For welcoming Jennifer Anniston’s honesty about her struggle to have children

[RhubarbRocks]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-63576100

As someone who went though multiple rounds of unsuccessful IVF in my late 30s and early 40s it’s good to see this normalised in the news. It sometimes feels very isolating when you can’t have children (not least here when it’s sometimes questioned why childless women are here - I joined during ivf and have stayed for all the other non child related chats!)

So not really an AIBU but maybe a question/observation about the assumptions we make about whether a woman does/doesn’t have children.

As someone who fosters and will soon be adopting a child. It is absolutely not a consolation prize for infertility! It’s a hard process parenting a child that has been through trauma (and they all have), usually with attachment disorders on top. It’s offensive to both women with infertility issues and adopters to suggest the 2 are in any way related.

Oh for fuck sake 🙄

I admire you for doing that. We didn’t feel we had what it takes to adopt - not that parenting overall doesn’t come with challenges, we just didn’t feel equipped to provide what would be needed. Sorry, writing that down feels like we copped out.

I think her words are admirable and honest.

I find that she agreed to this as the lead photo for the article disappointing. Very tacky and off brand for her. The eye patch bikini and the obvious uncanney valley facial photoshop.

I've always enjoyed her as an actress and have been really impressed with her actual dramatic chops in S1 of The Today Show and have also always rooted for her as a celeb I don't know but this is just Kardashian level naff and disingenuous.

Sadly in the USA it very much can be

I suffered infertility in my early thirties, at no point ever would I have considered adoption. I wanted to carry my own biological child. I'm not a particularly maternal person so it wasn't ANY child, it was my own child, with my own eggs, carried by myself - or nothing.

This is nothing against adoption, my best friend is adopted and she has the most wonderful, amazing parents. But adoption wasn't the answer for me. And it's not a cure for infertility either. I hear the process is brutal and many couples wouldn't be accepted anyway.

I think it was incredibly brave of Jennifer. I can't imagine the toll it must have had on her with all the intrusion and speculation from the media.

Ah you gotta love the “just adopt” brigade 🙄🤬. If I had a pound for every time someone said that to me I could have paid for every heartbreaking cycle of IVF.

🤬

That’s not a cop out at all!

It’s being realistic and recognising what you are able to deal with. Anyone adopting a child for the ‘normal’ parenting experience is going to be very disappointed.

The bit about the ship has sailed made me sad 😞 People seem to be saying it’s about when she was with Brad but she was quite young then was she not? So the egg freezing comment wouldn’t make much sense. She was married again though so it could have been with him. It must really hurt that Brad had kids with someone else and they’re friends now but it’s like there’s too much water under that bridge now to ever be able to go back to him ☹️

Jennifer is 4 days older than me. I was an adopted baby and after suffering several early miscarriages I was never lucky enough to have my own baby. Also in an abusive marriage during my 30s which would not have been right to being a child into. By the time I was divorced and met DP I was 43 and the ship has now sailed for me too. I still get silently angry when people say "why didn't you have kids"

Cause Matt Perry just brought his book out?

They would have had wonderful children

Joking aside ... Always sad.

I read that article and to me it seems she left it too late and her fertility declined.

@Dartmoorcheffy ... I'm sorry. Empathy here. X

I am childfree so it doesn’t upset me when people ask questions but one of my best friends is childless and she is constantly being upset by people being rude or intrusive (or flippant ‘you could adopt’ ‘have you tried relaxing? ‘’my aunts cousins best friends hairdresser was told she couldn’t have kids but then she ate chocolate mousse and had sex doggy style every third Saturday and now she’s got three kids’) so when I am asked questions I answer but I say something like ‘you should be careful asking questions like that though because it would’ve been very upsetting if I was infertile or had lost a child’. It’s heartbreaking for her and I’m sorry you’ve been through that, and sorry for anyone else here who has suffered infertility and/or loss.

I can empathise with her with regards to ivf journey and I also respect the fact that she hasn't gone down the celebrity trend of buying a baby.

I read Mary Ann Sieghart’s book ‘The Authority Gap’ recently (worth a read) which talks about heuristics - the short cuts the brain makes to make sense of the world. I do think that the woman = mother shortcut is one that is almost inescapable - including for me, a woman who can never be a mother. It is an interesting perspective idea that we see the world through that lens - and the attention Jennifer Aniston therefore got for not fitting in with the expected mould.

I'm surprised she hasn't gone the surrogacy route. Rebel Wilson, who is much younger has just done that. It seems hellishly common.

Thank you for saying that

Gosh. How tricky. You can see how it might happen - your husband leaves you in your early thirties. You don't panic, you date, you keep hard at work, thinking at some point it will come good. You are still young after all. Then you conclude in your late thirties that you need to go for it regardless and maybe your egg reserves are not looking healthy and things are looking a lot less good. Just as there are many who do conceive late, there are many who do not have egg reserves and great fertility after their mid 30s.

Good on JA for her honestly, which is brave. But I am sorry that she had to weather so much crap and misogyny for this.

I’m sorry you’ve had that happen to you.

Good for her, I admire her so much having gone through unsuccessful IVF myself. So many celebrities don’t say they’ve had fertility issues until they’ve had successful IVF.

Really feel for her, amazing that she has been so open. Would also like to add my voice to those admiring her for not using a surrogate.

My own sister recently told me she hadn't heard me talk about IVF or adoption so I couldn't be that bothered about not having had children. She has no fucking idea.

Childless women are considered odd, unnatural. And women who manage to conceive or try to when they are older are treated harshly and heartlessly so many times on threads on here.

Cameron Diaz used a surrogate didn’t she?

Yes. I'm not sure how I feel about surrogacy. It's quite different in the US. Cameron Diaz has given up acting in order to bring up her child. Priyanka Chopra stated something like her schedule didn't allow her the time to be pregnant. I do wonder if that was the truth.