Reply to Why isn’t it socially acceptable to say that you regret having kids?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I have less problem with the sentiment and more with how it is expressed and how self-referential a worldview this expression reflects. Once a child is born, it’s not yours to regret—they are their own person, not tantamount to a house you now have buyers remorse for purchasing.

I think if folks expressed it “I regret not anticipating how difficult parenting would be for me” or “I am saddened by how much of parenting I dislike” or even “I’m embarrassed by how much I resent the sacrifices of being a parent” it would be much more sympathetic and much less dehumanizing for the kid.[/quote]

I don't know that it would necessarily be dehumanizing for the child. I don't regret having kids, and my parents have never said they regret having me, so this is speculation. But my mom really should not have had me, at least not when she did. She is mentally ill and had five kids in five years because her religion forbade birth control. It's not surprising that she couldn't' give us what we needed. She struggled, a lot, and all the kids knew that we were the reason why. But she was always adamant that she was glad she married my dad (whom she later divorced because they were utterly incompatible) and glad she had kids when she did because then she got us. Okay, yay for her? But as for my siblings and me, things didn't turn out so well. Anybody can look at my mom and see that she had too many kids too fast, and that doesn't mean that those people think we should have died, just that they have brains and know that our needs as children were chronically unmet. And if my mom were to admit that mistake, it might go a ways in her acknowledging how hard things were for us and how unfair the situation was? I don't know, I'm in my 40s and I don't really care anymore, but I think this stubborn insistence that everything happened just as it should have for the sake of the child gets a little strained sometimes. [/quote]

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