To think a lot of people regret having kids but are too ashamed to say it?

Agree x2 (although my siblings with kids actually help my parents more but my parents are fairly young still.)

I am childless as opposed to childfree. Childless at 25 and childless at 45 are two completely different experiences. At least from a mental / emotional viewpoint.

Agree. My siblings have kids and now my mum needs help guess who the lion's share is falling to...

Childfree life isnt always endless last minute holidays and cocktail parties...

I can only imagine the horror stories. There are some vile people out there and I will never understand why they decide to have children.

I don’t currently regret having my son. I adore him. But he’s extremely hard work and also one of the most amazing people I know. Mixed bag of feelings but no regret

Oh please don't be sorry - I can absolutely live with the disappointment!

Same here. Would've been a lot easier.

Nice to have them as adults though

So because I don’t have the same opinion as you you think I am getting nasty little kicks out of resurrecting an old thread??! I have better things to do with my time than seek out old posts thank you - why would anyone do that with such an old thread? It happened to show up - I never looked at the date when I replied and I never didn’t recognise the title - sorry to disappoint you!!

No, I don't think so, a small minority probably.

I suppose it might have shown up in a “similar threads” list. I think a lot of old threads get resurrected because of that.

Probably the same little nasty kicks you got last time from saying that people without children and more likely to experience their relationship breaking down etc.

The thread was buried 8 months deep in the AIBU board which is very busy, so clearly you've actively sought it out.

Anyway, this really is the last I have to say on here.

If I had something to say I wouldn’t be hiding behind a different name - why would I? What would I have to gain from that?

Huh???? Why on earth would I intentionally resurrect an old post? What would I possibly have to gain from that? When I posted recently I didn’t even realise it was an old thread or in fact that I had already commented on it? If I had wanted to continue the conversation I would have started my own post

I disagree, I actually think there are a lot of places online where belittling what it is to be a parent is the trendier way. It's almost unusual to hear anyone outwardly state they enjoy parenting without accusations of being a competitive parent or whatever

It’s possible she has name changed since last time and thought her new name would show up rather than the old one so it wouldn’t look like the same person answering again! But MN changed it a while back so you couldn’t post under different usernames on the same post.

No of course not. It's just you were quite argumentative and unable to listen to any other points of view last time around and it's quite obvious you have dug out this thread and bumped it back up so that you can start again with similar arguments 8 months down the line. I can see right through that, so this will be the last time I am engaging with this conversation.

Are you the Mumsnet police???!

You already commented numerous times on this thread last time around so I am not sure why you have resurrected it 8 months later.

Definitely not a lot - I don’t know anybody that regrets having their children. I completely disagree!

Well splitting up surely means the marriage/relationship is not happy so couples in long marriages/relationships are (hopefully) happy.

Me and DH have been married 45 years and are very happy and, as I said, all the childfree couples we know have long (first) marriages. We don't know many couples with children with long marriages as almost all of them are divorced at least once

Well I’m not talking about you and your marriage I’m talking about people I know

It’s much easier and more straightforward for childless/childfree couples to split. So the ones who don’t split up must really want to stay together. Also women in marriages without kids are more likely to be able to afford to leave.

We don’t have children and have been happily married for 35 years. And the idea people with kids don’t split up and don’t have affairs is laughable.

I don't regret having kids. But it hasn't turned out how I would have hoped, now they are adults. One is in Australia, and the other is moving to another continent soon. I wish they lived closer. I won't know my grandchildren, in the way that I knew mine. I was clearing out their old wardrobes the other day, and it felt so weird, looking at their childhood things - almost like they were from a different lifetime. They don't call much either - and before someone says that'll be something I've done - it absolutely isn't - they had good childhoods and when we do get together we have a great time. Just remember if you are in the trenches of child rearing now, that you will have many, many years out the other side without them, and you will wish you could go back in time.

I am sorry to hear that.

I have a younger disabled, autistic non verbal child, This is the thing I think about first thing in the morning and last thing at night. I also have an older son who is a high flyer. Worrying about both of them keeps up at night.