Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think everyone without kids thinks that this is absolutely the best life. Then you have kids and realize it gets better. Do I miss my childless days? Always. But in a way that I am grateful for that chapter but also grateful for the next chapter. Life without experiencing parenthood is incomplete.

I think that blanket statements like this are mean.

What is right for one person is not right for the next.

Just speak for yourself, that is all you really know.

Not everyone should (or wants to) be a parent, as evidenced by some of what goes on around us.

Anonymous wrote:I would express fake envy to make you feel better. I get that not having kids is easier, but life would have a pointlessness to it. Extremely glad I have my sometimes difficult and annoying children.

Anonymous wrote:I think everyone without kids thinks that this is absolutely the best life. Then you have kids and realize it gets better. Do I miss my childless days? Always. But in a way that I am grateful for that chapter but also grateful for the next chapter. Life without experiencing parenthood is incomplete.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When people say this, they’re usually just messing with you or preemptively trying to make you feel better about your childlessness. No one actually thinks you did it right. The friend you mentioned with the disabled son just sounds like a loser though.

It's definitely this. People don't know what else to say and are trying to find something nice so they settle on expressing fake envy. But they wouldn't trade places for anything.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think everyone without kids thinks that this is absolutely the best life. Then you have kids and realize it gets better. Do I miss my childless days? Always. But in a way that I am grateful for that chapter but also grateful for the next chapter. Life without experiencing parenthood is incomplete.

I try to stay open minded and believe you can live a good and fulfilling life without kids BUT this was definitely my personal experience. But I became a mom later in life (38) so I had lots of time to experience and enjoy the DINK lifestyle. It was great. But being a mom is better (for me). I was amazed especially in those early years at how much I enjoyed doing incredibly mundane things and living a pretty circumscribed life because I had to accommodate a baby or toddler. But I just love my child so much that even just staying in to hang out felt rewarding. And as my kid has gotten older that feeling has deepened AND I've regained some of my freedom -- things get a lot easier once your kids are school age.

To me it is was similar to getting married -- you give up some freedoms but you barely notice because in exchange you get to spend your life with someone you love. And with kids it's even easier in my experience because it's easier to love a child you created than an adult.

I had my years of traveling year round and going out to eat all the time. Seeing concerts on weeknights. Sleeping in until noon on Saturday. It was great! I would not want to spend the rest of my life living that way. Becoming a parent has allowed me to evolve as a person.

I think that's wonderful and I've seen the same with other people I know who had kids - but I think what a lot of parents don't understand is that even people withut kids have lives that evolve and change. I am 50 - I don't go to concerts all night or sleep until noon. I'm up at 6 am most days - slept until 6:20 this morning and it felt like I'd slept forever. We are adults with adult lives. We didn't stay perpetual 20 year olds (by and large - I do have a 60 year old cousin who basically lives the same way as he did at 20, but he's the exception). Our lives grow and evolve, too. Just in different ways from yours. And in some of the same ways! I think a lot of you are imagining being a DINK as if you never stopped being 25, and it's really not like that.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I might say something like this without meaning it, because secretly I feel sorry for you and your empty life.

Or, you're just angry and bittter that settling and down and having a family is just 'something you do', like getting good grades and going to college. You never really gave it much thought. That's why it seems so frustrating for you when others around you choose to not have children because you didn't know that was an option. You didn't know you could be happy without having children.

So this! Like a pp said…sheep following sheep without much thought.

But almost everyone here has had that DINK life before having kids. They know what that life was like and they are telling you they don't miss it. On the other hand, DINKs will never know what they missed out on, and really have no idea how the other half are living.

You can’t miss out on something you DON’T want.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think everyone without kids thinks that this is absolutely the best life. Then you have kids and realize it gets better. Do I miss my childless days? Always. But in a way that I am grateful for that chapter but also grateful for the next chapter. Life without experiencing parenthood is incomplete.

I try to stay open minded and believe you can live a good and fulfilling life without kids BUT this was definitely my personal experience. But I became a mom later in life (38) so I had lots of time to experience and enjoy the DINK lifestyle. It was great. But being a mom is better (for me). I was amazed especially in those early years at how much I enjoyed doing incredibly mundane things and living a pretty circumscribed life because I had to accommodate a baby or toddler. But I just love my child so much that even just staying in to hang out felt rewarding. And as my kid has gotten older that feeling has deepened AND I've regained some of my freedom -- things get a lot easier once your kids are school age.

To me it is was similar to getting married -- you give up some freedoms but you barely notice because in exchange you get to spend your life with someone you love. And with kids it's even easier in my experience because it's easier to love a child you created than an adult.

I had my years of traveling year round and going out to eat all the time. Seeing concerts on weeknights. Sleeping in until noon on Saturday. It was great! I would not want to spend the rest of my life living that way. Becoming a parent has allowed me to evolve as a person.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be honest OP: you're really 33 and have another decade of fertility, and you're likely going to have children.

I wish the media/socials would stop overusing the word DINKs and limit it to the people who are truly DINKs for life. ie, they're 55 years old, or both partners have had tubal ligation/hysterectomy/vasectomy.

(yes, I know families can be formed in many ways and vasectomy can be reverse. but at least this is a tangible sign you're deeply committed rather than an attention seeking Gen Z)

I recently saw a reputable survey that said more than half of young women did not want to be parents, whereas more than half of young men wanted to be parents.

I know someone will ask me to post a link, but I don’t feel like searching for it . The point is that I found those data to be disturbing and also indicative of the fact that as a society, we make the experience of parenting much more appealing for men than for women (in 2024).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I might say something like this without meaning it, because secretly I feel sorry for you and your empty life.

Or, you're just angry and bittter that settling and down and having a family is just 'something you do', like getting good grades and going to college. You never really gave it much thought. That's why it seems so frustrating for you when others around you choose to not have children because you didn't know that was an option. You didn't know you could be happy without having children.

So this! Like a pp said…sheep following sheep without much thought.

But almost everyone here has had that DINK life before having kids. They know what that life was like and they are telling you they don't miss it. On the other hand, DINKs will never know what they missed out on, and really have no idea how the other half are living.

Anonymous wrote:There is a lot of denial in this thread about the true state of things out there in parenthood land.

There are many anonymous forums where people complain bitterly about their lives as parents, there is a growing body of sociological research on the issue of regretting parenting, there is an undeniable declining birth rate, there is abundant evidence that more and more people are comfortable admitting that they don't want that choice and it is more and more acceptable to admit that.

A person can love their child tremendously and still hold the position that parenthood was a mistaken choice for them. A person who tells their child they are a mistake is profoundly flawed, possibly psychopathic. It shouldn't be difficult for a person of average intelligence to grasp this distinction.

I have no doubt that some of the people who have posted comments excoriating OP here are people who have had very dark moments of deep regret over their choice of parenthood. Like anything else in life, it is very often those who protest most who are most conflicted.

Anonymous wrote:I might say something like this without meaning it, because secretly I feel sorry for you and your empty life.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I might say something like this without meaning it, because secretly I feel sorry for you and your empty life.

Or, you're just angry and bittter that settling and down and having a family is just 'something you do', like getting good grades and going to college. You never really gave it much thought. That's why it seems so frustrating for you when others around you choose to not have children because you didn't know that was an option. You didn't know you could be happy without having children.

So this! Like a pp said…sheep following sheep without much thought.