Ladies who are 35+ and single or married after 35: when did you grieve and accept childlessness?

[DeniseNY]

I’m 46, and no I don’t grieve over not having children. I think about a lot of the decisions that I made in my life (decisions that I now regret), that have led me to being single at this stage, but I don’t dwell on it. Even when I was younger, I never felt an overwhelming urge to have kids. I don’t think that makes me lesser woman or less human being than those who have had kids.

 

[LuciaPacifici]

:console:

You are not alone. What came easy for others also did not come easy for me. I was diagnosed with autism and if social skills were a school, I would be arriving in the short bus. Relationships baffle me and I doubt I would make a good wife anyway. My own mother is not surprised that I am not married. That’s okay as my siblings have happy marriages and have given her grandchildren. Me, I am more comfortable with machines than with people.

I personally do not think that the idea of preparing for the next life is grim. One way to prepare is to focus on the here and now and to be grateful each day for the gift of today. It may not be an ideal life but honestly whose is?

I understand the same feeling with relationships. Well at least extended social lives and friendships. I actually think I would be a great wife, but I don’t think I’m very good at getting to that point at all, I’m so bad at even getting a guy to stay in touch with me.

You’re right though, “memento mori” is in no way morbid. The wedding feast of the lamb. It does help with perspective, although doesn’t totally easy the pain.

Pax Christi

 

[3DOCTORS]

I understand the same feeling with relationships. Well at least extended social lives and friendships. I actually think I would be a great wife, but I don’t think I’m very good at getting to that point at all, I’m so bad at even getting a guy to stay in touch with me.

You’re right though, “memento mori” is in no way morbid. The wedding feast of the lamb. It does help with perspective, although doesn’t totally easy the pain.

Pax Christi

Count me in that group. If it weren’t for dysfunctional relationships, I’d have had no relationships at all. Nowadays contented singlehood seems fine, unless God speaks of some other plan. Seriously, I do have a lot of anxiety in relating to the opposite sex. Part of it is just plain old social awkwardness, and the rest is trying not to rush ahead of myself (thinking what kind of husband would he make on the 1st date, etc.). I’m also more of a homebody type and I know I don’t put myself in many places or situations where I’m likely to meet men. And I’m also suspicious, in our sex-obsessed culture, of the motives of a man - if he acts too interested in me, does he just want to go to bed, or conversely, if he’s just nice and friendly and easy to talk to is he gay. Yes, it’s cliche’ but often it’s true!

 

[LuciaPacifici]

Count me in that group. If it weren’t for dysfunctional relationships, I’d have had no relationships at all. Nowadays contented singlehood seems fine, unless God speaks of some other plan. Seriously, I do have a lot of anxiety in relating to the opposite sex. Part of it is just plain old social awkwardness, and the rest is trying not to rush ahead of myself (thinking what kind of husband would he make on the 1st date, etc.). I’m also more of a homebody type and I know I don’t put myself in many places or situations where I’m likely to meet men. And I’m also suspicious, in our sex-obsessed culture, of the motives of a man - if he acts too interested in me, does he just want to go to bed, or conversely, if he’s just nice and friendly and easy to talk to is he gay. Yes, it’s cliche’ but often it’s true!

I admire people that are doing well single, sometimes I am sometimes I’m not. I am a bit shy and also don’t like going out as much as others. I think you are pretty wise to take things slowly. Whenever I like someone too quickly it ends up like this most recent silly thing when I got hurt by someone I didn’t even like at first.

 

[Sarcelle]

Count me in that group. If it weren’t for dysfunctional relationships, I’d have had no relationships at all. Nowadays contented singlehood seems fine, unless God speaks of some other plan. Seriously, I do have a lot of anxiety in relating to the opposite sex. Part of it is just plain old social awkwardness, and the rest is trying not to rush ahead of myself (thinking what kind of husband would he make on the 1st date, etc.). I’m also more of a homebody type and I know I don’t put myself in many places or situations where I’m likely to meet men. And I’m also suspicious, in our sex-obsessed culture, of the motives of a man - if he acts too interested in me, does he just want to go to bed, or conversely, if he’s just nice and friendly and easy to talk to is he gay. Yes, it’s cliche’ but often it’s true!

One good way to counteract anxiety, especially when dealing with people of the opposite sex is to think of them as siblings in Christ. This way we treat them as we should and this is a lot less anxiety producing than thinking of them as potential spouses.

 

[SilverLight]

One good way to counteract anxiety, especially when dealing with people of the opposite sex is to think of them as siblings in Christ. This way we treat them as we should and this is a lot less anxiety producing than thinking of them as potential spouses.

I have anxiety and for me personally its not the people. Its remembering how I have been treated in the past or something along those lines. I would not treat them as potential spouses when meeting for the first time either. When I am meeting a guy I am wondering who they are and what they are like overall. Anxiety is different and personal for many people.
That’s just my feelings on this.

 

[Rose71]

Am I the only woman here who is going to thank Matt Collins for offering the male perspective?

I was married for the first time aged 42 and with some medical problems, conceiving is unlikely but not impossible. I firmly believe that grieving is a choice and I chose ten years ago to sponsor a child in a developing country. I figured it was no good feeling sorry for myself that I wasn’t married with children (which is how I always saw myself as a child) if I wasn’t prepared to show my support for children per se.

In my case, I was living and working in a community were people teneded to either get married in their early 20s, or move away and return as ‘young porfessionals’ with a young family, so thechances of meeting anyone were slim indeed. I threw myself into all sorts of activities and spent most of my mid-20s to late 30s absolutely worn out

Then, I managed to buy a house and move back to the area where I grew up; I’d already found a bunch of people there with whom I enjoyed spending time and one of that bunch took a shine to me and I to him.

I think being single a long time can lead to (not deliberately) placing so much importance on meeting ‘the one’ and so much daydreaming of what ‘might be’ that when THE ONE finally lands, he / she isn’t always easy to recognise. In my case, he was someone who I had always felt drawn to because of his natural warmth and empathy and I realised that without consciously doing so, he was the one I was seeking out to talk to when the group was together. I think I had my lightbulb moment when my mother said (after another long, tedious -for my poor mother - conversation about my being alone forever) that you know it’s right when you feel completely at ease with a man because you can be totally yourself in his company.

We started dating when I was 40 and it was a big leap of faith for me because I worried about all the ‘what ifs?’ What if he changed his mind? What if I let myself go head over heels and then he decided he’d just been infatuated? I’d never had to pursue him, or been through that whole inner-drama and being egged on by variour girlfriends about ‘did he call you? What did he say? What did he mean by that?’ which looking back was all utterly counterproductive nonsense that made me put any man who was unattached on a great big pedestal; spend hours daydreaming about what our life together ‘could’ be like and then being bitterly disappointed when after spending far too much time dropping what I thought were house-brick-sized-hints-while-trying-not-to-look-desperate i.e. smiling at him, greeting him like a long-lost friend and then pointedly telling him how terribly busy my life was and how I’d no time for relationships , he would show up with another girl.

Anyway, on to the offspring bit!

I’ve seen friends who are (were?) perfectly rational, intelligent women become obsessed with having children to the point where it has in some cases, actually destroyed their marriages. I’ve seen some pretty ugly things on discussion boards about trying to conceive (one example, a lady in her late 30s overheard a young girl in her late teens announcing how she was pregnant and wasn’t really trying and posted. “I wanted to punch her!” Her comment was endorsed by several other ‘professional’ and ‘intelligent’ women!

I wake up evey day thinking, “Thank God for my good fortune” because my DH and I have a lovely home together and we have nieces and nephews whose company we enjoy and the odd update from my latest sponsor child. If that’s the life God has planned for us right now, then we’re delighted with it.

The only times I feel a bit low is, I have realised, nothing to do with any deep seated need to have children, but another basic human need: the need to feel accepted and valued as part of society. When I am out for my morning walk and see all the ‘mums’ walking back from taking their children to school, it can feel like they are a little clique in the village and although I’m of a similar age and smile and say ‘hi’ when I pass, they just don’t seem interested in talking to me. It’s getting better though, I’ve made a few friends in the village and now one little group always exchages a few words.

The other time it can get annoying is when Husand and I have been somewhere or achieved something that makes us happy and we want to share our news. There’s nothing more deflating than to be asked where you went for your holiday / how you did in a competition / did you enjoy your day out and then when you’ve said, “Oh yes, thanks, we had a lovely time / got a prize / had a fantastic meal” have the person who asked pull a pained face and say, “Well, we’d love to do that…but of course, when you’re a MUM…”

I see being a mother as perhaps the most important job in the whole world and definitely one of the most difficult if not impossible to get right all the time. I see it as an honour, a privilledge and a challenge. I don’t see it as a definition of someone’s social status or worth in society though.

If we are blessed with children, we would welcome them and pray that we make good parents. If we don’t, we’ll still thank God for what we’ve got. To be perfectly truthful, with elderly parents, the thought of looking after a small child and possibly caring for an elderly parent seems like a huge challenge - but we’ll take whatever God gives us

 

[simpleas]

I am 38, gonna be 39 this year not married not dating no nothing lol. I never really grieved at all. I guess this means having a child was really not in my heart. I did go through a period in my early 30’s where I noticed babies a lot and was enchanted by them but not in a way that made me long for them. The fact that I worked with disabled children for 5 years maybe cured me of my longing for them
I have always asked God to show me what he wants of me and I guess having babies was just not in the picture. Am I opposed to the idea? no but it’s not something I dwell on.
Before you ask, yes I’m not exactly an average person in this regard, I have always been odd in a lot of things hehe

You sound like me! Lol

 

[3DOCTORS]

Am I the only woman here who is going to thank Matt Collins for offering the male perspective?

I was married for the first time aged 42 and with some medical problems, conceiving is unlikely but not impossible. I firmly believe that grieving is a choice and I chose ten years ago to sponsor a child in a developing country. I figured it was no good feeling sorry for myself that I wasn’t married with children (which is how I always saw myself as a child) if I wasn’t prepared to show my support for children per se.

In my case, I was living and working in a community were people teneded to either get married in their early 20s, or move away and return as ‘young porfessionals’ with a young family, so thechances of meeting anyone were slim indeed. I threw myself into all sorts of activities and spent most of my mid-20s to late 30s absolutely worn out

Then, I managed to buy a house and move back to the area where I grew up; I’d already found a bunch of people there with whom I enjoyed spending time and one of that bunch took a shine to me and I to him.

I think being single a long time can lead to (not deliberately) placing so much importance on meeting ‘the one’ and so much daydreaming of what ‘might be’ that when THE ONE finally lands, he / she isn’t always easy to recognise. In my case, he was someone who I had always felt drawn to because of his natural warmth and empathy and I realised that without consciously doing so, he was the one I was seeking out to talk to when the group was together. I think I had my lightbulb moment when my mother said (after another long, tedious -for my poor mother - conversation about my being alone forever) that you know it’s right when you feel completely at ease with a man because you can be totally yourself in his company.

We started dating when I was 40 and it was a big leap of faith for me because I worried about all the ‘what ifs?’ What if he changed his mind? What if I let myself go head over heels and then he decided he’d just been infatuated? I’d never had to pursue him, or been through that whole inner-drama and being egged on by variour girlfriends about ‘did he call you? What did he say? What did he mean by that?’ which looking back was all utterly counterproductive nonsense that made me put any man who was unattached on a great big pedestal; spend hours daydreaming about what our life together ‘could’ be like and then being bitterly disappointed when after spending far too much time dropping what I thought were house-brick-sized-hints-while-trying-not-to-look-desperate i.e. smiling at him, greeting him like a long-lost friend and then pointedly telling him how terribly busy my life was and how I’d no time for relationships , he would show up with another girl.

Anyway, on to the offspring bit!

I’ve seen friends who are (were?) perfectly rational, intelligent women become obsessed with having children to the point where it has in some cases, actually destroyed their marriages. I’ve seen some pretty ugly things on discussion boards about trying to conceive (one example, a lady in her late 30s overheard a young girl in her late teens announcing how she was pregnant and wasn’t really trying and posted. “I wanted to punch her!” Her comment was endorsed by several other ‘professional’ and ‘intelligent’ women!

I wake up evey day thinking, “Thank God for my good fortune” because my DH and I have a lovely home together and we have nieces and nephews whose company we enjoy and the odd update from my latest sponsor child. If that’s the life God has planned for us right now, then we’re delighted with it.

The only times I feel a bit low is, I have realised, nothing to do with any deep seated need to have children, but another basic human need: the need to feel accepted and valued as part of society. When I am out for my morning walk and see all the ‘mums’ walking back from taking their children to school, it can feel like they are a little clique in the village and although I’m of a similar age and smile and say ‘hi’ when I pass, they just don’t seem interested in talking to me. It’s getting better though, I’ve made a few friends in the village and now one little group always exchages a few words.

The other time it can get annoying is when Husand and I have been somewhere or achieved something that makes us happy and we want to share our news. There’s nothing more deflating than to be asked where you went for your holiday / how you did in a competition / did you enjoy your day out and then when you’ve said, “Oh yes, thanks, we had a lovely time / got a prize / had a fantastic meal” have the person who asked pull a pained face and say, “Well, we’d love to do that…but of course, when you’re a MUM…”

I see being a mother as perhaps the most important job in the whole world and definitely one of the most difficult if not impossible to get right all the time. I see it as an honour, a privilledge and a challenge. I don’t see it as a definition of someone’s social status or worth in society though.

If we are blessed with children, we would welcome them and pray that we make good parents. If we don’t, we’ll still thank God for what we’ve got. To be perfectly truthful, with elderly parents, the thought of looking after a small child and possibly caring for an elderly parent seems like a huge challenge - but we’ll take whatever God gives us

Nice post!

 

[Giggly_Giraffe]

I vividly remember a homily Fr Jeff gave while God was recreating me. The homily was about an elderly police man who placed an add for marriage in a news paper looking for a good cathołic woman who could cook, clean, and do chores. A woman who was 36 years old answered the add and they were married four months later. They had three children after their marriage. Fr Jeff said he didn’t know much about their teachings to their three children, but they must have had abundant love because their youngest grew up to be Pope and wrote his first encyclical on love! catholicnewsagency.com/news/popes_parents_met_through_singles_ad/

I had been contemplating how creation works and getting to know our Father, creator of Heaven and Earth. Of all things visable and. invisible. I was reconciling how we are made in the image of God. It seemed unfair that half of creation could perpetually create, and the other half of creation only created I. The middle. Looking at how God the Father organized creation, He too seemed to follow this natural law (ability to create anytime, butmost fruitful in the middle). He also bestowed many blessing on the older women (Sarah & Elizabeth). This homily I heard gave me hope as I felt my biological clock ticking away with no potential husband. When I finally got dates with my future husband I remember contemplating our age and how we would be as married. I saw us more like missionaries living poor and helping in foreign lands. I also shared my dismay about women’s creation abilities with my future husband. He thoughtfully stated that it’s merciful because childbearing takes so much from a woman’s body. Granted, at this time in my life, I believed that woman gave birth and could go back to work in. The rice field (ha-ha). I was super athletic, and could not fathom a diminished body. Now, after two childreen, I feel like I’m 90 & looking back I can’t remember being super athletic … It seems like a dream long ago … In many ways it seems like that homily I heard long ago was telling me that if have three kids. I’m amazed at having my two childreen, and understanding of why creation is most fruitful in the early- middle of life. God is good.

 

[ZellieFan]

I deeply desire children. I’ve always wanted a handful or more but now at 35 it’s doubtful. I haven’t grieved because i still believe there is time but ultimately God decides. I often wonder why people open to life can’t find suitable marriage partners.

 

[stanncie]

You sound like me! Lol

Yay, i’m not the only weird one! I am perfectly happy being single and childless 99% of the time. I do realize it’s not the norm though and I do feel bad for those out there that imagined their life diferently and are having a hard time accepting what’s been doled out to them :imsorry::imsorry:
I have moderate ADD and can barely take care of myself on most days so maybe I should thank God for deciding for me. I am not introverted at all and can make friends with rocks so that’s not a problem. I do have a hard time trusting people though sot hat might have been a big obstacle in my failed relationships

I do always pray to God to lead me where he wants and so far it’s just me and my cats. Who am I to question it?

 

[Sarcelle]

I deeply desire children. I’ve always wanted a handful or more but now at 35 it’s doubtful. I haven’t grieved because i still believe there is time but ultimately God decides. I often wonder why people open to life can’t find suitable marriage partners.

Ironic isn’t it?

People who would have made wonderful spouses remain single and people who would have made wonderful parents can’t seem to conceive.

 

[Sarcelle]

Yay, i’m not the only weird one! I am perfectly happy being single and childless 99% of the time. I do realize it’s not the norm though and I do feel bad for those out there that imagined their life diferently and are having a hard time accepting what’s been doled out to them :imsorry::imsorry:
I have moderate ADD and can barely take care of myself on most days so maybe I should thank God for deciding for me. I am not introverted at all and can make friends with rocks so that’s not a problem. I do have a hard time trusting people though sot hat might have been a big obstacle in my failed relationships

I do always pray to God to lead me where he wants and so far it’s just me and my cats. Who am I to question it?

Count me in as one of the weird ones.

A Bernese Mountain dog and a Maine Coon cat is next on my desired list.

 

[simpleas]

Yay, i’m not the only weird one! I am perfectly happy being single and childless 99% of the time. I do realize it’s not the norm though and I do feel bad for those out there that imagined their life diferently and are having a hard time accepting what’s been doled out to them :imsorry::imsorry:
I have moderate ADD and can barely take care of myself on most days so maybe I should thank God for deciding for me. I am not introverted at all and can make friends with rocks so that’s not a problem. I do have a hard time trusting people though sot hat might have been a big obstacle in my failed relationships

I do always pray to God to lead me where he wants and so far it’s just me and my cats. Who am I to question it?

Ha, well at present it’s me and my two dogs!

 

[Sariah]

Neither my husband nor I felt moved to become parents, so it worked out fine for us.

 

[Valeite]

I’m afraid I don’t fit into the OP’s description either but I’d like to share my story if I may.

I’m a man, now aged 58, married to a wonderful woman for 35 years. She was 21 when we married but, before we did actually wed, one evening I raised the question of children. She retorted - quite angrily - that she wasn’t going to have ‘housefuls of kids’ and that when she was ready we could have one child, no more. (I should add that we became Catholic much later and weren’t at that time). I put it down to stress as it was close to the wedding day and thought not much more about it.

When we were first married, we were far too busy having fun to think about the prospect of having a family. A couple of years later though I raised the question again. She said that she wasn’t ready and would like to wait until she was at least 30. ‘Fine’ I thought, ‘I’m prepared to wait’.

Come our early 30s I raised the question again. She still felt she wasn’t ready but I was still prepared to wait. Some time before she had lost her job and we elected to live on my salary; I thought it would be easier when we eventually decided to start a family. Now she was still at home, keeping house but the prospect of children seemed more and more remote. I should add that at this time - and from the time we first married - we were using contraception at her insistence. Our friends were busy raising families but that didn’t change anything. I raised the possibility of adoption but my wife wasn’t keen. We moved area to fit in with my job - I thought we could still be a family wherever we lived, although many years later my wife cited it as the reason why she eventually opted not to have children - she didn’t say so at the time.

By this time in our early 40s, we became Catholic. The prospect of a family was remote by now and we stopped using contraception. I did notice though that she was refusing sex at certain times of the month, well outside the time of her period. Obviously she still wanted to avoid the remotest possibility that she might become pregnant. For my part, I’d resigned myself to non parenthood and at this time it was fine by me - I felt too old for midnight feeds and toddler tantrums.

I realised, as I got older, that there would be no children to call me ‘Daddy’, no grandchildren to fuss over. I started to feel bereft and became depressed, leaving my wife to pick up the pieces.

That was when my wife came into her own. She cared for me, supported me and made me stronger. That was when my life took another turn. I felt the first calling to ordained ministry and, after a long process of discernment, became a permanent deacon. Now I have an active ministry which at least partly fills the void.

Still, though, I feel there’s something missing. Our friends are now becoming grandparents and the hurt I feel is tangible. Looking back I suppose I could have broken up the relationship - a priest once advised me to obtain an annulment - but what would that have accomplished? At the start of this post I called my wife ‘wonderful’ and for me that’s what she is. You meet a soulmate just once in your life and I have met mine. I couldn’t imagine life without her.

Now, I still feel the pain but it’s tempered by the love I have for my wife and that I have for the ministry I perform. Maybe that’s the plan God had for me all along, I don’t know. All I can do - all any of us can do - is to put ourselves in His hands. May His will be done.

 

[DesertSpirit]

I am single. I adopted 2 girls when I was 37 and 42. Now I am a Grandmother. There are children who need homes.:angel1:

 

[TeachCatechism]

I’ve never had this strong urge to have biological kids. I’ve been open to adoption but giving birth scares me plus I have some physical problems. However still being single at 44 makes me feel like an outsider. I do have a male friend but he’s dealing with some issues currently that don’t make him a good husband. I do like kids, but I see the problems many have and it makes me feel better I have no kids. I may look at this differently if I had met someone earlier in life. I know a couple who adopted a 6 year old because they were older and infertile and it reassured me not everyone is destined to give birth.

 

[Cupofkindness]

Great thoughts on this thread. Especially the article posted by EasterJoy. Thank you!

Your thread reminds me of this column by Fr. Ron Rohlheiser, because it speaks to a larger confrontation that happens to nearly everyone. I still have other things that I mourn, now that I am much older than that, even, but I know what you mean that what you are talking about is a particularly profound loss to contemplate.

BEWAILING OUR VIRGINITY

JULY 14, 2002

Scripture is often shocking in its earthiness. The Book of Judges gives us an example: A certain king, Jepthah, is at war and things are going badly. He prays to God in desperation, promising that if God lets him win this battle he, Jepthah, upon returning to his kingdom will offer on the altar of sacrifice the first person he meets. God takes him at his word. Jepthah wins his battle and is overjoyed. His joy quickly evaporates. Upon returning home, he sees his own daughter, in the bloom of her youth, running out to meet him and he, conscious of his promise to God, now faces a horrible dilemma – break an oath to God or sacrifice his own daughter.

He tells his daughter of the promise and is ready to break his vow. She, however, offers to die in sacrifice … except there is one thing (as there always is in every great story of the soul). What is the one thing in her case? She’s a virgin and will now die in non-consummation and barrenness, never having achieved wholeness and never having given birth. So she asks her father to grant her a period of two months to go into the desert and bewail her virginity. Her father agrees and she and her maiden companions go out into the desert to grieve the fact that she will die unwhole, barren, never having been granted the full symphony. She does her grieving in the desert, returns, and dies on the altar of sacrifice.

On one level this is an awful story – a terrible commentary on God, patriarchy of a bad sort, and religion at its worst. At another level, though, it’s a profound story, worth meditating. Biblical stories of this genre, as we know, are neither historical nor meant to be taken literally. Rather they depict the inner dramas of the soul, of every soul, in every age. This is our story. We too are invited to mourn our virginity. What’s our particular virginity?

Henri Nouwen once said that here, in this life, “there is no such a thing as clear-cut pure joy, but that even in the most happy moments of our existence we sense a tinge of sadness. In every satisfaction, there is an awareness of limitation. In every success, there is the fear of jealousy. Behind every smile, there is a tear. In every embrace, there is loneliness. In every friendship, distance.” That’s an important insight.

There is no such thing as a clear-cut, pure joy. This constitutes a kind of virginity. We are always somewhere unwhole, barren, unable to give full birth to what’s pushing for life inside us. This frustration takes various forms during the course of our lives, but it’s always there. Sometimes it’s there in the area of sexuality, irrespective of whether we are married or celibate. I remember a former colleague of mine, a married woman, challenging a group of priests: “You, celibates, feel too sorry for yourselves,” she said. “Do you know what’s worse than sleeping alone? Sleeping alone when you’re not sleeping alone!” Everyone, in some areas of life, is deeply alone.

More deeply though our frustration is with the limits of life itself. Art too has its martyrs, Iris Murdoch once remarked, and there is no greater pain in life than the inadequacy of self-expression. None of us ever finds adequate self-expression.

This stems not from idiosyncratic pathology, but from the way we are built. We are made for the infinite and are, as John of the Cross says, caverns without a bottom, infinite canyons that nothing can ever fill in. With a depth and a capacity for the infinite, we shouldn’t be surprised that we don’t find all we need within the finite. We’re over-charged for this life.

We experience this in our daydreams. There we feel the discrepancy between what we yearn for and what we can actually have, though there comes a day when we realize that, this side of heaven, our yearned-for consummation is not to be had. But the fire doesn’t die. We ache just as much after the realism soaks in. It’s then, when we realize that so much of what we yearn for is not to be, that, like Jepheth’s daughter, it’s time to head for the desert to make peace with our souls and with God for the infinite patience that is asked of us.

Karl Rahner once said that “in the torment of the insufficiency of everything attainable we come to realize that here in this life all symphonies remain unfinished.” Former spiritualities called this living “in a vale of tears.” There is nothing morbid about such a statement.

In the end, one way or the other we all die as virgins, never having fully experienced consummation, barren, never having given birth. Celibate or married, we all sleep alone. There comes a time to mourn this so as to find the joy that lies on the other side, after the grief, on the altar of sacrifice.

(the “vale of tears” is from the Salve Regina, a prayer which expresses the universal nature of this difficulty very profoundly and yet very matter-of-factly:

Hail, holy Queen, Mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness and our hope. To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve. To thee to we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. Turn, then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us, and after this, our exile, show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus. O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary.

V. Pray for us, O holy Mother of God.
R. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.