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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think it's not the end of the world if you can't have children?

336 replies

Jaygee61 · 13/02/2018 12:36

I speak as one who couldn't. Ttc for 10 years. It broke my heart. But I healed. I have a different perspective on things now. I feel there were worse things that could have befallen us, being diagnosed terminal cancer (OH did have cancer but it eas treatable fortunately) motor neuron disease, being paralysed in an accident. We live lives of joy and dignity.. We have created a great marriage and I'm proud of that. I love spending time with my nephew.

But society seems to view being childless by choice as a fate worse than death. Something not to be accepted but fought against at all cost. . If you're not prepared to go to any lengths to have a child you can't have really wanted one in the first place....

OP posts:
openbluewater · 13/02/2018 14:24

Exactly tangled

TipsNotHacks · 13/02/2018 14:25

OP, I was interested in your post having experienced infertility yourself.

I’m currently at the ‘very much not coping’ stage. Nearly 6 years into TTC I cannot see the despair and sadness dissipating any time soon.

Previously I was an extremely easy going person. I don’t recognise myself anymore. All my friend are pg/have kids. I can’t see them until their kids are at least a year. I live in hope that the next course of IVF will work. On the outside, we have good jobs, a nice home (with cream carpets, white wooden floors, crisp white walls and fancy sofa’s, imagine how clean it all looks!) and could go to Australia tomorrow if we wanted to. But the reality is that my life is spent wondering if “this time next year I could be pregnant”. The sadness of infertility is utterly crippling, make no mistake about it. It has ripped my soul to pieces, taken away my peace and turned my life upside down.

Rosiie · 13/02/2018 14:25

I know someone who's just found out she's having twins and is not happy about it. She's even thought about abortion, pisses me right off.

There's those who can't have children and would give the right arm just to have one, and then there's those who are blessed with children but don't give a shit.

I'm glad you've healed jaygee Thanks

openbluewater · 13/02/2018 14:26

That’s the thing I find most irritating, that these raw voices, filled with pain, are juxtaposed next to idiots wittering about cream carpets and Netflix.

Lottapianos · 13/02/2018 14:27

For anyone is struggling, I highly recommend the Gateway Women online community. It's for women who don't have children, for whatever reason. I have found it enormously supportive

lookingforthecorkscrew · 13/02/2018 14:29

Rosiie it's her right to have an abortion if she wants one

NotACleverName · 13/02/2018 14:32

Not everyone wants children, Rosiie. The woman you mention is entitled to have an abortion if she wants one.

SpitefulMidLifeAnimal · 13/02/2018 14:33

Rosiie You don't seriously think that people should have children they don't actually want simply because other people cannot conceive, do you?

SaskaTchewan · 13/02/2018 14:36

It's common sense that you have a hell of a lot more money with kids than without. It's easy to calculate how much you would have to spend with just one, so that's a lot of cash for anyone to spend!
Some things you just cannot do with kids, why not concentrate on what you want to achieve? It's not all about cream carpets, but there's more to life than having kids. Even if you do have one, you still have a life to live and things to accomplish.

Posters seem to think that all parents are happy. People wont' dare say it loud, but many people bitterly regret having kids and know it's the worst mistake they've ever made.

PurpleDaisies · 13/02/2018 14:38

there's more to life than having kids.
Do you have children?

sirlee66 · 13/02/2018 14:39

Infertility is a cruel, cruel thing and I'm going against the grain here by saying YABU to say it's not the end of the world.

To me, it was. I'd rather have died than not been able to do what, I believe, I was put on the planet to do.

I've wanted to be a mum since I was a young child. Having unexplained infertility was the worst period of my life. I wanted to die. To me, it was a fate worse than death because I was too much of a wimp to go through with anything. I'd have taken the cancer to get off this world. Unless you have experienced it, you'll never begin to understand how very dark it is.

Im so happy that you've been able to move on OP. That's something I'd never have been able to do.

SaskaTchewan · 13/02/2018 14:40

Ask women with a damaged body, bad PND and SEN kids if they are living a dream. Having a baby is not always that amazing dream people seem to think it is.

It's probably doesn't mean anything, but friends around me who had babies very easily barely struggled whilst others with bad fertility issues who ended up pregnant did suffer with PND and horrendous first years.

Lweji · 13/02/2018 14:40

there's more to life than having kids.
Do you have children?

I do and I do agree. At least for me.
I'm sure for others children are the one most important thing, and it's a biological drive.
I had that drive and love DS. But I know I'd still be able to be happy without him.

PurpleDaisies · 13/02/2018 14:41

It’s very easy to say “there’s more to life than having children” when you have them.

Riverside2 · 13/02/2018 14:42

I don't understand why anyone would see Lweji's comment as crass?!

amusedbush · 13/02/2018 14:44

idiots wittering about cream carpets and Netflix.

What makes you and your wants so fucking superior that you can call other people idiots??

SaskaTchewan · 13/02/2018 14:44

there's more to life than having kids.
Do you have children?

I do now, but had them very late, and late enough to have time to achieve a few things on my list. Late enough to know that they don't make me more or less of a woman, and late enough that I don't need to live my life through them. I have my own.

tangledyarn · 13/02/2018 14:45

Because some people without kids are here saying that actually it feels like the end of the world and they feel desperate and heartbroken.

openbluewater · 13/02/2018 14:46

Everyone is different.

What does grate is people confidently stating that because they did various things, that is the definitive answer.

And I’m sorry, but people saying ‘well we had children late so I know ...’

No, you don’t.

PurpleDaisies · 13/02/2018 14:48

I do now, but had them very late, and late enough to have time to achieve a few things on my list.

So you’re not in the position of living a life without children. Just blithely saying “accept it, there’s more to life than kids” when you have them is totally unhelpful. Having them late is in no way comparable to not handing them at all.

Rosiie · 13/02/2018 14:49

Yes it's her right to have an abortion, but what upsets me is that this woman already has two children who do not receive the the love and attention they need. And now the eldest child does even want to live with her anymore, and yet she keeps having children. That's what upsets me.

SpitefulMidLifeAnimal · 13/02/2018 14:49

Everyone is different

In which case, you should refer to your previous comments about Lweji's post, where you have berated her for not holding the same opinion as you.

Leiaorganashair · 13/02/2018 14:52

For me, facing not having children was tied up with being "alone." I put it off until my 40s because I was more or less solidly single from 25 to early 40s. I don't think anyone faced with growing old with either a partner or a child can relate to that.

openbluewater · 13/02/2018 14:52

I don’t think I berated her. I said that it was crass. I do think my choice of wording was poor - crass is too strong - but I would stand by it being thoughtless.

I do think women should have abortions if they want them, though. I want my own baby, not to make other women miserable by forcing them to have them!

pallisers · 13/02/2018 15:01

YANBU.

I wanted children and am glad I have them but now we have spent more than 21 years rearing children, I wonder what our lives would have been like if we didn't have them. They have brought a lot of joy (and heartache) but also closed off some choices to us. We have had good careers, done hobbies etc. but it would be different - more expansive - without them.

The irony is, I suppose, if I couldn't have children I'd have spent years being miserable about it/trying to fix it so it isn't as if I could just embrace a childless life. But if we didn't have children I think we'd have a great marriage, far more time together, both would have pursued interests with more focus, I'd have gone back and done a different degree 15 years ago and might even have worked in my ideal field, dh might be working in a different field too by now.

We have several SIL/BILs who are childless and their lives are wonderful.