Crazy 8 :)

Eight years ago tonight, I sat down & pressed "publish" on my very first blog post.

EIGHT YEARS.

That's a long time. :) 

Unlike many other ALI bloggers, I started blogging nine years post-Katie (17 years now) and six years post-fertility treatments (14 years now).

And now 8 years has gone by.

I'm not always sure how I keep coming up with things to write about, but hey, I'm still here...!

Here are a few updated stats:  

Number of years blogging:  8
Published posts (including this one): 973 (and I'm hoping to crack 1,000 before 2015 is over :)  )
Average # of posts per year: 122
Average # of posts per month:  10
Published comments: more than 7,225
Page views (tracked since May 2008):  369,100+  
Followers:  151

One thing I know that's kept me writing is the growing number of other childless/free bloggers to "talk" to and share experiences with.  As I mentioned in my blogoversary post last year, when I first started writing here, there were just a handful of blogs dedicated to living without children after loss &/or infertility. (Most notably, Pamela Jeanne, who is still blogging at Silent Sorority, was already out there with her original blog, Coming2Terms.) 

Today, there are a lot more of us in this corner of the ALI community -- and the numbers are continuing to grow. There are some really excellent blogs out there (which you can find in the blogrolls on the right side of this page), and communities such as Life Without Baby, founded by Lisa Manterfield, and Gateway Women, the brainchild of Jody Day in the United Kingdom. And earlier this month, Karen Malone Wright of The NotMom organized the first-ever conference for women without children in Cleveland, which brought together more than 100 women from across the United States, as well as Canada, China, Hong Kong and Iceland! That's pretty amazing!

More than 1 in 5 women today do not and probably will never have children, by choice or for a variety of complex other reasons -- and there's a growing momentum within this community. More and more, we are writing and speaking up about our experiences -- the good and the bad -- and drawing some much-needed attention to our unique issues and needs. And the rest of the world is (finally!) starting to take notice. Slowly but surely, we're making progress.

As always -- thank you all for reading/listening, commenting and just being here.

Blogoversary #7 (2014)
Blogoversary #6 (2013)
Blogoversary #5 (2012)
Blogoversary #4 (2011)
Blogoversary #3 (2010)
Blogoversary #2 (2009)
Blogoversary #1 (2008)
First post