To think some women with children look down on childless women?

[Kartrashian]

Just curious really ...

I’m childless and I know at least two women that I see in a social situations (friend of a friend/family member) that genuinely look through me like I’m invisible.

They always make the effort to talk to the other mums.

I do want to stress that I said SOME women .., but has anyone else experienced this?

I'm childfree by choice and have definitely been patronised by a few women with children. It's some kind of jealousy or distrust because you're not exactly like them. The women who do that tend to be self involved and a bit thick. The same kind of woman who thinks that any single woman must automatically be after their (fat ugly and boring) husband imo.

Chocolate I agree with you that motherhood is often hugely misrepresented. It’s all shiny new Prams, smiley mum with shines hair and baby massage groups with your new friends from antenatal class.
However he reality can be tough and very isolating.

Black

I know exactly the sort you mean! I work with a lot of them.

When I met my new partner (through work), there was much unrest amongst the other eligible single women. I was relatively new to that workplace and there was a fair bit of “but she has a baby...why would he want her” commentary.

My new boss is female, and child free. Someone actually said “she just can’t empathise like we can, as mothers”. I was not having that shit. She can empathise just fine, she just doesn’t take any nonsense. Which I think is great, as a very similar sort of person. I’ve more in common with her than the “I’m special because i’m a mother” brigade.

I've seen that happen and vice versa. Ime it mostly ever happens when childless women start giving really ridiculous parenting advice/rubbing being 'childfree' into mothers' noses or, if it's the childless women doing the liking down upon its when mothers have done the whole 'life has no meaning without children/people just don't understand until they have kids' thing. It's not really ever done for no reason from what I have seen.

Fair enough KateMc.

Some people are dickheads. Some dickheads have kids some don't.

I've met childless women who look down on women who have kids - they can't believe I could be so stupid to have kids when I could be in the pub with them.

Got bored with the pub before I started TTC.

Works both ways, some people are dicks

Also, bit off-kilter but once a cousin-in-law who I didn't really know well at all pointed at my then 3 yr old daughter at a family gathering, then said "Isn't it time for another?" I'd just had a miscarriage and what business was it of hers anyway? What if I just wanted an only? People can be fucking stupid.

Yes a couple of women at work suddenly became very friendly when I became pregnant with DC1. They had completely ignored me (one) and been actively rude and sneery (the other one) before. It was really noticeable and baffled me at the time. Interesting to hear that it's happened to others. I cannot relate to that sort of behaviour but it's useful - helps you sort the wheat from the chaff so to say.

Can't get over how hurtful some people are.

boopsy i hope your aunt is having an amazing life and your sister is forever prone to paper cuts

I find more that people automatically assume I have children because I am female and in my 40s, and women make 'you know what it's like' comments about child behaviour issues, pregnancy, schools etc. when they're talking to me about their family lives. I then feel a bit awkward saying, 'Actually, I don't have any experience of that' so I often just nod along.

Often I'm quite envious of child free friends.

Some like my SIL are amazing with my DC and my daughter's godmother but I've drifted apart from some others because they don't really get that I have very little free time and hiring a babysitter is expensive and, I can't drink wine and chat till 2am because I'm up at 6am with the DC everyday. Also I have a friend who I used to be very close to but she patronises my DC, especially my DS, who is shy and a bit awkward but very clever and engaging. I just find it offensive. I guess we just have different priorities now.

I have also felt this at times. Certainly not all women, as you said. I don't know if it's so much "looking down", more like I am of no interest because I'm not a Mum as well. I had a couple friends who had babies and despite my best efforts to remain friends and continue to see each other, I no longer got any reciprocation. Spending time with one of them got very fraught as if everything we had in common before had disappeared. Even a mention of some Corrie gossip received a snapped reply of "I don't have time to watch that anymore, do I? I have a baby now."

It really annoys me that there is the assumption that if you don't have kids you are drinking cocktails all night/ travelling the world/lying around in a bathrobe being pampered everyday. For most people that isn't the reality, they are working, doing housework, dealing with other shit in their lives just like parents are.
For me its my terrible health that has stopped me from having kids and when I am not working v part time I am just busy dealing with that and not having much of a life atall so its a pretty galling and patronising assumption to be made.

I've met childless women who look down on women who have kids - they can't believe I could be so stupid to have kids when I could be in the pub with them.

See I find this very patronising. Why is it assumed single child free people have drinking as their only priority?

I was thinking this morning about the fact that men don't seem to get asked so much about children. As I said before, my DH hasn't had all the spiteful comments I have had.

Also it seems that almost the first question a woman with children will ask another is "how many children do you have". Now I am in my 60's I seem to keep being asked "so how many grandchildren do you have". If I say "none" I then often get "Oh well how old are your children". If I pre-empt that by saying I have no children I often get surprised looks.

The other day in the hairdressers there was me and 4 other women. One had brought her baby in while she was getting her hair done. They were all chatting about babies and their children. I was quite happily reading a magazine. Suddenly the one with the baby turned to me and asked how many children I had. I replies none and the hairdresser said "but you have dogs". The baby woman said in a sneering voice "I bet you call them your babies" to which I replies "no, I call them my dogs".