Amy Key, 46

One of the motivations for writing my book Arrangements In Blue was to confront the question of what a meaningful life could look like when it isn’t shaped around parenting and romantic love. I think lots of people are open to the idea that other ways of living can be meaningful, but they can’t quite imagine what that might look like; there is still a prevailing social and cultural assumption that having kids and falling in love are the things that automatically create meaning in life.

I certainly feel it less so now, but when I was in my 30s, I felt people – including colleagues, friends and family – took me less seriously than other people because my life didn’t resemble theirs: I wasn’t equal to their idea of adulthood and adulthood was attained through coupling up and having kids. In conversations with people about their kids or their relationships or the stress of renovating their house, I’d play-act a little and pretend I was one of them, scanning my own experiences – or even borrowing those of other people – for something relevant to bring into the conversation so I could feel included and accepted.

I know for some people ‘child-free’ and ‘childless’ can be helpful, clarifying labels, indicating the presence or absence of pain. But for many people, these binary labels aren’t accurate. People without kids may live alongside all kinds of feelings about it. Speaking for myself, at times I feel sadness; at other times it’s liberty. I know how I feel about it will always be shifting. I accept that there could have been another life for me, and I won’t know that life. But to assign more meaning to that unlived life than the one I am living is a waste of time. My job, if I could call it that, is to make the best life I can for myself. I have a good life, full of love, intimacy and meaningful connections; it just happens that parenting isn’t part of it.

Meaning in life isn’t delivered to you like a windfall just because you get married or have kids. You create meaning for yourself. One of the things I’ve done is to decide what is significant for me. Sometimes that has been about nurturing relationships that are vital to me. Other times it’s been about taking time out to acknowledge a life event that I want to pay attention to. This could be private, eg when I achieve something professionally important to me, I buy myself a piece of art. I don’t spend a lot of money, but I choose with care and love them. They remind me of where I’ve come from. When I’ve been bereaved, I’ve planted something that will flower year after year, creating a space for remembrance. When something wildly exciting has happened, like my book being published, I’ve thrown a big party. And I’ve tried to encourage my friends to adopt this marking of other life transitions too, and ask: how are we going to celebrate this huge thing that’s happened? We accept that people can design their own huge carnivals for getting married, an event that could mark a very short-lived personal relationship, but we’re somehow all too shy and ashamed to make a fuss about other things. And I don’t mean these things have to be about attainment or commercial success – they could be about overcoming addiction, ‘graduating’ from therapy, getting a pet, leaving a relationship, coming out. Where does that leave people without kids or a partner? What are we missing about their lives? Their growth and happiness are every bit as important as a change in legal status or starting a family. I’d love to encourage people to notice and mark what is personally meaningful in their lives.

Sharn Rayment, 35

Because I don’t have children, I’ve often been categorised as the ‘career girl’, as if it’s a toss-up between the two: you either have children or you have a career. I find this so frustrating because it’s not an either/or situation for me, and most parents I know also work. I feel pressure to be ‘successful’ at work or have exciting things going on in my life. I feel this comes from the constant pressure as a woman to prove myself; I’ve had to fight off people telling me ‘you’ll change your mind’ for most of my teenage and adult life, and in some ways, I think I’m still fighting that battle to prove them wrong by showing off how good my life is as a child-free person. But more and more I’m sitting comfortably in my child-free state and letting go of that pressure because I don’t want to please anyone but myself.

I’ve felt that pressure externally and internally so many times, and people have even said: ‘If you don’t have children, what will you do?’ Like a life isn’t a life if you don’t reproduce.

I think human connection, relationships, friendships and closeness are what make life worth living and can give you a sense of purpose. I now call my long-term relationship and two cats a ‘family’ because often you’re seen as not having a family if children aren’t in the frame. There’s no void or anything ‘missing’ in my life; I have exactly what I want and need, which is my very own loving, caring family. I see my life as complete, not ‘pending’ until I reproduce.

Finding friends through work who felt the same or weren’t interested in having children right now opened my eyes to a happy and full existence that didn’t necessarily include being a parent. Connecting with other people just like me has been the perfect antidote to the naysayers – it’s helped me feel free from the pressures of parenthood.

“I feel like I need to justify my worth”: 25 child-free women on the pressures they face