ONLY a culture amusing itself to death would listen to the Mother’s Day ramblings of an intentionally infertile woman who wonders, at the advanced age of 44, whether to have a child without a husband. Eve Ledermain writes in her anti-motherhood Mother’s Day essay in The New York Times:

I’m afraid of undertaking motherhood alone, in a tiny apartment with a three-flight walk up and little savings. I’m equally scared of the drone of doing so with a husband and a good job in a nice home. And what I fear the most is missing the indescribably deep connection with a child that yields a lifetime of stories.

Paralyzed by uncertainty, I nearly want to flip a coin to end the wrenching lack of knowing. But as T.S. Elliot said, “Things don’t go away. They become you. There is no end, but addition.” So undecided and waiting for my soul to speak, I’ll wait on, for the choice to become me.

Okay, instead of a “wrenching lack of knowing,” Eve, try this. Admit that it’s way too late for you. You’ve wasted your youth. Given your self-centeredness, you’d have made a lousy mother anyway.

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JESSE POWELL writes:

Here’s a shocking statistic from the Economist magazine. From the article, “China’s Achille’s Heel“:

 “Over the past 30 years, China’s total fertility rate—the number of children a woman can expect to have during her lifetime—has fallen from 2.6, well above the rate needed to hold a population steady, to 1.56, well below that rate (see table).

 But for now it [the one-child policy] is firmly in place, and very low fertility rates still prevail, especially in the richest parts of the country. Shanghai reported fertility of just 0.6 in 2010—probably the lowest level anywhere in the world.”

 Did you catch that? The Total Fertility Rate in Shanghai, China was 0.6 in 2010; less than one-third the replacement rate! Shanghai is the richest city in China with per capita income close to the standards of the rich Western countries. It is the most densely populated city in the country and the largest city by population in the world; it had 23 million people in 2010. This is about the same population as the country of Taiwan. Shanghai as a city has a population a little smaller than Texas (Texas has 26 million people). For every woman in Shanghai who has two children during her lifetime there are two other women who never have children at all. It is hard to imagine what that kind of insanity is like.

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Mothers of large families receive the Medal of the French Family

TIBERGE of Galliawatch writes:

Elizabeth Badinter, like Simone Veil, has consistently closed her eyes to the reality of the destruction of the French family and the slow steady takeover of the country by Islam. Both women, being Jewish, have aroused no small amount of resentment among traditional Catholics. Robert Badinter, her husband, was responsible for the ban on capital punishment.

Badinter claims that fertility of  French women is just fine, denying statistical evidence to the contrary. Tiberge has posted twice, here and here, on the Medal of the French Family, which goes to mothers of more than five children. Muslim women have dominated the awards in recent years.

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Rachel P. writes:

I have spent some time on your blog and find it interesting. I do, however, think there is little offered to the infertile woman in your piece “The Locked Door of Infertility.” Children and family life are in many ways the cornerstone of modern devout Christian identity. It’s really not enough to say, in essence, to the infertile woman: “That’s unfortunate. Read More »