Growing share of childless adults in U.S. don’t expect to ever have children

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fine by me. I’ve always wanted 4 kids, so if people want to have fewer to offset my strong drive to reproduce, it’s a win for us all.

YOu call it a strong drive to reproduce, I call it a breeding fetish.

That’s fine with me. I love having tons of kids around, love being pregnant, love the baby stage, love it all. Some people wanna spend their life traveling or on hobbies, I want to spend mine raising kids.

We have two biological kids and this is so weird to me. Pregnancy is so taxing on the body (so much prolapse after 3+ pregnancies) and the birthing itself is horrific. It takes so much effort, time, and $ to raise a child properly that I can't phantom having a litter of them. You are supposed to read at least 30 minutes to them every night before bedtime, so even if you had them back to back, which is unhealthy (again, prolapse), the kids will be at different literacy stages, so you'd basically have to spend 2 hours each night doing barely adequate reading. I can't see how anyone with limited resources can raise so many kids properly and give them the right start in life. It will always be a compromise - less personal attention, so and so school district, not a lot of quality food, not a lot of college $. Travel and being exposed to different things are crucial for a developing mind.
One of the PP wrote that large modern families are a sign of binary financial resources (wealth or poverty) and this person is right. I went to college with someone who is one of five and all of them grew up with several governesses, went to the best lower schools, and were shipped to Deerfield in 9th grade. They are all successful and well adjusted. It takes a TON of $ to raise five the right way.

PP. For sure there are compromises, but we’re not sending our kids to garbage schools and foraging for food in dumpsters. Kids go to a great charter school. We eat better quality food than most because I’m great at cooking and meal planning. I don’t spend 2 hours reading at night, we incorporate learning and reading throughout our day and into other activities. We’re not traveling to Europe anytime soon, but we all love camping and regularly travel to camp, which is cheap. Kids are all at the top of their class and are regularly in the 98-99th percentile on standardized tests. I volunteer 15+ hours a week at school so I can be with kids more and keep an eye on how they’re doing, and work 15 hours a week from home. H works a super flexible job with great work-life balance so he’s very involved. Pregnancy has been easy, I spent my first pregnancy reading everything I could on how to preserve your body and did tons of exercises to keep everything in working order. Now I just maintain those exercises and keep up strength training, and pregnancy is easy peasy. No prolapses or even leaking. These things were a priority for me so I did the work to make it happen. Three kids total with number 4 on the way Oh also, get rid of the screens. That made a huge difference. Guarantee my kids get more family and one-on-one time than the singleton kids I know who are on screens 3-4 hours a day because mom and dad are busy working.

And I’m not even the worst offender I know, lol. I know one family with 4 biological kids, 4 adopted kids, and at any given moment they are fostering 2-4 more. Mom is a SAHM, dad works a Fed job. Kids are all great and the family is pleasant to be around. Mom and dad even have time for dates and hobbies while still being highly involved with their kids.

There’s compromises with everything. I have a friend who has decided to prioritize travel and new experiences, so he takes overseas jobs in the Middle East that pay extremely well so he can blow $20-30k per vacation several times a year. He’d like a relationship but recognizes very few women want that lifestyle, so he’s at peace with being single. Or I have a friend who got divorced and decided to invest everything they had in their one child, so took a huge career hit, never got remarried or even dated, never had more children even though they wanted to. Or my sister, who decided not to have children so she could focus on a very challenging but rewarding career, and feel less stressed about money. You have to decide what is most valuable to you and make the necessary sacrifices.

You just sound exceedingly smug. Not everybody is as “lucky” as you make yourself out to be. I took very good care of myself in pregnancy and still had major complications after both of my kids.

Don't worry, they are all lies. She never finished high school and her brother is not a doctor. She thinks prolapse can be avoided by strength training 😆 Me too, PP. Don't forget that lots of women, especially Black women, still die in childbirth.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fine by me. I’ve always wanted 4 kids, so if people want to have fewer to offset my strong drive to reproduce, it’s a win for us all.

YOu call it a strong drive to reproduce, I call it a breeding fetish.

That’s fine with me. I love having tons of kids around, love being pregnant, love the baby stage, love it all. Some people wanna spend their life traveling or on hobbies, I want to spend mine raising kids.

We have two biological kids and this is so weird to me. Pregnancy is so taxing on the body (so much prolapse after 3+ pregnancies) and the birthing itself is horrific. It takes so much effort, time, and $ to raise a child properly that I can't phantom having a litter of them. You are supposed to read at least 30 minutes to them every night before bedtime, so even if you had them back to back, which is unhealthy (again, prolapse), the kids will be at different literacy stages, so you'd basically have to spend 2 hours each night doing barely adequate reading. I can't see how anyone with limited resources can raise so many kids properly and give them the right start in life. It will always be a compromise - less personal attention, so and so school district, not a lot of quality food, not a lot of college $. Travel and being exposed to different things are crucial for a developing mind.
One of the PP wrote that large modern families are a sign of binary financial resources (wealth or poverty) and this person is right. I went to college with someone who is one of five and all of them grew up with several governesses, went to the best lower schools, and were shipped to Deerfield in 9th grade. They are all successful and well adjusted. It takes a TON of $ to raise five the right way.

PP. For sure there are compromises, but we’re not sending our kids to garbage schools and foraging for food in dumpsters. Kids go to a great charter school. We eat better quality food than most because I’m great at cooking and meal planning. I don’t spend 2 hours reading at night, we incorporate learning and reading throughout our day and into other activities. We’re not traveling to Europe anytime soon, but we all love camping and regularly travel to camp, which is cheap. Kids are all at the top of their class and are regularly in the 98-99th percentile on standardized tests. I volunteer 15+ hours a week at school so I can be with kids more and keep an eye on how they’re doing, and work 15 hours a week from home. H works a super flexible job with great work-life balance so he’s very involved. Pregnancy has been easy, I spent my first pregnancy reading everything I could on how to preserve your body and did tons of exercises to keep everything in working order. Now I just maintain those exercises and keep up strength training, and pregnancy is easy peasy. No prolapses or even leaking. These things were a priority for me so I did the work to make it happen. Three kids total with number 4 on the way Oh also, get rid of the screens. That made a huge difference. Guarantee my kids get more family and one-on-one time than the singleton kids I know who are on screens 3-4 hours a day because mom and dad are busy working.

And I’m not even the worst offender I know, lol. I know one family with 4 biological kids, 4 adopted kids, and at any given moment they are fostering 2-4 more. Mom is a SAHM, dad works a Fed job. Kids are all great and the family is pleasant to be around. Mom and dad even have time for dates and hobbies while still being highly involved with their kids.

There’s compromises with everything. I have a friend who has decided to prioritize travel and new experiences, so he takes overseas jobs in the Middle East that pay extremely well so he can blow $20-30k per vacation several times a year. He’d like a relationship but recognizes very few women want that lifestyle, so he’s at peace with being single. Or I have a friend who got divorced and decided to invest everything they had in their one child, so took a huge career hit, never got remarried or even dated, never had more children even though they wanted to. Or my sister, who decided not to have children so she could focus on a very challenging but rewarding career, and feel less stressed about money. You have to decide what is most valuable to you and make the necessary sacrifices.

You just sound exceedingly smug. Not everybody is as “lucky” as you make yourself out to be. I took very good care of myself in pregnancy and still had major complications after both of my kids.

Don't worry, they are all lies. She never finished high school and her brother is not a doctor. She thinks prolapse can be avoided by strength training 😆 Me too, PP. Don't forget that lots of women, especially Black women, still die in childbirth.

The U.S. has the worst maternal mortality rate in the developed world. Go on TikTok and look up #preexlampsiaawareness. The stories are heartbreaking.

https://www.tiktok.com/@bigfoot69ing/video/7024133283445296390

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pets have become the new children and fill a gap for many people. I've seen more prescription drug advertisements for pets then ever this year. Clearly people are caring for them and willing to spend money on them like they are children. But unlike children you don't have to worry about daycare or college tuition.

Or heirs or anyone being at your bedside while you die of cancer or old age. Dream big.

Im child free, but have lots of amazing friends and any one of them would be at my bedside if I was dying.

What if all of you are like in your 90s??

I have a lot of friends so I’m assuming odds are that I’ll have someone that makes it to their 90s also and people that have kids so someone looks out for them when we are older is an insane reason to have kids.

I'm a parent and agree with the PP. Don't have kids so they will take care of you when you are old. They won't in America. There's a huge probability that you will die alone, in some assisted facility in the boonies, while your family is in an urban area, working. One in 7 Americans have dementia and the number is increasing, so you won't even know where you are or who you are when time comes.

[Anonymous]

Murdering a few of your unborn children so you devote resources to only 1-2 is very creepy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Murdering a few of your unborn children so you devote resources to only 1-2 is very creepy.

What are you talking about?

[Anonymous]

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fine by me. I’ve always wanted 4 kids, so if people want to have fewer to offset my strong drive to reproduce, it’s a win for us all.

YOu call it a strong drive to reproduce, I call it a breeding fetish.

That’s fine with me. I love having tons of kids around, love being pregnant, love the baby stage, love it all. Some people wanna spend their life traveling or on hobbies, I want to spend mine raising kids.

We have two biological kids and this is so weird to me. Pregnancy is so taxing on the body (so much prolapse after 3+ pregnancies) and the birthing itself is horrific. It takes so much effort, time, and $ to raise a child properly that I can't phantom having a litter of them. You are supposed to read at least 30 minutes to them every night before bedtime, so even if you had them back to back, which is unhealthy (again, prolapse), the kids will be at different literacy stages, so you'd basically have to spend 2 hours each night doing barely adequate reading. I can't see how anyone with limited resources can raise so many kids properly and give them the right start in life. It will always be a compromise - less personal attention, so and so school district, not a lot of quality food, not a lot of college $. Travel and being exposed to different things are crucial for a developing mind.
One of the PP wrote that large modern families are a sign of binary financial resources (wealth or poverty) and this person is right. I went to college with someone who is one of five and all of them grew up with several governesses, went to the best lower schools, and were shipped to Deerfield in 9th grade. They are all successful and well adjusted. It takes a TON of $ to raise five the right way.

PP. For sure there are compromises, but we’re not sending our kids to garbage schools and foraging for food in dumpsters. Kids go to a great charter school. We eat better quality food than most because I’m great at cooking and meal planning. I don’t spend 2 hours reading at night, we incorporate learning and reading throughout our day and into other activities. We’re not traveling to Europe anytime soon, but we all love camping and regularly travel to camp, which is cheap. Kids are all at the top of their class and are regularly in the 98-99th percentile on standardized tests. I volunteer 15+ hours a week at school so I can be with kids more and keep an eye on how they’re doing, and work 15 hours a week from home. H works a super flexible job with great work-life balance so he’s very involved. Pregnancy has been easy, I spent my first pregnancy reading everything I could on how to preserve your body and did tons of exercises to keep everything in working order. Now I just maintain those exercises and keep up strength training, and pregnancy is easy peasy. No prolapses or even leaking. These things were a priority for me so I did the work to make it happen. Three kids total with number 4 on the way Oh also, get rid of the screens. That made a huge difference. Guarantee my kids get more family and one-on-one time than the singleton kids I know who are on screens 3-4 hours a day because mom and dad are busy working.

And I’m not even the worst offender I know, lol. I know one family with 4 biological kids, 4 adopted kids, and at any given moment they are fostering 2-4 more. Mom is a SAHM, dad works a Fed job. Kids are all great and the family is pleasant to be around. Mom and dad even have time for dates and hobbies while still being highly involved with their kids.

There’s compromises with everything. I have a friend who has decided to prioritize travel and new experiences, so he takes overseas jobs in the Middle East that pay extremely well so he can blow $20-30k per vacation several times a year. He’d like a relationship but recognizes very few women want that lifestyle, so he’s at peace with being single. Or I have a friend who got divorced and decided to invest everything they had in their one child, so took a huge career hit, never got remarried or even dated, never had more children even though they wanted to. Or my sister, who decided not to have children so she could focus on a very challenging but rewarding career, and feel less stressed about money. You have to decide what is most valuable to you and make the necessary sacrifices.

Oh, yours are small. Mine are older (one in med school) and the time and financial resources needed increase exponentially after a certain age, especially if they are into sports. We had summer weekends in which we asked the grandparents to help us with the sports, as both played travel. We had months with tutoring costs almost as high as our mortgage.

Likely won't be a problem for us. We tend to be fairly strict on the amount of time put into organized sports because we want to prioritize family. And spending that much money on tutors is just insane. I had straight A's all through high school and college and near-perfect SAT and GRE scores, and my sibling is a physician. We never used tutors. No one I know uses tutors to that extent, usually it's just if a kid is struggling in one or two classes. But if you're paying a second mortgage just to get your child into med school, being a physician probably isn't the right choice for them. None of the physicians I know needed that much help.

We're all different - I had tons of tutoring growing up and for us the expectation was only the best schools; sports and second languages were mandatory. Of course they all get tutored to get into med school, especially at the top ones and for MCAT. What if one of your kids is a great athlete and wants to do travel? Do you say no honey, we don't have the time and money for your passion?
I wonder if you feel the need to keep having kids so you can find a purpose in life. It seems that you are a bright person, who at least tried to go to grad school; however you got lost on the way to professional success and now are stuck in a dead end job, working 15 hours/week. I wonder if having lots of kids is a way to show your worth as a human being, who, despite all the potential, didn't make it. Is your mom judgmental of you? Does she think that you are a failure, especially because your brother is an MD? Having more kids is a good justification for the dead end job, not having to face the world, or compete for a real job. It's a great protection mechanism. I can imagine the Thanksgiving dinner talk - Bob is an oncologist, saves lives, makes $700K/year, while Susan... Susan is great at getting impregnated. She loves it and can't control the urge to reproduce, like our cat Fluffy.

NAILED IT.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, I am starting to get it now that I have a child.
Not having kids is just protecting oneself from setbacks and disappointments (some would call it lazy and cowardly but who knows).
One can have an SN child and all that it entails.
Or a child that just isn’t quite the inspiration and pride of their parents.
One can get stuck in a bad marriage due to shared kids
People just avoid vulnerability
One may call it lazy or one might call it smart
I think it’s great to have a choice

I'm.pretty sure I just don't want kids. Why is this so difficult for some people to accept?
And before someone asks why I'm on a parenting board, I'm also a nanny and that's how I discovered this place

I think it’s natural to want to experience something new and unique, like becoming a parent (even if one doesn’t have a strong reproductive instinct).
Therefore I think when people avoid it - it means some deep rooted subconscious fears or trauma.
But it’s just my theory, I don’t have a problem with people who don’t want kids.

God, you people are bizarre. Childless people’s experience many new and unique things. Having children doesn’t have to be one of them, and no, that’s not “subconscious fears or trauma.” Absurd.

-a parent

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

That cat is living the life!

[Anonymous]

There’s compromises with everything. I have a friend who has decided to prioritize travel and new experiences, so he takes overseas jobs in the Middle East that pay extremely well so he can blow $20-30k per vacation several times a year. He’d like a relationship but recognizes very few women want that lifestyle, so he’s at peace with being single. Or I have a friend who got divorced and decided to invest everything they had in their one child, so took a huge career hit, never got remarried or even dated, never had more children even though they wanted to. Or my sister, who decided not to have children so she could focus on a very challenging but rewarding career, and feel less stressed about money. You have to decide what is most valuable to you and make the necessary sacrifices.

+1 We all weigh what is most important to us and make the choice that works for our circumstances. There is no arbiter of Right Choices in the universe.

[Anonymous]

Spinsters treating animals like children honestly makes me really sad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Spinsters treating animals like children honestly makes me really sad.

She's not a spinister.

Dogs have worn jackets for centuries, possibly longer than children have.

If what someone else does with their life makes you sad, you should seek professional help, it's not normal.

[Anonymous]

Dana is childless, is she not?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Spinsters treating animals like children honestly makes me really sad.

Dogs are pack animals. They actually want to be with us, even when we are doing strange things. I can't say the same about children.

[Anonymous]

Kids are a crap shoot..

I know three ffamilieswho are all very good people. Super involved with their kids growing up. Yet it didn't matter. One son was just a flat out moron. He would do stupid crap no matter how much the parents disciplined him. His brain just had to be wired biologically different than most normal peoples' brains.....he had absolutely zero impulse control. He'd constantly do all sorts of drugs. He ended up trying a stupid stunt jumping out of a window to impress his friends and broke a vertebrate. He ended having to take opioids to treat the pain and ended up falling down into the hole of opioid addiction. Imagine an addictive personality getting involved with some of the most addictive substances known to man. It put the family through pure hell. They spent huge amounts of money on rehab, had things constantly stolen from their house, and ultimately had to cut him out. This was also all after paying for very nice and expensive private schooling all through grade and high school and even paying for college, which the son failed out of. The other family I know had a son who got involved in drug dealing and ended up in jail. He was from a family in plain old UMC suburbia and grew up with all the means in the world. The family basically went broke on lawyers fees. He ends up getting out of prison after about a year or two, commits more crime and is back in jail, this time completely cutoff from the family.. they're scared to death what he might try once he gets out in about another 6 years and whether he may try to seek retribution against his parents for disowning him and making him face the full brunt of the law and punishment after his parents refused to pay for any more lawyers. The third example is from a mom who had to raise three kids alone after a divorce. She never excelled in school, so she never went to college. She had to take bartending and waitressing jobs in her 30s and 40s to keep a roof over their head. Of course those jobs mean you cannot be around during the weekends and won't be around many times at night. She was not a bad person, nor was she a bad mom....she just needed to put food on the table. Her teenaged kids end up mixing in with the wrong crowd because there was just almost no supervision. By the time the daughter turned 19, she was already pregnant with an out of wedlock daughter. She got addicted to heroin and other hard drugs by about 20, and by 21 she started doing armed robberies at banks with some other scumbag who was 38 in order to feed her addiction. Of course she gets caught and was thrown in jail for about 5 years. She's now late 20s, with a daughter who's about 8, and she has very little job prospects available to put her daughter through college or to provide a good life to her daughter. The cycle may repeat.


The point being that even if you are the best parent in the world and spend inordinate amounts of money on childcare and education and are constantly involved in your kid's life that you can still somehow raise a POS. And we aren't even considering the stress involved if you have a child with some chronic medical condition that's expensive to treat or having a kid with some kind of disability that basically wipes out any ability to save. Have kids? No thanks. Between the ridiculous costs for childcare, college, and the total crapshoot of product you can produce even when you are a good parent, why would any sane person want a spawn?