Karen Malone Wright
Karen Malone Wright is childless by chance, determined to end barriers between women who once dreamed of motherhood and those who never did. She started The NotMom to be the welcoming resource she never found for herself. An only child, Karen dreamed of being a wife and mother, but her first marriage quickly ended in divorce. A career in writing and publicity did lead to success, however, and to her second husband, Andrew. Soon after marrying in 1993, Karen was diagnosed with diabetes. Pregnancy was possible, but at great risk. Deciding to forego parenthood was hard, revealing unhelpful websites for the childfree, infertile, or pre-adoptive. In 2012, when Karen launched The NotMom, news of global childlessness was rare. Sites for non-mothers are popular today, but most focus on only one cohort. The NotMom brand embraces every woman without children, sharing their diverse life stories about “how” and “why”. Karen has been recognized by The New York Times, Ms. Magazine, BBC Radio London, and other media as an expert on childfree and childless adults and issues important to them. 2015 marked the first NotMom Summit, a groundbreaking two-day conference, and a second Summit was held in 2017. More than 400 women from the US, UK, Belgium, Canada, China, Iceland, and New Zealand attended. Karen now works as a freelance writer and messaging strategist, also authoring a book about her NotMom odyssey. She lives in Cleveland, Ohio with Andrew and their rescue cat, Frankie Lloyd W
