: www.hilaryfennell.com “It’s hard to imagine that there remains a subject so taboo that although shared by one in five women over 45, it is never discussed. That subject is being childless, but not by choice.” Hilary Fennell, programme maker and journalist is one of a growing number of such women in Ireland. In this documentary she explores what it means to be childless in a child-centred […]

Jody Day interviewed by Laura Behnke for ‘The Life Actually Podcast’ on childlessness across the life course; working to deshame ourselves as part of healing; how understand the grief process helps us deal with all of life’s changes and much much more! (Audio + Transcript)

October 14, 2021 Jody Day 0

[October 2021] Jody Day interviewed by Laura Behnke for ‘The Life Actually Podcast‘ in which we discuss, amongst other things: the data around the numbers of childless/free women, and why it’s on the rise; about shame as a powerful tool of social control; about how not having children means you also won’t get to be a grandmother either; about my own unplanned pregnancy and abortion at 20 and how this is a hidden part of many women’s stories, both mothers and childless women; about how our childhood experience of being mothered may influence our later thoughts about becoming mothers ourselves; […]

If you’ve ever wanted to have a productive conversation about childlessness with your friend, colleague or HR Director and found it too hard, listen to this brilliant interview by Doryn Wallach @It’s Not a Crisis Podcast – and maybe even share it with them? This is bridge-building in action.

July 26, 2021 Jody Day 0

You can listen to the clips above by clicking on them and find the full interview here or by searching ‘It’s Not a Crisis podcast’ wherever you get your podcasts. The full transcript is below. In this interview with Doryn Wallach, who is a mother in her 40s (as are most of her audience) we talk about the challenges of being childless in a world full of parents, how pronatalism operates, about how the whole ‘As a Mother’ thing works against childless/free women, about the difference between childless & childfree, about the complexity of childlessness after abortion, about what NOT […]

The fetishization of the baby bump, the rise in childless and childfree women amongst the Millenial generation and so much more! Jody Day interviewed on the Virgin.Beauty.B!tch Podcast (May 2021)

May 25, 2021 Jody Day 0

In this interview with Christopher and Heather on their ‘Virgin.Beauty.B!tch’ podcast, we go deep into some of the societal and structural issues around both voluntary and involuntary childlessness that I’m absolutely passionate about, but which rarely get discussed. About how pronatalism + consumerism have fetishized and commodified motherhood and how this oppresses all women, whether they are mothers or not. And how it all started with that Demi Moore pregnancy bump shot on the cover of Vanity Fair in 1991 (which doesn’t look quite how I remembered it; my memory has actually merged together 3 separate Vanity Fair covers!). The clip […]

Why do the issues of motherhood get so much more attention than those of childless women? Jody Day interviewed by Helen Russell for her ‘How to be Sad’ Podcast (May 2021)

May 24, 2021 Jody Day 0

Listen to a short clip of Jody Day’s interview with Helen Russell for her How to Be Sad’ podcast above or click here to listen to the whole interview (56-minutes). Read the full transcript below. Helen Russell’s interview with me for her ‘How to be Sad’ podcast interview covers so much ground that I hardly know where to start! We go fearlessly into places that normally childless women don’t discuss publicly including some things I’ve never discussed before: My journey from childhood and young adulthood where I didn’t think I wanted children, to becoming an involuntarily childless woman experiencing unexplained […]

Gateway Women Masterclass: Childlessness and Sexual Intimacy: the taboo within the taboo

April 24, 2021 Jody Day 0

RECORDED LIVE ON SATURDAY 22 MAY 2021. TO REGISTER FOR FUTURE FREE GW MASTERCLASSES CLICK HERE Over the decade that I’ve been the vault of childless women’s most private stories, there’s one topic that comes up again and again, once they feel safe enough to talk about it: sexual intimacy. And yet, whenever I’ve tried to create some kind of group conversation around it, it’s fallen flat. It seems many of us are hungry for someone else to talk about this – as long it’s not us and our sex life! Whether we’re in a relationship or not, our sense […]

Childlessness after hysterectomy: “I am still a woman, hear me roar!” by Sarah Lawrence

February 9, 2019 Jody Day 9

I’m sitting here ruminating on how to talk about how grieving childlessness morphs after a hysterectomy in a way that is engaging… I’ve always loved a challenge, but even so! I guess the first thing would be to tell you my story, so you have some idea about why I know about this topic because it’s not something that usually gets talked about, is it? My dreams of having a family were, abruptly, ended during a 10-minute consultation in 2014. In a very blunt manner, I was told that I had stage four endometriosis and, that as a consequence, I […]

Where are the childless voices in the celebrations over IVF’s 40th anniversary?

July 15, 2018 Jody Day 9

If you weren’t already aware, in ten day’s time, on 25th July 2018, Louise Brown, the first person to be born from IVF turns forty – so it’s IVF’s 40th birthday too. There’s going to be a big party at the Science Museum in London and the UK HFEA (Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority), and other fertility organisations are in self congratulatory mood. This tweet says it all (thank you to my colleague Dr. Robin Hadley for this) and a sobering reminder of how often IVF fails – almost 80% of the time. In response to this tweet, the HFEA had […]

Getting through Mother’s Day as a childless woman

March 11, 2018 Jody Day 8

“Mother’s Day” – the two words that signal the most dreaded time of the year after Christmas when you’re grieving childlessness. For UK readers, Mother’s Day falls today on Sunday 11th March although, thanks to social media, we get to experience it all over again when international Mother’s Day happens in May… I was interviewed at length for an article which was published today in the The Observer about being childless on Mother’s Day. One of the questions really made me think was this: “Does the notion of Mother’s Day upset/anger/depress you?” I thought about it and although whilst I was […]

Facts and Figures on Childlessness Around the World

September 12, 2017 Jody Day 0

Below is an extract from Chapter 2 of my book, Living the Life Unexpected: 12 Weeks to Your Plan B for a Meaningful and Fulfilling Future without Children(Bluebird/PanMac 2016) in which I survey the facts and figures around the world. You can download the introduction and first chapter free here. All data and sources in my book are fully academically referenced, should you wish to explore further. In Chapter 1 of the book, I reference a recent meta-analysis suggests that whilst perhaps 10 per cent of women without children choose not to be mothers (childfree), and 10 per cent can’t have them for […]

The voices of childlessness: ‘A Family Without A Child’

August 17, 2014 Jody Day 8

On Friday 15th August 2014, a documentary presented by the BBC presented by award-winning journalist Sangita Myska was aired on BBC Radio 4. Called A Family Without A Child it featured the candid and rarely-aired stories of four women: Sangita herself, ‘coming out’ about her and her husband’s infertility issues; myself, reliving some of the darkest moments in my journey through the heartbreak of childlessness; Jessica Hepburn on her hardcore experiences in the world of IVF and author Paula Coston on the reality of being a single, childless woman of 59 and once again experiencing loss as friends become grandparents. Although all four of […]

1 2 »