Children are boring

[Bobbin35]

Very much following on from a thread on here about Greg James. It’s very true for me children are boring and I don’t want children. It’s very annoying that friends of mine insist I be interested in their child beyond asking how they are. If I started ensuring all my friends liked dogs, horses (that I own) I think I would lose friends very quickly but many of my friends assume I am their friend so therefore have to also be interested in their child. I’m not a bad friend I just don’t want to talk children at all just as I wouldn’t want to bore anyone I know about my horses if they are not horse people!

Agree with that!

I have dcs and love them unconditionally, but even I don't want to talk about them all of the time! One of the parents at my dc's school talks about nothing else other than her dcs in depth, i feel my mind wandering. It is like anyone that talks about the same thing constantly though, if you talk about dogs/horses all of the time I'd be bored too. A varied conversation is best, alittle about dc's fine, alittle about other interests etc.

Babies are boring until they are about 3 months.

Children are just little people. Some people you get on with while others you don't.

That’s like me saying horses are boring, I don’t understand why anyone would have them. I don’t ask about my friend who has them.

I don’t know the first thing about having horses so I don’t have a right to make a blanket statement based on the smallest observation and interaction I’ve ever had with them it just looks incredibly short sighted and judgmental.

It sounds as though you’ve misunderstood the very concept of friendship. Being interested in each other’s live is pretty fundamental. I have zero interest in horses but if you were my friend I’d ask about them
and happily listen to you tell me your horse news.

I agree with what @howaboutchocolate said, I don’t understand why it is acceptable that children are so discriminated against by some people.

Children are boring, I don’t want to hear about them.
Children are loud, they shouldn’t be at a restaurant/art gallery/cinema etc.
I don’t like children.

Things I see written about children all the time (on bloody mumsnet, of all places). Children are just people under the age of 18. Can I say the same about older people? Disabled people? People of colour? People of a particular sex, ethnicity, class? No. Because it’s unacceptable and in some cases kind of getting into hate crime territory. But somehow it’s okay when it’s a child.

I'm not remotely interested in random children I don't know but I'm interested in my friends ' children because I love my friends and their children are a part of who they are.

I work in a school and I think children are absolutely fascinating! I love spending time with them - mine and other people's.

Your friends' children are the most important people in their lives. Surely you can understand that they would want to talk about them! I am always happy to hear about my friends' children, relationships, parents, pets, jobs, hobbies... all of it.

Horses on a standalone basis don't interest me in the slightest but my SIL's interest in her horses interests me.

As a parent, yes they are. But when they're your own, there are a million things in them that compensate for said boringness. They're also all-consuming in the early years which is why most parents wax lyrical about parenthood/children.

What a rubbish friend.
My friends take an interest in my children,
I take an interest in their jobs, homes, families, boyfriends etc.
we discuss tv, politics, etc

my parents died when I was younger, I still can take an interest in my friends parents.

it’s called friendship

Everybody was a child once themselves, whether they have children or not. I hope nobody was a dog or a horse, or 😂 I'd be worried

I think this is a difficult one.

Part of friendship is making time and effort for the people you care about, even when things might feel a bit one-sided or there might not be as much “in it” for you. Often these phases aren’t permanent, so if you really value someone then you stick around regardless. It’s that simple. It’s not all about us, we can’t always be the main character etc!

That being said, it can be a lonely place to not have children (by choice or otherwise) and, because it’s understandably the biggest thing in their lives, all your friends have to say to you is about kids. Especially if there isn’t much effort to ask after you. And especially if you are going through this with multiple friendships at once.

I have a lot of friends with young children/babies at the moment and I don’t think any of them are aware of just how hard a time I am having at the moment; with my job, with my health etc. because they don’t ask and I feel bad unloading onto them when I can see how tough things are for them too. I know it won’t be like this forever, but the timing feels particularly rubbish because it seems like it’s all at once! What they do end up asking me about is other people with kids, like my siblings or other friends in common, when really I’d like them to ask just one question about me.

My friends with children hang out with me when they need a break from the kids. It works pretty well, as beyond asking how they are, and hoping they're doing well, I'm not that interested in their children. If I were fussed about kids, I would have had my own.

How odd to post this on Mumsnet.
Is there not a Horse Owners Net?

It’s odd. The only person I’ve ever heard moan about someone talking about their kids in real life was my step nan. And she just wanted to talk about herself. 😂

I think when you have babies/young children, they can be all consuming so many of us probably do talk a lot about it for a few years. Thankfully, even though we had kids at different times, my friends and I understood this.

Now our kids range from 11-27 and we’ve all come through the all consuming part, having listened to others going through it when we weren’t at the having kids stage or were well past the all consuming stage. That’s what friends do. Now it’s the stuff about the kids like how they’re settling in at secondary school or A level stress or new partners, engagements, learning to drive, gap years etc. It’s coming through all that and talking about it, being there to listen, as well as doing weekends away, supporting one of our friends through illness, having nights out, coffees etc that has built our solid friendships. And my friends kids are like nieces and nephews to me, they’re part of my life. With real frienships, how could it be any other way?

I suppose it depends how much they talk about them. Any single topic constantly talked about is a bit dull, but it's also unrealistic and crappy friendship if you expect them never to be mentioned in your presence. I don't really like horses, but if, say, one of yours was sick and you were worried about them, I would listen because it's important to you. You sound a bit fixated to be honest.

Children are boring but most adults are boring too.

And most people's jobs, holidays and hobbies are also boring.

In fact, most things in life are boring.

But some people have the gift of making the mundane interesting. My friend can tell me about a particularly disastrous school run she did with her twins and 18 month old and I'll have tears of laughter in my eyes from the way she describes it, even though it's a very boring topic. By contrast, some people are just... boring. No matter how interesting their lives are. I remember going out for dinner with a friend and her partner who had taken 6 months out to travel around South America and he didn't seem to have anything beyond "yeah, it was great" to say about the trip.

MaresNet 🤫

It would be quite a one sided friendship to have a friend that never wanted to speak about my child. Mainly because I am SAHM and so even the question “what’ve you been up to this week” would have me scrabbling for anything non child related I might have done (went food shopping and hung out at home would probably be a safe response) and other than that we could talk about what’s on in the news or what’s going on in her life.

In real life most friendships are give and take and we show an interest in the big things in our friends lives, no matter how boring they may be.

Why would anyone with children want to be your friend OP? Doesn't make sense to me.

I agree op children are boring and the parents who claim their toddler is utterly hilarious and their best friend. Please.

I’m a mother to what I believe to be is the loveliest, most fascinating little girl in the world… but that’s the key for me, she’s mine and the number of other people she’s fascinating and the best person in the world to is limited to a couple of people around us. I don’t send out photos of her to my friends, they don’t particularly know her and I can’t say I enjoy it when I get photos of their kids or random updates. I love my kid and my sister’s kids. My interest pretty much stops there and if people don’t like that, then they aren’t the friends for me. I tend to gravitate towards people with and without children who have a similar attitude, it works for me.

Children are extremely interesting. Parents constantly banging on about their children, less so.

Sounds like you shouldn't have kids

Literally line 3 of the OP says she doesn't want them.