Katherine Baldwin

1. Please tell us a bit about yourself and your work.
I am a love, dating and relationships coach, working primarily with women who are childless-not-by-choice and single-not-by-choice and who would like support to find, form and maintain a healthy and loving relationship. My work focus on transforming our relationship with ourselves and changing any unhealthy relationship patterns so that we can date differently and find the love we want and deserve. I am the author of How to Fall in Love and my writing on self-love, love and relationships has been featured across the British media. I am also a midlife mentor, supporting women through midlife transitions, and I am a wellbeing and mental health speaker.

2. Has writing always been a focus for you or was it a Plan B?
It has always been a passion. I started working as a professional journalist at aged 25 and continued to be employed as a journalist into my late 30s. I then moved into freelance journalism, writing about topics such as self-love, love and childlessness, and I started writing a blog, which I began at aged 40 and continue to write today. The book evolved out of the blog.

3. How do you explore ideas or find inspiration for your work?
They come to me all the time, every second of the day. Through conversations with friends and clients, things I read in the press or on social media.
 

4. What does the process of writing involve for you?
I write thoughts down on paper all the time in notebooks and journals. I scribble down blogs and poems and ideas for articles and books. I am currently working on a novel that features a woman who is ambivalent about motherhood and I try to write a little bit most days. Like most
creatives, it can be hard to carve out the time to write but I try to progress a writing project every week.

5. And what does writing then also give you in return?
It’s cathartic. Since starting my blog, From Forty With Love, I’ve processed many thoughts and feelings through writing. It’s given me a voice, a way to be heard and to share my experiences. It’s also connected me with other women around the world who’ve been drawn to my writing and seen themselves in my story. That has been incredible. It’s helped to validate my experiences. It’s also helped me to build a coaching business based on the messages I share in my book, How to Fall in Love.
 

6. Has seeing your work in print changed how you view yourself, and also how you view your NoMo status?
I’ve been seeing my words in print since I was 25. I’m quite used to it. But having a book has been incredibly affirming and validating. It hasn’t changed how I view my status, perhaps only by giving me a voice and a platform to share different experiences.

7. Tell us about the wider reception that you’ve had to sharing your story - has it changed how others have viewed you and your identity as a non-parent?
I hope that my writing has helped to broaden people’s minds and understand that we all have very different experiences, of our childhoods and our adult lives. My intention with my book is to support people to understand themselves better, their relationship patterns, their relationship status and their attitude to parenthood.

8. How do you feel about the current representation of childless and/or childfree people in literature?
There needs to be more representation. I hope my novel helps with this. I think we will see more childless/childfree women in literature in years to come.

9. What would you like the publishing world to know about non-parents, both as writers and readers, and our stories?
We are complex beings with unique stories. We are all different, with different paths to not having children. We are valid and valuable. We have so much to contribute. There are many more of us than you think. And importantly, that our stories of loss or regret or longing are similar to the stories of parents – we all experience loss, longing, loneliness, heartache, emptiness etc, whether we are parents or not. We are different, yet we are the same.
 

10. What future plans do you have, especially for your writing?
To publish my novel and write a sequel. To finish and publish a narrative non-fiction book I am writing, based on my own journey to not having children. To finish and publish a book on emotional overeating (non-fiction). To have a regular column somewhere! To continue to write
because it’s part of who I am.