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?

IMHO - basically something is very wrong with America. But, it has been wrong for a long, long time. The basic unit of society - family - is broken for everybody. No one is having a good time. Not the kids, not the mom and not even the dad. Elderly grandparents are also in a limbo though they may also share some blame for being hedonistic aholes when they were parenting.

Karma is kicking your backside - in a big way. Young people should not have kids. You should look after yourself and live a small and frugal life.

Doesn’t seem that great having kids anywhere else. Even in countries with social benefits it’s just worse in other ways. It’s why the birth rate is down in every western country. Having kids sucks.

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?

IMHO - basically something is very wrong with America. But, it has been wrong for a long, long time. The basic unit of society - family - is broken for everybody. No one is having a good time. Not the kids, not the mom and not even the dad. Elderly grandparents are also in a limbo though they may also share some blame for being hedonistic aholes when they were parenting.

Karma is kicking your backside - in a big way. Young people should not have kids. You should look after yourself and live a small and frugal life.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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!

NP. If you are interested in biological anthropology, you might like the book "Our Babies, Ourselves" by Meredith Small.

It's about some of the odd features of our culture regarding babies. It is weird to keep them in nursery bedrooms separate from parents. That's why they cry. They aren't evolved to feel safe so far from parents. They have to get used to it/learn they are safe. Americans also bathe their babies far more than a lot of cultures.

Time savers for me included buying a condo townhouse to avoid yard work, finding a reliable decent daycare center, and keeping the baby in my room until about 12 months. I never found a village.

Anonymous wrote: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 wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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!

NP. If you are interested in biological anthropology, you might like the book "Our Babies, Ourselves" by Meredith Small.

It's about some of the odd features of our culture regarding babies. It is weird to keep them in nursery bedrooms separate from parents. That's why they cry. They aren't evolved to feel safe so far from parents. They have to get used to it/learn they are safe. Americans also bathe their babies far more than a lot of cultures.

Time savers for me included buying a condo townhouse to avoid yard work, finding a reliable decent daycare center, and keeping the baby in my room until about 12 months. I never found a village.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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/

American dads put in more time doing paid labor than working moms. When you add up total hours worked -paid and unpaid - moms and dads do the same. So fathers do half, and your misandry is not backed up by the data.

Anonymous wrote:

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 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?

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?

IMHO - basically something is very wrong with America. But, it has been wrong for a long, long time. The basic unit of society - family - is broken for everybody. No one is having a good time. Not the kids, not the mom and not even the dad. Elderly grandparents are also in a limbo though they may also share some blame for being hedonistic aholes when they were parenting.

Karma is kicking your backside - in a big way. Young people should not have kids. You should look after yourself and live a small and frugal life.

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?

Immigrants are having a good time but we’re making it a priority to get rid of them because they are inferior
IMHO - basically something is very wrong with America. But, it has been wrong for a long, long time. The basic unit of society - family - is broken for everybody. No one is having a good time. Not the kids, not the mom and not even the dad. Elderly grandparents are also in a limbo though they may also share some blame for being hedonistic aholes when they were parenting.

Karma is kicking your backside - in a big way. Young people should not have kids. You should look after yourself and live a small and frugal life.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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!

NP. If you are interested in biological anthropology, you might like the book "Our Babies, Ourselves" by Meredith Small.

It's about some of the odd features of our culture regarding babies. It is weird to keep them in nursery bedrooms separate from parents. That's why they cry. They aren't evolved to feel safe so far from parents. They have to get used to it/learn they are safe. Americans also bathe their babies far more than a lot of cultures.

Time savers for me included buying a condo townhouse to avoid yard work, finding a reliable decent daycare center, and keeping the baby in my room until about 12 months. I never found a village.

Anonymous wrote: didn’t have a village and realized too late I was married to a hunter type who wanted to go off to get meat for weeks at a time. He also had some characteristics that would have probably gotten him killed off in a farm or factory accident 100 years ago, or shot dead on the frontier 150 years ago.

This will sound harsh but along with the isolation of modern life, modernity has also allowed the survival of some characteristics and genes that otherwise wouldn’t make it to reproduction and family life and caregiving duties even a couple generations ago. Only in a society focused on academic achievement and computer-based white collar work could my exDH have made it to the point of meeting me, let alone marrying and having a child.

I think back to my grandparents cousin’s and some random great uncles when I was very small and they were kind of off in their own exile and always had been, and no one expected much from them. Back then there was room for these types to just do their thing and survive at a low-level pensioned job or in a cottage on the back acres of a small family farm. Now there’s a lot more pressure to play along to find a place on society even if it’s a bad fit. (And obviously some don’t and become homeless or addicts or otherwise never find their role)

Anonymous wrote:

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!