If you wanted children but weren’t able to have them, you are tasked with making peace with a life you didn’t choose. This grieving process occurs inside a culture that often has little respect for the childless. 

In this episode, Andrew speaks with psychotherapist Jody Day about grief, how ageing is different if you are not a parent, and how to find meaning, purpose and identity in what can feel like a very negative social context. 

Jody Day is the British founder of Gateway Women, the global support & advocacy network for childless women. She’s the author of what many professionals consider to be the ‘go-to’ book on the topic, Living the Life Unexpected: How to find hope, meaning and a fulfilling future without children. 

Jody was chosen as one of the BBC’s 100 Women in 2013 & a UK Digital Woman of the Year in 2021. She is a global thought leader on female involuntary childlessness, a psychotherapist, a 2017 and 2022 TEDx speaker, a founding and former board member at the UK Charity Ageing Without Children and a former Fellow in Social Innovation at Cambridge Judge Business School. 

Often referred to as the founder of the ‘childless movement’ and less often, but more memorably as ‘the Beyonce of childlessness', she’s been an Ambassador for World Childless Week since its inception in 2017. After a lifetime in London, she now lives by the sea in West Cork, rural Ireland, where she’s completing a novel (featuring a childless heroine of course!) and nurturing her emerging Gateway Elderwomen project. 

Subscriber Content This Week

If you’re a subscriber to The Meaningful Life (via Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Patreon), this week you’ll be hearing:

⭐️ How to get your mojo back.

⭐️Three things Jody Day knows to be true.

⭐️AND subscribers also access all of our previous bonus content - a rich trove of insight on love, life and meaning created by Andrew and his interviewees.

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Join our Supporters Club to access exclusive behind-the-scenes content, fan requests and the chance to ask Andrew your own questions. Membership starts at just £4.50: https://www.patreon.com/andrewgmarshall 

Details about Jody Day’s book Living the Life Unexpected: How to Find Hope, Meaning and a Fulfilling Future Without Children can be found here and you can download the Introduction and Chapter 1 free, here. There is a live reading group for those working through the book in Jody’s online community. 

Visit Gateway Women, the global support & advocacy network for childless women. 

Follow Jody Day on Instagram and Twitter @gatewaywomen and on Facebook @GatewayWomenUK. 

You might also enjoy Andrew’s interview with author Shani Silver A New Perspective on Being Single

Get Andrew’s advice on creating real change in your life and relationships in his book Wake Up and Change Your Life: How to Survive a Crisis and Be Stronger, Wiser and Happier

Andrew offers regular advice on love, marriage and finding meaning in your life via his social channels. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube @andrewgmarshall