Family life sucks

[Anonymous]

I went to stay with my sister for a week to help out as she just had her second child. I don’t have any kids yet, but honestly it seemed like her life is hellish. As is a lot of my friends in the same phase of life. They have high friction relationships with their partners, are trying to juggle too much on their own, and are squeezed financially.

It made me wonder if there’s something wrong with how we do the family thing America. Is there a better way? Or is this just life for a lot people with kids?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to stay with my sister for a week to help out as she just had her second child. I don’t have any kids yet, but honestly it seemed like her life is hellish. As is a lot of my friends in the same phase of life. They have high friction relationships with their partners, are trying to juggle too much on their own, and are squeezed financially.

It made me wonder if there’s something wrong with how we do the family thing America. Is there a better way? Or is this just life for a lot people with kids?

Say it louder for the people in the back.
You accurately captured it
People just decide to push through and do it anyway.
Better way is to have a village bc it takes a village to raise kids. We are too isolated here. No one wants to rely on anyone.

[Anonymous]

PP what does relying on others more look like to you? I mean I could identify that how things are being done by my family and friends seems really undesirable, but I didn’t know concretely what a better way looks like?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to stay with my sister for a week to help out as she just had her second child. I don’t have any kids yet, but honestly it seemed like her life is hellish. As is a lot of my friends in the same phase of life. They have high friction relationships with their partners, are trying to juggle too much on their own, and are squeezed financially.

It made me wonder if there’s something wrong with how we do the family thing America. Is there a better way? Or is this just life for a lot people with kids?

Yes! There is a better way. We need to stop expecting moms to do it all. Go to work and also be the mom from the 1950's. During WWII the government had daycares because women were needed when men went to war. They closed them when men came back.

To be fair, there are times where family life is really bad like after the birth of children so it isn't a fair snapshot of life. Like if you came over when you were puking every 20 minutes you would think life isn't worth living but, miss the sunsets.

[Anonymous]

Sometimes there are just rough times in your life and for many that’s with newborns. You’re only seeing a snapshot. Sometimes you just have to get though the ick parts to get to the preschooler age that you love or the elementary school or even the young adult age you love.

My life is stressful at times, but then so many times I’ve grateful for my 3 kids. Like on Christmas morning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to stay with my sister for a week to help out as she just had her second child. I don’t have any kids yet, but honestly it seemed like her life is hellish. As is a lot of my friends in the same phase of life. They have high friction relationships with their partners, are trying to juggle too much on their own, and are squeezed financially.

It made me wonder if there’s something wrong with how we do the family thing America. Is there a better way? Or is this just life for a lot people with kids?

Yes! There is a better way. We need to stop expecting moms to do it all. Go to work and also be the mom from the 1950's. During WWII the government had daycares because women were needed when men went to war. They closed them when men came back.

To be fair, there are times where family life is really bad like after the birth of children so it isn't a fair snapshot of life. Like if you came over when you were puking every 20 minutes you would think life isn't worth living but, miss the sunsets.

Most mom's don't do it all if they are married. Many fathers do half or more.

[Anonymous]

Newborn time can be challenging. My kids bring so much happiness and richness to my life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to stay with my sister for a week to help out as she just had her second child. I don’t have any kids yet, but honestly it seemed like her life is hellish. As is a lot of my friends in the same phase of life. They have high friction relationships with their partners, are trying to juggle too much on their own, and are squeezed financially.

It made me wonder if there’s something wrong with how we do the family thing America. Is there a better way? Or is this just life for a lot people with kids?

Yes! There is a better way. We need to stop expecting moms to do it all. Go to work and also be the mom from the 1950's. During WWII the government had daycares because women were needed when men went to war. They closed them when men came back.

To be fair, there are times where family life is really bad like after the birth of children so it isn't a fair snapshot of life. Like if you came over when you were puking every 20 minutes you would think life isn't worth living but, miss the sunsets.

Most mom's don't do it all if they are married. Many fathers do half or more.

American dads spend about half the time of moms doing unpaid family labor. Your assertion is not backed up by the data.
https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2013/03/14/chapter-4-how-mothers-and-fathers-spend-their-time/

[Anonymous]

I minored in biological anthropology in college. Reality is, human children are not meant to be raised solely by two people. We did not evolve with isolated nuclear families.

Human children are so time-intensive that we evolved to be raised by an entire village of people (alloparents). From what I remember, among hunter gatherers, the ratio of adults to children is around 4:1 and infants are held by up to 18 different people per hour.

Animals with extremely time-intensive parenting, such as birds, usually have a very short period of rearing. A baby bird is off on its own within 6-8 weeks.

Of course, there are trade-offs. Among animals, babies usually just follow their parents around while the parents go do normal life activities. However, this leads to extremely high death rates of 50-90%. Even among hunter-gatherers, childhood mortality is around 50%.

And having a village raise your child means they will alloparent in different ways from you, and you have very little say in it. There are reports of hunter-gatherers where the parents do virtually zero discipline and leave it up to other members of the group. This wouldn't fly among many parents today.

Unfortunately I don't think there's really a solution for families in the United States. We want to be independent and not live with multiple other people. Things like free daycare, free healthcare, a living wage, etc do help, though. But the reality is that life with kids is just intense. Add a capitalistic system where we're supposed to buy more things and bigger things, and nobody is happy.

[Anonymous]

Smart of you to look around you and see the pattern. As others have said, it IS a pattern, and it’s difficult to watch.

My solution was to just have one child, which allows me to maintain my relationship, professional life, and hobbies while still experiencing parenthood. Many people rule that out because they feel it is “unfair” to that child to not provide them with siblings. I don’t want to get into that debate and how irrational it is, I’m just saying it is why many people won’t even consider stopping at one.

But for modern life, one child is an excellent compromise.

[Anonymous]

This is why the birth rate is falling.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I minored in biological anthropology in college. Reality is, human children are not meant to be raised solely by two people. We did not evolve with isolated nuclear families.

Human children are so time-intensive that we evolved to be raised by an entire village of people (alloparents). From what I remember, among hunter gatherers, the ratio of adults to children is around 4:1 and infants are held by up to 18 different people per hour.

Animals with extremely time-intensive parenting, such as birds, usually have a very short period of rearing. A baby bird is off on its own within 6-8 weeks.

Of course, there are trade-offs. Among animals, babies usually just follow their parents around while the parents go do normal life activities. However, this leads to extremely high death rates of 50-90%. Even among hunter-gatherers, childhood mortality is around 50%.

And having a village raise your child means they will alloparent in different ways from you, and you have very little say in it. There are reports of hunter-gatherers where the parents do virtually zero discipline and leave it up to other members of the group. This wouldn't fly among many parents today.

Unfortunately I don't think there's really a solution for families in the United States. We want to be independent and not live with multiple other people. Things like free daycare, free healthcare, a living wage, etc do help, though. But the reality is that life with kids is just intense. Add a capitalistic system where we're supposed to buy more things and bigger things, and nobody is happy.

This is very fascinating. thank you for this!

[Anonymous]

I agree that the early years are HARD but now with my two children -- 1 college aged and one just-graduated college -- it is pretty sweet. Sure, there are significant costs involved at this phase, but these two kids of ours are developing into amazing young adults and it is a privilege to have front row seats. Yes, there are prior years of "hard" but the long-term payoff is better than I had imagined.

[Anonymous]

I think part of the problem is that as we become more economically stable, there is the expectation that you will hire help instead of rely on friends and neighbors. Some people are lucky that they have supportive families (good for you for helping out your sister), some of us are not so lucky. But beyond family, it would seem odd these days to just ask a neighbor or even a good friend to randomly babysit for free. In the old days, kids could just play together in the neighborhood, and whichever parent was around would take them in and not think too much of it. People helped each other out more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree that the early years are HARD but now with my two children -- 1 college aged and one just-graduated college -- it is pretty sweet. Sure, there are significant costs involved at this phase, but these two kids of ours are developing into amazing young adults and it is a privilege to have front row seats. Yes, there are prior years of "hard" but the long-term payoff is better than I had imagined.

Yeah, but it doesn't always work out this way. My stepson is in college and is having significant mental health / failure to launch issues. His older brother graduated and now spends all day in his childhood bedroom sleeping and playing video games. Both are super smart but have ADHD etc and got very mixed grades and have trouble finding work.