Completely Put Off Having Children

ladystardust

The chan chan man wrote: »

Having kids is the meaning of life. Before them, nothing really mattered. It’s tough, but definitely worth it.

Ok I love my kid but I dont think nothing mattered before. Lots of things mattered, my husband, my family and friends, my career. All these things still matter, just kiddo matters too. I dont think having childrens the meaning of life and it's a totally legitimate option not to have them.

The chan chan man

The chan chan man wrote: »

Having kids is the meaning of life. Before them, nothing really mattered.

This is the attitude I hate! Parents basically telling other adults that their lives are meaningless without kids!

Wompa1

It's becoming cliché but having kids was the best thing I have done in my life. I have relative career success. I've gotten to travel a fair bit. The odd time, there's fleeting moments of "jaysus, I'd love to be able to just feck off into town and go for a pint" or whatever but it's quickly out of my mind because ultimately, there's nowhere I'd rather be than with them.

I think back to the times going to pubs and nightclubs. I had some fun nights out but a lot were just the same auld sh1te, I also remember at one point on a Friday night sitting across from my friend getting frustrated and bored with it.

The really cool thing, I think that doesn't get mentioned much is that everything is new to you again. The things you've done thousands of times are new because you are experiencing them with your kids for the first time and at a young age, they always get excited by it which brings you excitement and joy.

You also have feelings of love that are unique, that you don't feel for a partner, family or pet. There's a natural bond and the fact you go through so much and are with them as they develop gives you a closer bond than you'll have with anyone else.

If I was single, I don't know what I'd be doing with the rest of my life. I don't have any more career goals to achieve. I have already travelled a lot.

Read more books and spend more time on Boards, I suppose :pac:

Wompa1

bubblypop wrote: »

This is the attitude I hate! Parents basically telling other adults that their lives are meaningless without kids!

From a biological standpoint, it is the only reason to exist. We live and multiply and continue on the human race.

sydthebeat

pwurple wrote: »

You know, we were on the fence about children for a long time, mostly due to a feeling of environmental responsibility. The world has 8 billion people, did we want to add more consumers to it?

It's why we also considered fostering.

But in the end, we wanted to experience parenthood ourselves. Another phase in life, something we didn't want to miss... And now that they are here, they are lovely human beings (or at least we like living with them!). We do our best to make sure they have some level of environmental awareness and don't wreck the place.

If every couple had one child the population of the world would drop

Loveinapril

I always knew I wanted to be a mother. We planned our two but after the first was born, I spent weeks regretting the decision. It was SO HARD. I felt like I was a terrible mother. The sleep deprivation was nothing like I had ever experienced (I used to work 13 hour night shifts so thought it wouldn't be that bad). I completely underestimated the power of my hormones at the time, I felt like I was gone and I didn't recognise myself. Then that all calmed and I started to find my rhythm. We found out I was pregnant again around my son's first birthday. They are 2.5 and 10 months now and it is the best but most difficult thing I have ever done. I am looking forward to not feeling tired at some point but every day I laugh out loud because of them so it is mostly worth it!

Housebuying

I think deciding not to have children is one of the most selfless acts. A child takes over your world and if you can't give that you shouldn't have one.

I see parents trying to fit children into their current lifestyle, both the kids and the parents seem unhappy. All my mother goes on about is all the things she couldn't do as she was tied to the kitchen sink (her words).

People say children change your life completely. And this is true. You should only have kids if you want your life to change completely.

I love my children more than anything. I was prepared and HAPPY to make all the sacrifices that they need. I think before kids, I never felt truly fulfilled. BUT it's not the life for everyone.

Real Life

We had a baby almost 7 months ago. I was never interested in Kids, wouldnt have minded never having any and I was the kind of person to get annoyed hearing kids crying and screaming in public. But anyway things happened as they did and we ended up having a baby and genuinely its amazing.

Very tough at times but its hard to explain how much love you have for this baby and how you would do anything for them, and thats coming from someone who had no interest in kids remember.

My girlfriend had a rough birth that took its toll on her and also has PND which has been very tough and were working through it, but the baby has brought so much happiness to us too. Sometimes I think back at how silly I was to be so against kids for so long but anyway thats how it goes, thats my experience obviously not everyone will be the same.

The chan chan man

bubblypop wrote: »

This is the attitude I hate! Parents basically telling other adults that their lives are meaningless without kids!

Nothing mattered...to me. I dont care what anyone else does. Have kids, don’t have kids, i couldnt care less. For me though, now i have a reason to be doing what I’m doing.

s1ippy

s1ippy wrote: »

- To people who already have children, was it everything you were expecting or were there a lot of surprises?

I obsess with doing all kinds of research possible before making big decisions so I feel when we had children we were quite prepared. But of course there are surprised - positive and negative. No matter how much you prepare your child is going to be an individual character with individual traits - and you can never fully prepare for that.

I guess the biggest surprise for me was that being a parents brought a renewed sense of wonder to the world for me. Everything that had become mundane and common in my life I was now seeing through the wondering eyes of a child. And it make me look at the world anew - or from a new perspective. And I found that enriching in ways I had not expected.

Me and the girlfriends have always planned 4 kids. We have 3 so far. So only one to go before I start getting things snipped or knotted up or both. On balance I think I have been overall a good parent so far. I hope to continue as best I can.

Diarmuid

bubblypop wrote: »

This is the attitude I hate! Parents basically telling other adults that their lives are meaningless without kids!

It's projection. They had nothing in their life before a kid.

eviltwin

The chan chan man wrote: »

Nothing mattered...to me. I dont care what anyone else does. Have kids, don’t have kids, i couldnt care less. For me though, now i have a reason to be doing what I’m doing.

That's depressing

ShareShare

Im 35 M child free. I had a vasectomy about 4 months ago.

Very pleased with my choice. It was a long decision though. Over a decade of thinking about it.

I did it entirely for selfish reasons. I like pleasure, travelling, relaxing, socializing, silly hobbies and the care free nature of life.

Children consume your soul. It can of course be very rewarding, but i dont see it being more rewarding that pretty much anything you devote yourself to. It does however come with lots of disadvantages.

A few friends of mine have kids, and a few women i meet too have them. They can barely even have a conversation without being interrupted about 30 times. Cutting dates short because the kid is tired, hungry, angry, jealous etc. Their money is always tight. Free time is non existent, and their craving of adult conversation can speak volumes of loneliness.

I love kids as long as i can give them back after a day.

I love that i have lots of money for nice things for myself. I love that myself and my partner have lots of pleasure and very little restrictions. We love our huge freedom.

I think its a very personal decision, and neither are wrong, but one definitely is far more burdensome.

Looking at everyone around me with kids, with one exception, puts me off having them. All seemed much happier before having children. They travelled, had fun, freedom, money to spend on themselves, energy, weren't sleep deprived, etc. Most parents I know have all those positives taken away and one in particular has said she wouldn't have children if she could go back in time. I see it as a life of servitude which is why I don't think I will ever have any. I see people trying to get everyone to mind their children except themselves - parents, inlaws, aunts/uncles, creches, schools, after school clubs. If they loved being a parent surely they would want to spend time with them?

Thelonious Monk

eviltwin wrote: »

That's depressing

It kind of is, and what if you fall out with your kid or you become estranged? Then you're just a pointless mess all over again.
Kids, a partner, money, a new house, a car, none of these things are going to make you happy really, but you may very well bank all your happiness on them. True happiness is deeper than that.

Feisar

Father of an 11 month old here.

As Blaze420 said there wasn't a baby shaped hole in my life before he came along. I'd have been perfectly happy in life sans the wee man, not missing what I never had and all that. The main drive for children would have come from herself, we would have discussed this when things started to get serious between us.
There would definitely be a baby shaped hole in my life now if he was taken away, taken literally that might seem a bit obvious and while it's true in and of itself there is more to it. My whole perspective on life has shifted, my priorities are different now. Where I once would have wanted the best for myself, that's a distant second to fulfilling what's best for him. I get the feeling I'll feel his defeats and triumphs such that they may be much more than I ever felt my own.
Although as someone else said, sometimes I just want to bugger off for a pint!

Sky King

Reasons to not have kids - my god where do I start. It's the most narcissistic selfish thing you can do.

How about how immoral it is to put more resourse consuming people on our already overpopulated planet - and here in the western world kids consume WAY more resourses than elsewhere.

Or how about how immoral it is to inflict this human condition on some person without asking their permission, just to satisfy your own need for 'fulfillment'. Putting people here to have more people to have more people... it's the most pointless exercise ever.

Even healthy kids are annoying at the best of times, then don't get me started on all the 5hit that could be wrong with them... They could have some disability or disorder or chronic illness that requires constant care. Or be really annoying like that autistic kid on the TV who screeches and bangs his head on the wall. Or (far more likely) they could turn out to be complete assholes despite your best efforts.

Or the kids could turn out to be great adults and just fukc off an leave you like what happened to a friend of mine's mam - she's divorced and her kids ****ed off to Asia for years and left her on her own. What a waste of a youth raising them so 'you'll have them when you are old'.

cgcsb

It's good that you ask those questions instead of just squeezing them out based on instinct and worry about the consequences later. If you remove the individual from the story and take a big picture view, creating another human right now seems like the opposite of a good idea. There are officially 8 billion of us (about 9 billion if you take into account the lack of census enumeration in the vast swathes of shanty towns and refugee camps in the world) already. Even if we completely change our way of living on this planet over the next 10 years and only use renewable/nuclear energy and sustainable materials, we will still run out of resources by the middle of this century. Even now if everyone were to live equitably in the world, we'd all be rationed to a matchbox sized piece of meat a day. This is only getting worse and emerging economies like China and India are increasingly embracing western lifestyles which are consumer intensive, eating 5 or 6 times as much meat as their parents did and driving cars, which were unaffordable 20 years ago. There are already a lot of children in the world who need a home, so can't see the point in creating a fresh one. The future is basically wars over what resources are left, fresh water, land that can sustain crops etc. Our food chain will likely collapse this century due to climate change and over consumption.

There are a few scenarios that will allow human society to continue with what we call normality:

1)Start a nuclear war. If China and India for example obliterated eachother that could reduce the human population sufficiently
2)A natural disaster. But let's be honest humanity isn't greatly impacted by this. Even something as deadly as the corona virus spreading across the world has only managed to kill 0.01% (mostly folks who were old and had already procreated) of us and our response to that will be a global baby boom. Weather events brought on by climate change aren't big enough to dent our numbers. The only natural disaster at this point that will have a significant impact on our population is an asteroid impact
3)On the subject of asteroids and space, another scenario is if we can economically extract resources from the asteroid belt and recover billions of tons of minerals and/or if we can establish a significant presence on Mars and learn how to use martian soil as a growing medium
we may have more capacity to expand for another few generation or 2 before we hit the same problems again.

neonsofa

Had my first when I was a teenager, wasnt planned. Her dad isnt involved which makes it harder cause everything is on one salary. I dont think I would have chosen to have kids otherwise, however I think I say that with the hindsight of knowing how tough it has been. Before I had her I didnt care about college/career etc (like most teenagers!) but once she was in the picture, all of that became priority in order to provide for her and not let her miss out just because her mam was careless.

So in an ironic way, I think I am better off in terms of career and lifestyle because I only did it for her, whereas if I was still single and carefree I dont think I'd have worked as hard, but I'd keep a lot more of whatever wage i do have for myself so I guess it would all balance out! :pac:

I'm not a very maternal person so I lose my patience very quick, and you need a lot of patience with kids. They talk a lot. I think a lot of people base their decision on having "a baby", rather than thinking about a whole person, a whole new life.

I also think there is a lot of shame around parents saying they dont enjoy parenthood or that they probably would have chosen to remain childfree if they knew how difficult it was. As if it means they hate their kids or regret them. I can hand on heart say I love mine, but I can also say that raising a child while young and single is not ideal, we make it work but there is no shame in saying parenthood was not a walk in the park like some make out. That doesn't have to be followed with "but it's all worth it" or "but I wouldnt change it for the world". You can love the people that you brought into the world, and have lovely memories and bonds with them as people, and still think parenting is really tough and boring and monotonous the majority of the time! It's ok to say that without always adding a disclaimer, and I wish more people would just speak freely about the difficulties without feeling shame, or thinking that it means they in turn regret their children.

The baby years go by way too quick and you dont get to enjoy them properly cause you're so sleep deprived, so I always love cuddling new babies that I can hand back :pac:

silverharp

Has this been posted yet , the OP reminded me of it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwZ0ZUy7P3E

Thelonious Monk

cgcsb wrote: »

It's good that you ask those questions instead of just squeezing them out based on instinct and worry about the consequences later. If you remove the individual from the story and take a big picture view, creating another human right now seems like the opposite of a good idea. There are officially 8 billion of us...

Yes all of what you said haunts me, and I don't really want to contribute to it.

facehugger99

s1ippy wrote: »

For a very long time now my partner and I have been seriously considering whether or not we will have children. We are erring on the side of not, because we feel that society is absolute squalor and couldn't reconcile bringing a child into it.

I would agree that self-centered people who spend their time lapping up the constant diet of negativity pumped out by the media, should if at all possible, avoid having kids.

Absolute squalor - lol.

Try visiting a slum in Rio or Mumbai.

Feisar

Sky King wrote: »

Reasons to not have kids - my god where do I start. It's the most narcissistic selfish thing you can do.

How about how immoral it is to put more resourse consuming people on our already overpopulated planet - and here in the western world kids consume WAY more resourses than elsewhere.

Or how about how immoral it is to inflict this human condition on some person without asking their permission, just to satisfy your own need for 'fulfillment'. Putting people here to have more people to have more people... it's the most pointless exercise ever.

Even healthy kids are annoying at the best of times, then don't get me started on all the 5hit that could be wrong with them... They could have some disability or disorder or chronic illness that requires constant care. Or be really annoying like that autistic kid on the TV who screeches and bangs his head on the wall. Or (far more likely) they could turn out to be complete assholes despite your best efforts.

Or the kids could turn out to be great adults and just fukc off an leave you like what happened to a friend of mine's mam - she's divorced and her kids ****ed off to Asia for years and left her on her own. What a waste of a youth raising them so 'you'll have them when you are old'.

Well that's one way of looking at it! To be honest I was afraid my particular brand of human condition would be passed along. Thankfully he seems to have taken after his mother.

EmmetSpiceland

I think people without kids need to give people with kids a “break”. I don’t think they realise that those with kids, generally, don’t have much else to talk about.

That’s fine in small “doses” but if you get yourself stuck with one of those “competitive” types I think it’s fair enough to tell them what you think of having kids and all that nonsense about the planet. Fire with fire, and all that.

The real ones to watch out for are that, most dreaded, breed the “stay at home dad”. Why are these guys always, nervously, “buzzing” around the place double, and triple, checking that everyone is ok, all while their, older, partners rolls their eyes. And why do they always have, unkempt, curly hair and a beard?

Speaking as a parent, one of the biggest “upsides” to this lockdown is that I’m not dragged along to “play dates” where I have to engage with the, overly, competitive mother/fathers or with the annoying eunuchs.

Kids are a lot of work at the best of times, these people don’t make it any easier.

s1ippy

cgcsb wrote: »

It's good that you ask those questions instead of just squeezing them out based on instinct and worry about the consequences later. If you remove the individual from the story and take a big picture view, creating another human right now seems like the opposite of a good idea. There are officially 8 billion of us (about 9 billion if you take into account the lack of census enumeration in the vast swathes of shanty towns and refugee camps in the world) already. Even if we completely change our way of living on this planet over the next 10 years and only use renewable/nuclear energy and sustainable materials, we will still run out of resources by the middle of this century. Even now if everyone were to live equitably in the world, we'd all be rationed to a matchbox sized piece of meat a day. This is only getting worse and emerging economies like China and India are increasingly embracing western lifestyles which are consumer intensive, eating 5 or 6 times as much meat as their parents did and driving cars, which were unaffordable 20 years ago. There are already a lot of children in the world who need a home, so can't see the point in creating a fresh one. The future is basically wars over what resources are left, fresh water, land that can sustain crops etc. Our food chain will likely collapse this century due to climate change and over consumption.

There are a few scenarios that will allow human society to continue with what we call normality:

1)Start a nuclear war. If China and India for example obliterated eachother that could reduce the human population sufficiently
2)A natural disaster. But let's be honest humanity isn't greatly impacted by this. Even something as deadly as the corona virus spreading across the world has only managed to kill 0.01% (mostly folks who were old and had already procreated) of us and our response to that will be a global baby boom. Weather events brought on by climate change aren't big enough to dent our numbers. The only natural disaster at this point that will have a significant impact on our population is an asteroid impact
3)On the subject of asteroids and space, another scenario is if we can economically extract resources from the asteroid belt and recover billions of tons of minerals and/or if we can establish a significant presence on Mars and learn how to use martian soil as a growing medium
we may have more capacity to expand for another few generation or 2 before we hit the same problems again.

To anyone who is cross with me because I think the world is awful, here is what I couldn't be bothered to write out to all those posters who attacked me and said I shouldn't have children because I'm depressed etc.

I actually love my life. I have a full, rich existence with a large, loving family and many friends, several pets and an extremely healthy long-term relationship. As for projecting your negativity onto me just because it upsets you if someone even alludes to disease, war, famine... Just because the West seems to be doing alright, doesn't mean that in two decades it will be the same.

I look at the refugee children flopping around on their dad's shoulders as they're carried for thousands of miles, the older child who happens to be that bit more perceptive becoming depressed and suicidal when they start to figure out the realities of life, teenagers reaching adulthood completely lost and without direction who recede into themselves and never become self-reliant.

I worked in education for years and in my part time job, I still care for many people with disabilities who will never have a high quality of life through no fault of their own. I'm always available for free babysitting for any friends or relatives who need it (except since the pandemic). I reared two of my younger siblings so I really know what having a child entails, to a degree.

So many of the exhausted but happy parents on this thread have been very insightful and the chill childless people have also opened my eyes. I only know two older couples (50+) who have decided not to have kids and they are genuinely the coolest and most content people I know.

I think the point about Idiocracy is a great one and I was actually debating with one of my friends who has kids recently, because it's fairly well known by our friends that we probably won't have children... My buddy was going "but ye have to have kids because my daughter won't have anyone to play with only morons otherwise!".

Implying that a loving home for kids is pretty scarce and that breeds unstable and unhappy people all around. But do you really want to bring a child into a world where huge amounts of people are from miserable homes? Strikes me as even more of an argument not to do that to the individual. They currently don't exist, so no harm no foul.

My older brother who is an activist but also has children he massively regrets (one of those parents who is always trying to get out of spending time with his kids, like he thinks they're not his responsibility or his time is too much more important) and he started talking about how messed up the foster kids are, trying to put me off what I know would be a huge undertaking so that I go what he perceives as the "easier" route. All I could think of is how broken his kids are from seeking his acknowledgment and it only spurred my decision to remain childless on more

As a household, we could create stability and love for existing children who find themselves without it. I think it's interesting to note that I have three very close friends are adopted, including my best friend, and by pure coincidence I know about six more who were fostered, met them through the music scene and travelling around the country. Those particular individuals I know are always vivacious cnuts with a huge lust for life and often have thinly veiled psychological issues which they'll suppress by drinking heavily. Which makes me want to foster even more because I want to help people (children or teens) through their separation anxiety and allow them to confront their issues and start a new life.

Sorry for the long post, I really don't feel I have to justify my position or outlook to people who think that the world is all sunshine and light and are completely freaked when I say it's in sh!t, but I hope my stance might be something other people relate to because the world could really use some love and if you have it to give, it might be worth giving it to somebody who doesn't have a lot of it.

flasher0030

Deleted User wrote: »

Looking at everyone around me with kids, with one exception, puts me off having them. All seemed much happier before having children. They travelled, had fun, freedom, money to spend on themselves, energy, weren't sleep deprived, etc. Most parents I know have all those positives taken away and one in particular has said she wouldn't have children if she could go back in time. I see it as a life of servitude which is why I don't think I will ever have any. I see people trying to get everyone to mind their children except themselves - parents, inlaws, aunts/uncles, creches, schools, after school clubs. If they loved being a parent surely they would want to spend time with them?

You sound very insecure. You can choose to continue a life of socialising, holiday when you want, sleep-ins till 11am at the weekends, watch netflix all day if you want. But in my opinion, you'll regret not having kids if you are in a position to do so. Of course it helps if the proper factors are in place i.e. decent partner, decent job and decent accommodation.

I enjoyed the wild life up until my early '30s. That's when herself advised that it was time to get a move on. I'll be honest, the thought of having to give up my 5ams staggering in the door devastated me. Anyway we had 2 kids - boy and girl. It's been unbelievable. Simple things at the beginning. I love music so to make a novelty of the getting up several times during the night, I had my own playlist set out for different nights. Anyway kids are more grown up now - 9 and 6 - and it's absolutely amazing. Helping them develop through school, playing sport with them, climbing mountains, reading with them, jumping on them, them jumping on you. The list goes on and on. And the social life does gradually come back - albeit in a more restrictive way. But, God, do I appreciate more the few beers when they do arrive.

Anyway, don't not have kids out of fear. Almost everybody has that. But it turns out to be one big adventure - a rollercoaster adventure.

pwurple

sydthebeat wrote: »

If every couple had one child the population of the world would drop

Yes. And if every couple had two children the population of the world would drop too.

DrPhilG

I'm in my early 40s, been married for 10 years and together for 20.

We both made it clear early on that we didn't want kids. I think there are only a few things that need to be made very clear as soon as a relationship looks like its long term and potentially for life. Kids is one of them. I know 2 couples who didn't have the conversation until they were hitched, then found out that one was dying for kids and one was totally against it.

Why aren't we having kids? Because we don't want any. Simple as that. As someone said earlier in the thread, if you have to list your reasons for having kids, chances are you don't want them.

Some talk about their desire to "continue the family line". Neither of us have any such desire, and both of us have nieces and nephews who will do that anyway.

The desire to create a little version of yourself, nope. Have no interest in a mini-me, a mini-her or a combination of both.

On top of that, neither of us particularly like kids. That's not to say that we're grouchy old sods that scowl and chase the local kids off the street lol. We get on fine with the neices & nephews.

If I did want to have a kid, the side issue of raising a child in the ever increasingly insane world where young people are obsessed with their 15 minutes of viral fame and where political correctness and "wokeness" is making the world a flat out stupid place, would also make me pause mind you.

monkeysnapper

I wasnt bothered if we had kids to be honest, I wasnt even emotional when we had out first ...

I had a pretty mixed upbringing and moved away from home at 19 and never went back .

Spent years listening to the whining bastards in shops and restaurants thinking who in their right mind would want that.

Anyway I have 3 kids , 5 , 8, and 10 and I love the bones of them .... I'm getting to give them a childhood I never had and having some fun along the way ...

I always loved dogs and that was enough for me , it lights me up inside to see kids feeding and walking dogs and caring for them .

They can be little bastards to sometimes

sydthebeat

pwurple wrote: »

Yes. And if every couple had two children the population of the world would drop too.

Yes it would.

So the premise on here from some that not having children is the only way to "save the world" as its overpopulated is incorrect.

You can still have children and at the same time cause the world's population to drop