Is giving birth a prerequisite for true parenting?

By Mary-Ellen 

There is an ages old adage that goes something like, “It takes a village to raise a child.” Similarly, this adage could be stated as, “One home, many roofs.” At nearly sixty-two years of age, my life has been characterized by much contact with children and the above sayings, have always run deep within my knowing as a woman.  

As a young girl, I could always see that the raising of children was everyone’s responsibility. Coming from a large family, where at different times there were many around the table, seeing my parents care for other ‘family’, whether blood or not, always felt a natural occurrence, which something inside me endorsed as being the correct way to do things. It was an innate knowing. 

It wasn’t that we all just pitched in, it was rather a deeper level of care that saw no difference between me as a child, or the children of others being cared for by the adults central to any particular gathering. 

In my working life, I spent over twenty-five years teaching children of all ages, as well as an eleven-year period, working to protect and support children in the Child Protection System, known in Queensland, Australia, as Child Safety. 

In both roles, I supported children to feel safe, to learn, to work as a member of a family or group within society and to generally grow and keep in touch with their natural essence, in a world that encourages everything but that. I would say that in those thirty-six years, I worked very closely with at least eight hundred children, if not, more. In my personal life, coming from a family of eight children, lovingly supporting my twenty nieces and nephews was fairly commonplace, particularly when they were younger.  We spent much time together, depending on where they were living.  The children all looked to me for fun, love and above all, guidance, and respect. 

Sheree and I faced the wrath of both our families, who for whatever their reasons struggled to accept that we were an authentic couple.

At the age of 29, I met my partner Sheree, and thirty-two years on, we are still together after having raised two girls and six grandchildren together. Raising two young girls as a gay couple in the early 1990s was no mean feat. Sheree and I faced the wrath of both our families, who for whatever their reasons struggled to accept that we were an authentic couple. My mother, in her reaction to the news that one of her seven daughters, was ‘gay’, struggled with the fact that I would never have a wedding, that I might never have my ‘own’ children and that I was actually taking on someone else’s children to raise. As the years passed, she did come to see that all was not lost and having gained Sheree and her daughters, into the family was far more important than having a daughter follow society’s expectations of an engagement, a marriage, a mortgage and 2.5 children. 

My life has been one of exploration. From a very young age I was always sensitive to the fact that there was much more to us than commonly accepted. I was very aligned to truth and within my family I was always calling out that which did not belong in terms of truthful behaviours by both my parents and siblings. I was called a ‘stirrer’ or ‘feather ruffler,’ but this did not bother me at all. You see, I had this inner sense that we were all much more than our behaviours, that we were all much more than what we were told by the world, including our teachers and parents, and therefore, we each had the opportunity and responsibility to live that.

I was aware that we were all very connected and that our behaviours, even those solely directed at ourselves, like beating up or abusing our bodies with excess food, alcohol, or negative self-talk, not only impacted ourselves, but all of us. I had a strong knowing, that deep within we were all the things we longed to be – worthy, self-loving, settled, aware and above all ‘light’. This light is our capacity to move simply through life without being weighed down by what we all have accepted as being part and parcel of being human. We are human, we are in bodies and that is a fact. What we have also accepted as fact, however, is that our lives need to be difficult or burdensome, when this is not truly the case. Sayings such as ‘like it or lump it’, ‘that’s your lot in life’, ‘you only get one life’ and many others, always spoke to me of a life of burden and heaviness rather than a life of ‘light’, which I knew was possible for everyone.

I understood that the raising of children was everyone’s responsibility and this, as well as the know-how of how to relate to kids, came naturally. 

I had a keen sense of responsibility, and I knew that we were all in this together. From a young age, I was often told I was ‘an old Soul’ as I had a wisdom that was much in advance of my years, but, to me, it was as familiar and comfortable as an old pair of shoes. 

Within this soulful connection, was an understanding and knowing of the truth of family life and children that belied my young age. I understood that the raising of children was everyone’s responsibility and this, as well as the know-how of how to relate to kids, came naturally. I didn’t ever build kids up with positive mantra-like claptrap, rather I spoke to them in a way that recognized and honoured their ‘essence’ that I always knew was present. 

I knew that we all shared this same essence – not of goodness or kindness per se, but an essence of strength and completeness, no matter what the outside behaviours.

During my teaching career, and long afterwards, children would speak with me about their experience of having me as their teacher and the common thread was, that they felt ‘seen’, recognized for who they were. 

I often reflect on a phone call from a twenty-three-year-old male who had left my care in Child Safety at age eighteen. He phoned me at work one day, about seven or more years after I had last seen him, to tell me where he was and what he had been doing. He told me that he had a job in the mines, had bought his first house and his partner was about to have their first child. This in itself, after coming through the Child Protection System for eight years is mammoth. He ended the call that day saying he had often wanted to ring but hadn’t for various reasons. On that particular afternoon he decided to make the call as he wanted to thank me for what I had given him in his life. I was his Child Safety Officer for two years. He thanked me that day and ended the call by telling me, “You taught me what love is.”

This phone call touched me deeply. What it fully confirmed in me was the knowing that you don’t have to physically give birth to children to know them. It also fully confirmed in me, the inner knowing that I had always had, that we are all in ‘essence’ the same. It also reminded me, that this essence is always present, no matter what our age and our circumstances, and that this essence is always responsive when we are spoken to and treated with love.

So, at nearly sixty-two years of age, I am a woman, who in society’s view doesn’t know much about children because she hasn’t given birth to any. But…I can say without any doubt, that, in this life, I have busted this myth wide open!

Connecting to the essence of a child is key in relating to them, working with them, raising them, and loving them. Having given birth to them is not a prerequisite.   

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