To expect "childless by choice" women not to be rude about me being pregnant?

[Shoobiedoo]

I am due any day now and just met my new neighbour (we are the only two houses to have moved in a new build row of five), who on seeing my bump told me she was childless by choice and a new baby screaming and ruining her peaceful home set up would be her worst nightmare. Errrr...what exactly are you supposed to say to that?

My old neighbour, who is kindly watering our garden at our old house while it is being tarted up for the market, also childless by choice and slightly older, kept making nasty faces of revulsion when I put my hand on my stomach when the baby kicked me when I went round to give her a gift and thank her for her help. She actually said "Is the baby kicking you? Ugh, disgusting!"

I mean fine, you don't want kids but when did it become OK to make such overt comments or expressions of disapproval or disgust?

Maybe it is just my hormones but I was actually quite upset on both occasions.

Totally agree it's all about them - when I told her I was pregnant my (usually lovely) downstairs neighbour said "oh great, a screaming baby", which upset me a bit and made me really paranoid about noise, but she bought us a very sweet pressie when ds arrived and admitted she was feeling very broody

OrmIrian - you're right about the special treatment, practically the first thing my old neighbour said when she found out I was pregnant was "How soon are you going back to work?" which was asked in such a way that I knew the response "Not for the forseeable future I'm going to be a SAHM for a bit" was the WRONG answer, and "Oh probably a few weeks after I give birth" was the RIGHT answer...

I never, ever give my reasons for not having another child in RL as they could be taken the wrong way by people who do have more than one child.

Also, you don't know what you don't know. So anyone that has a child knows the downsides are worth it, but as it's obviously part of her reason for not having children she can't get past justifying her own decision.

A colleague was fascintated and disgusted by the kicking thing, but I didn't take it personally as she was strange - and then went on to have 2 of her own in under 2 years.

We have a childless career woman upstairs. She has the same size flat to herself, goes out a lot, on holidays etc and I wouldn't swap with her for the world.

Ds makes my heart want to burst on a daily basis. I don't know of anything else that has ever come close to how I feel about him. And your neighbours wouldn't have a clue about this.

Never mind. Hope the birth goes well and congratulations on your new house and impending mummyhood.

My best friend (a gym freak) looked at me with utter disgust when she saw me at c. 33 weeks pregnant. I'm not even thin when not pregnant but somehow the sight of me doing my impression of Free Willy filled her with complete horror, like "how could you allow yourself to get so fat?" Errr, it's called having a 9lb baby in there plus a shedload of amniotic fluid, in case you're wondering! (She wasn't).

It's bloody rude. I think it's perfectly reasonable for people to choose to be childfree, but just as - as an atheist - I don't go around telling Christians that I disagree with their life choices, they should sodding well respect ours.