Should people struggling with mental illness have children?

[Anonymous]

Lots of people don't know what their partner has.or what they have. I'm not sure how to find out.
Looking back, I would not have had kids with my two partners.
I have no idea what my ex DH has. Half the family can't hold a job or get out of bed. They said some family trauma. I have no idea.
My second partner may have had ASD that family they hide. They have no friends and relay on each other.
Not a big deal, but one challenge in life and he couldn't cope. My challenge was much, much bigger. I took mine with ease. He took himself out. Who does that to their kid?
Not only that. Both challenges were created by him.
Had I known life is hard for people with MI, I would have stayed away. Never met one growing up as they were locked away.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where do you draw the line? Why stop at mental illness? Should people with genetic defects have children? Who gets to decide what counts? [/quote

People with serious health issues often weigh seriously whether to have biological children, consult with genetic counselors, and use ART.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where do you draw the line? Why stop at mental illness? Should people with genetic defects have children? Who gets to decide what counts?

People with serious health issues often weigh seriously whether to have biological children, consult with genetic counselors, and use ART.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is something that I think of daily or hourly, as someone who married into a family with hidden mental illness (like literally hidden in a basement!) and whose STBX has developed dangerous mental illness symptoms over the past 5 years and after we already had a child together.

I’m sorry but the answer is absolutely not. It is irresponsible, selfish, and magical thinking on the part of a mentally ill person with a strong family history of mental illness to think that by just adding some new genes they might eliminate whatever issues run through their family.

Unfortunately one hallmark of some of the most severe mental illnesses and the ones that should disqualify people from procreating is total lack of awareness of their mental illness. Anosognosia should be the actual disqualifier rather than mental illness itself.

Completely agree. People who recognize their mental illness and who take proactive steps to manage it should be fine parents. My dad has bipolar disorder (and actually does take his medication, but sees the doctor 1-2x per year, refuses therapy, and doesn't report any issues to the doctor because he claims he doesn't have any, so the meds are not actually effective). His inability to recognize at any point that anything is wrong with him is the reason he should have never raised children (biological or otherwise). Because he's functional enough to not be in a conservatorship, no one can force him to do anything to take care of himself, and so there is no meaningful chance he will ever be able to manage his condition effectively and not verbally and emotionally abuse all the people around him.

[Anonymous]

Correct. If you experienced depression with your first child, it probably strained your marriage, so you should not repeat the process and focus on your mental health and the health of your child to ensure they can manage their mental issues that may have been passed down.

My friend who is very smart all of a sudden clocked out on life. Just stopped caring and doing anything. She told me it runs in her family but didn’t hit her til she was 35. I’m so glad she didn’t have kids. Imagine how that impacts them. People need to stop being selfish and fully disclose issues to partners.

Kids can and have fully ruined people who are barely holding themselves together. So why bring more damage into your life?

[Anonymous]

No
Both my sisters are mentally ill they both have daughters

One is 16 she was adopted my sister never accepted her and my neice is a mess.

My other sister is borderline personality disorder diagnosed at college age. She has a nine year old that poor child can not do anything unless it is perfect. Ugh

Makes me so sad

My nieces on my husbands side are 300 lbs and counting no one gets that way unless there is something wrong in their house. Again ugh

[Anonymous]

I have mental illness on both sides. I wish there were more resources available from OBGs for mothers who have a family history to help better prepare for the challenges that come with motherhood.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Correct. If you experienced depression with your first child, it probably strained your marriage, so you should not repeat the process and focus on your mental health and the health of your child to ensure they can manage their mental issues that may have been passed down.

My friend who is very smart all of a sudden clocked out on life. Just stopped caring and doing anything. She told me it runs in her family but didn’t hit her til she was 35. I’m so glad she didn’t have kids. Imagine how that impacts them. People need to stop being selfish and fully disclose issues to partners.

Kids can and have fully ruined people who are barely holding themselves together. So why bring more damage into your life?

That's a dysfunctional response to a mental health issue. My mom "clocked out if life" around that she due to untreated depression, a resistance to getting treatment, and a martyr complex. I knew this was a concern and have always been proactive about my mental health because it was really awful growing up in a home with untreated mental illness. I have dealt with depression and anxiety, like many I'm my family, but I always just book an appointment with a therapist, work proactively through CBT, and figure it out. My DC, far from being negatively impacted by this, has learned good habits from it. For instance I know that regular exercise helps stabilize my mood a lot, and my kid has internalized the same.

If you are the sort of person to respond to a mental health problem with a fatalistic attitude, I agree kids aren't for you. But depression and anxiety are SO COMMON, of course many of us have learned how to manage them and it has in some ways made us better parents.

[Anonymous]

Both DH and I have mental illness in our families. On his side it is undiagnosed. On my side severe anxiety, schizophrenia, and bipolar. I myself have struggled with depression and anxiety my whole life. Both of us have some autistic/ADHD traits but not sure it rises to the level of diagnosis.

We have one child with an autism diagnosis but who is doing well with minimal supports. She is very, very loved. She is happy and brings us and our extended families immense joy. I have zero regrets about having a child. I do regret not starting an SSRI for me sooner, because that first year was really rough and I would have been a better mom and spouse. I also feel strongly that neither DH nor I could handle more than one child well, and it would be unethical for us to have another.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have mental illness on both sides. I wish there were more resources available from OBGs for mothers who have a family history to help better prepare for the challenges that come with motherhood.

PP. Personally, I didn’t think my family’s history of depression, would severely impact my ability to have and raise children because I never experienced bouts of depression pre kids.

[Anonymous]

I chose not to have children as mental health diseases run in our family.

My uncle had schizophenia. He was unmedicated the last 15 years of his life but treated by an osteopath. We were around him a lot as children. It had a lasting impact on me.

Both my brother and sister were diagnosed with bipolar.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where do you draw the line? Why stop at mental illness? Should people with genetic defects have children? Who gets to decide what counts?

This is what I don’t get. There are more devastating diseases than anxiety or depression. Unlike many diseases, mental illness can be treatable and people live normal lives. I think a lot of people who had miserable mothers or fathers like to blame it on mental illness when in fact they are just miserable abusive people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where do you draw the line? Why stop at mental illness? Should people with genetic defects have children? Who gets to decide what counts?

This is what I don’t get. There are more devastating diseases than anxiety or depression. Unlike many diseases, mental illness can be treatable and people live normal lives. I think a lot of people who had miserable mothers or fathers like to blame it on mental illness when in fact they are just miserable abusive people.

I think you don't understand the pain of severe mental illness and how different it is from run-of-the-mill anxiety and depression.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It should be discussed heavily before doing so. If you suffer from depression or anxiety, it’s 10xs harder so the expectation should be that you may struggle parent vs the breezy social media posts we see.

You can develop mental illness at any point. If a woman had post-partum depression with her first child should she not have any more children since the risk is very high for a recurrence?

Yes. In fact my experience with friends is those who continued to have children after bad post partum depression regretted it. It was too much to do it again with an older child to also care for. Their marriages and families suffered.

I stopped at one because the birth experience was harder than I realized it would be

[Anonymous]

Do you mean should they choose to have children? Or should they be prevented from having children?