From the Editor, October 2017
To many, the image of a pregnant woman symbolizes not only motherhood but also, the desire for motherhood. And really: what’s more joyful than a photo of a newborn or one of a woman gently caressing her pregnant belly? Yet, what image might be more frightening to a woman who is facing an unplanned or unwanted pregnancy? Or more heartbreaking to a woman who miscarries or to another who hopes to have a child but cannot conceive?
That’s the challenge when an image becomes a symbol, isn’t it? When we connect it with an emotion, we turn it—both literally and figuratively—into an icon, an emblem, and even a creed. We forget that it can elicit an emotion in another that’s different from our own.
I’m grateful our founding editors designated a specific month to recognize the multitude of emotions associated with the desire to have children as well as those intertwined with the desire not to. We’re on the lookout year-round for essays, stories, writers, and books that bring unique insights to the conversation and, as in years past, the pieces in this issue do not disappoint. We feature the sad as well as the happy, the surprise as well as the hoped-for, and the doubts as well as the delight.
I hope you’ll find yourself in the pages of this issue and in the archives of our past Octobers.
Welcome to this year’s selections of Desiring Motherhood.
Karna
Editor-in-Chief
P.S. Stay connected between monthly issues by subscribing to our blog or by following us on social media. See you there!
Columns (NEW!)
The Sound of a Calling: The Whisper Before the Calling by Julianne Palumbo
Transformation: Car Talk by Katrin Grace
CNF
Mother Me by Magin LaSov Gregg
Wrestlings by Kyla Kupferstein Torres
Fiction
A Listening Walk by Natasha Bland
My Mother’s Shoes by Stacey Hohman McClain
Literary Reflections
Essential Reading: Desiring Motherhood compiled by Nerys Copelovitz
Ten Books by Julie Lehman
Poetry
Five Weeks by Rebekah Rempel
Polemic by Kelly Morse
if i have a daughter who is anything like me by Leta Rebecca Cunningham
To Mis-Carry by Elizabeth Callahan Steiner
Congratulations! by Lorna Rose
36 Weeks by Genevra MacPhail
Profiles
A Conversation with Margaret Combs by Kelsey Havig
A Conversation with Sandra V. Feder by Gina Consolino-Barsotti
Reviews
A Review of Lilli de Jong by Jamie Sumner
Photos by Anne Hurlbut, Katie Knake, Rudri Bhatt Patel, Gayla Ross, and Heather Vrattos