You Don’t Need a Registry to Be Celebrated

When Katie Zimmerman moved to Nashville thirteen years ago, she wasn’t thinking much about her singleness. She was just living her life — loving her city, growing in her faith, building friendships. But over time, as more and more of the people around her got engaged, married, and started families, she found herself facing a question she’d never really had to sit with before: What does a full, faithful life look like for someone who isn’t on that path?

That question became the beginning of a beautiful journey. Katie recently joined Kelly on the Mission Single podcast, and her story is one every single woman needs to hear.

A Blind Spot She Didn’t Know She Had

Katie grew up in a warm Christian community in Atlanta — but looking back, she realized something was missing from the picture she’d been given. Nearly every woman she knew growing up was married with children. She had never once seen singleness modeled as a valid, flourishing way of living.

“I realized I’d never known anybody to get married and never talked to a married person,” she told me. “But I didn’t think I’d ever watched singleness play out before. I had no idea what would be hard, what would be fun, what would be special.”

That realization hit differently once God began to bring women into her life who had walked faithfully as singles into their 60s, 70s, and 80s. Hearing their stories was, in her words, transformational. For the first time, she had a lived, embodied vision of what her own life might look like.

“I was often taught that faith was holding out hope for God to bring a husband and kids. But I think faith is holding on to God Himself – noticing and celebrating all of the creative ways that He provides for me from His own hand.”

— KATIE ZIMMERMAN

Digging In Honestly

One of the most striking things about Katie’s story is her commitment to honesty. She didn’t perform contentment. She actually pursued it by bringing the hard stuff to God instead of tucking it away.

“There were pieces I, for whatever reason, wasn’t fully bringing to Him,” she said, “because I thought, well, this will be painful. But I finally sat down with Him and said, here’s my list of things I wish were different. Having some of those bigger conversations with Him and with the people around me was really, really helpful.”

She also talked about keeping the conversation open, not arriving at contentment and calling it done, but staying willing to revisit the harder feelings as new seasons bring them back up. That kind of ongoing, honest dialogue with God is what makes her peace feel real rather than rehearsed.

The Available Life

Katie’s singleness has given her something she calls an “available life,” and the ways she’s leaned into it are genuinely beautiful.

When a close friend’s mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer, Katie, with a remote job and no one waiting at home, was able to drive to her friend’s house one day a week, just to be there. When her mother entered hospice, Katie stayed overnight. “I realized, as a single person, it doesn’t really matter where I sleep,” she said simply.

Her sister recently had a baby, and Katie now works from her sister’s house one or two days a week, deeply involved in her nephew’s earliest months of life. She has 15 children across the country whom she considers nieces and nephews. She even keeps a car seat in her car so she can pick up a neighborhood child from daycare.

“I’m just kind of constantly learning the ways in which I can be available,” she said.

Family Across Cultures

Katie attends a bilingual church in Nashville that represents over thirty countries. She wandered into it looking for a chance to practice her Spanish. She stayed because she found something she hadn’t expected: a full new understanding of family.

“I’ve been really blessed to be invited into families and cultures that aren’t my own.”

Katie Zimmerman

“I’m really blessed to be someone’s tia (auntie in Spanish) and someone’s sobrina (niece) and someone’s filha (daughter in Portuguese),” she said. “I’ve been really blessed to be invited into families and cultures that aren’t my own.”

One father at her church even pointed to Katie when talking to his nine-year-old daughter about the future, saying she didn’t have to rush into marriage, that she could be single for a while, like her tia, and still love people deeply, travel, and really enjoy life. That image of a child being given a new vision for what her future could hold says everything about the ripple effect of a life lived well.

A Different Kind of Shower

Perhaps the most tender part of the conversation was when Katie described a gathering her mom helped her put together. Her mother has been part of the same Bible study for about twenty years, a group of women who have prayed for each other’s children faithfully, and who have thrown beautiful, prayerful showers for every wedding and every baby that has come along.

Katie had attended those showers for years. And one day, a quiet question surfaced: What happens if one of us never gets married, never has kids? Do we never get to have this moment with these women?

She asked her mom if the group might be open to a simple brunch. Just a moment to be together, to be known. Her mom shared the idea, and the women “jumped all over it.”

“I wasn’t looking to be celebrated as much as I was looking to be known …”

Katie Zimmerman

They gathered last November over tea. Katie brought a little scrapbook filled with the faces and names of the people who make up her life — her church family, her 15 nieces and nephews, her neighbors and friends. She shared her story and her heart. The women listened.

“I wasn’t looking to be celebrated as much as I was looking to be known,” she said. “It was just nice to sit in that room and say, I’m okay. We’re okay. I’m actually thriving.”

The women gave her gifts too, each one bringing a children’s book for the shelf she keeps stocked for the kids who regularly come through her home. And they pooled together a gift they wrote out for “her ministry.” Not a formal, official ministry, just the ministry of her life, the open home, the car seat, the overnight stays, the available presence.

“It was really powerful that they would see it that way and would donate towards that,” she said quietly. “That really meant a lot.”

Celebrating Women at Every Milestone

Near the end of our conversation, Kelly asked Katie what the church and our communities could do better for single women. Her answer was gracious and practical: get a little more creative about how we see and celebrate them.

She shared the story of a friend who sent her an Amazon gift card when she bought her house alone, acknowledging that buying a home by yourself comes with real expenses and deserves real acknowledgment. Small gestures that say, I see this milestone in your life, and it matters.

And she was clear that she’s not asking us to celebrate married women less. She’s asking us to also celebrate women at the milestones that don’t come with a registry or shower.

“I will never pitch that we celebrate you less,” she told a recently-engaged friend who wondered if she deserved a shower. “I will only pitch that we also celebrate women at different milestones.”

One Truth to Carry With You

Kelly asked Katie to leave listeners with one truth for single women. Here’s what she said:

“I am single today. Will that be the same tomorrow? I don’t know. So what am I going to do with that? For me, it has looked like digging into this available life — leaning into this different family model, really enjoying it, and focusing on what God has put in front of me today.”

— KATIE ZIMMERMAN