Things you should never say in front of childless women

[Clothrabbit]

Just following on from another thread I started, what things have childless women on here had said to or in front of them, or read celebs spouting in public, that really hurt or upset them.

For me:

You don't know what real responsibility is until you have a child.
Having a child makes you less selfish.

I’m gonna get bashed here but oh well 🤪

Women should not comment on the life or lifestyle choices of other women. Some of the comments I have read are rude and patronising.

But the truth is having children does provide different experience, some positive and some negative.
I didn’t appreciate tiredness until I had a newborn. I didnt know what it was like to love someone unconditionally until I carried my baby and gave birth. Labour was the worst pain I have ever experienced ever! I am completely overwhelmed by how dependent my 8 month is on me. I have never felt as trapped in my life as I do now. I have lost the freedom I had before.

I have worked with children for years but now I can relate to the experiences of the parents I work with more than I could before.

Although the comments women without children hear are rude I think they can say more about how the ‘childless women’ feels about her situation then the manners of the ‘ commenter. For example I also work with SN children and I cannot imagine how hard and tiring it must be to provide around the clock care for a dependent child and when SN parents point this out to me I don’t feel they are being rude as I don’t feel upset that I’m not a SN parent iysyim.

@Leobynature

But no one is saying that you don't feel that way about your child. It's absolutely ok for you to explain your personal experience.

It's when people think they are entitled to comment on how I or someone else feels that is rude.

Saying you personally never experienced love like having a child is different to saying 'you (other people) don't know what real love is until you have a child' or telling someone who's tired 'oh you don't know what tiredness is!'

Or my favourite comment on here... It's okay, love isn't everything, it must be nice to focus on yourself and your friends.

It's patronising. It's condescending. It's telling someone how they should feel because you think you've had some hierarchy of experience to them.

It's also highlighting the fact that you've experienced something that someone else may be so desperate to achieve and are having struggles with without thought on how that may affect them.

Things like 'you don't know what tiredness is...' are often said in a jokey way, sometimes to practical strangers. You have no idea what their situation is. It may not be a joke for them. So be thoughtful in how you converse with people on a sensitive subject such as children.

You are absolutely within your rights to say you never experienced x y or z before having children. You don't have a right to tell other people they haven't either.

For example I also work with SN children and I cannot imagine how hard and tiring it must be to provide around the clock care for a dependent child and when SN parents point this out to me I don’t feel they are being rude as I don’t feel upset that I’m not a SN parent iysyim

Also I don't think that's a fair example. Of course you don't feel upset that you don't have a child with SN. It's the same when someone has an illness, I'm not jealous that they have an illness or upset because they've had more struggles than me. It's something I want to support them through because it's a hardship a lot of people don't have to experience. It's not a choice and it isn't a 'positive' situation.

You can't compare that to a woman who is childess but wants children being upset by comments from people with children.

Leo I've no doubt you're right. No one is saying you're wrong to think what you do.

You might very well think, I didn't know true happiness until I fell in love with my partner

But if you were talking to someone who was single, would you think it was appropriate or kind to tell them 'well of course you never know true happiness until you get married'

You can think that. It may well indeed be true.

But would it be kind to say that out loud to someone who may desperately want to experience that for themselves, but can't?

For example I also work with SN children and I cannot imagine how hard and tiring it must be to provide around the clock care for a dependent child and when SN parents point this out to me I don’t feel they are being rude as I don’t feel upset that I’m not a SN parent iysyim.

Well, that's just about the most shit analogy anyone could ever have come up with.

Think it through, please.

I mean, I never especially wanted kids, but I never didn't want them either, so my childlessness (and I have no issue with being called childless, that's how our language works, I'm not looking to be offended by every word anyone utters) is neither by choice nor by nature, but by circumstance.

But even I know that no-one ever craved for a SN child!

As I’ve pointed out on the TAAT that has sprung up about this one, there is a huge difference between stating your own experience, and telling someone you know better than they do about their own experience.

The tiredness one, so fed up of my friends telling me I don't know what tiredness is as I haven't got kids.

What I want to know is this: Why is the state of being childfree/less considered worthy of comment?

I don't have children and to be perfectly frank, I find it hard to understand why so many women do choose to have children. But the fact is that they do, and most of them are glad they made the choice they did. But I would never ever dream of saying to a pregnant friend "Oh are you sure you've made the right decision? You're letting yourself in for years of drudgery you know" or "It's not too late to change your mind. Abortion is still an option."

That would be extraordinary rude. Yet parents feel qualified to lecture the childfree about their choices all the time.

Yup. I’ve got chronic illness that causes extreme fatigue. Not so long ago I was unable to eat the dinner DH made because I was so fatigued I couldn’t move my mouth enough.

But I don’t have kids, so I don’t know what tiredness is.

Ok. My analogy was bloody awful.
I guess i was failing to say that if you have made the choice to not have children and think that Is the more favourable option why would you be offended with peoples shitty comments.
I guess I’m saying everyday I get told ‘you kid hasn’t got SN so you wouldn’t understand’ and do you know what in a lot of ways they are right.

I'm married, mid-40s, no children. I suppose childless by circumstance, I spent a very long time in a horrible relationship, then met DH at an age when children had to be on the agenda pretty quickly, or not at all. For a myriad of reasons we decided not at all. I feel like it was the right choice for me, but I was never 'definitely don't want children' it's just the way life worked out and I do have some regrets about not having them when I was younger.

And the comments people make still sting, make me uncomfortable, so now I make it a joke 'me, kids, nah can't stand em, my ovaries are made of sand, give me a cat any day yada yada'. But I'm able to do that purely because I am fairly happy with how things are. I cannot imagine the devastation those sorts of casual comments and questions would cause if I was infertile, had had multiple miscarriages etc. It's such a strange thing that being a parent is somehow perceived to transcend every other meaningful relationship we have in life, and that people (mostly women in my experience) feel it is totally acceptable to say those things. If I'd been an orphan, would anyone think it was ok to tell me how great having parents is and how I was missing out by not having any, that I couldn't possibly love my adoptive parents in the way they love their 'real' parents? No. They wouldn't. It's a peculiar acceptance that being a mother is the 'right' way and the rest of us are a bit odd somehow and therefore it's ok to comment on that. I say mother particularly as I really don't think childless/childfree men suffer from it in the same way.

The only positive I can take from my experience is that I work with several younger women, most of whom are not sure if they want children or not, and they see that as an equally valid option to having them. They are curious about my situation and have lots of questions, but it is genuine interest rather than 'but children are amazing why didnt you have any?'. The world is changing, but very slowly

Sorry. ^^That needed more paragraphs!!

@ShineOnHarvestMoon absolutely. 100% agree. I'm actually working on a questionnaire specifically for childlessness not by choice that is not focused on medical infertility, but instead on the other experiences of being childless not by choice - including being childless by circumstance (incl social infertility)

I'm a member of quite a few CNBC communities, with a LOT of women who are childless by circumstance for similar reasons as you outline, and I really really want to capture those experiences.

I'm working on the questionnaire to get the right wording of the questions, as it's not my personal experience - I'm actually having lunch today with some women from a 'Not-mums' group, many of whom are childless by circumstance

I just haven't posted the questionnaire yet, as it's not yet done! I'd be delighted to incorporate any of your feedback of the kind of questions you'd like to see / like to be asked? Please do PM if of any interest.

and , it's just shit and unfair.

'It's a peculiar acceptance that being a mother is the 'right' way and the rest of us are a bit odd somehow and therefore it's ok to comment on'.

You're so right. Women get a HUGE amount of validation for becoming mothers. I'm aware that validation is different to actual support, but there's still that reinforcement that you have made the 'right' choice. I think that level of validation feeds into the smugness and arrogance that leads some parents to undermine the pain and isolation felt by childless / childfree women

Howtodeal, you sound ambivalent about parenthood, like me. It still hurts when people question or undermine your situation. It can still be painful. It's such a deeply personal thing

@Leobynature how do you know if someone is childfree by choice rather than childless not by choice?

Say you have long hair and it's a lot of upkeep. You spend hours combing and drying and detangling and styling it.

There's someone who is bald - you don't know if they've chosen to shave their head because that's what they've chosen, or if they're bald because of cancer or alopecia

Would it be kind to say to them that they have no idea how difficult it is to manage such unruly hair?

They might have decided that they don't want to deal with the upkeep and made a choice to shave it all off, and they love that style and not having hair is a massive plus to them

Or they might give anything to have the problem of dealing with unruly hair, because that's not an option that's open to them at all. That choice was taken away from them

How would you know whether the person was hair free or hairless not by choice?

if you have made the choice to not have children and think that Is the more favourable option why would you be offended with peoples shitty comments

Because being described as selfish, cold, childish, not a real woman, unfit to do my job, not knowing my own mind, and having something wrong with me is hurtful?

“You can have some of my eggs”

I know it’s meant well, but it irks me. Infertility is the least of my problems!

I don’t have children. This is a snapshot of my sleep for the week. I know tiredness.

@Leobynature

What TeaStory said above.

Your post seems only to refer to people who are childless by choice, 'why would they be offended', but as others pointed out, you wouldn't know whether someone was childless by choice or not. Most people don't share that information.

Either way it really isn't anyones place to comment but it seems like with the subject of children, people seem to think it's open to public opinion.

Surely it's kinder and just easier all round to just watch what you say in case?

Just popped by to see how this thread was going. I see we were still having to fight our corner. It's so tiring. As if infertility isn't fucking tiring enough, we also have to deal with offensive, smug, patronising and downright rude and judgemental comments as well.

Leobynature, why should people feel the need to comment on someones personal circumstance? I,m not childless by choice but I Respect other peoples choices to either be a parent or not, I don't feel the need to comment on their parenting style, life choices etc. What I and most of the people on this thread object to is the patronising and at times nasty commentary from people telling us how we should or shouldn't feel.

Surely life is just easier when you don't address the situation at all? I have close friends who are childless. I'm aware that a couple are childless through circumstance (going through extensive IVF treatment) but I also have no idea why another one is childless; she's never felt compelled to share it with me and I've never felt compelled to ask. She loves me, loves my DC and is a fabulous friend.

The whole concept of judging a woman's life by her child-situation is nonsense. Some people just don't have children. It's nobody's business why, or how, or even if they want them in the future. It's also nobody's prerogative to ask those questions. It's an invasion and entirely unnecessary.

As for not knowing tiredness til you have DC, again, it's nonsense. Not knowing love til you have DC, nonsense. Not knowing selflessness til you have DC, nonsense. DC don't suddenly turn you into a super-tired Mother Theresa. They just turn you into someone who feels it's ok to comment on another woman's choices entirely unconnected with your own.

Oh the “its made me a better person” crap is annoying too.

Leobynature let me just work through your post for you, to help you understand
But the truth is having children does provide different experience, some positive and some negative
The truth is that we live in a patriarchal sexist society which values and judges women quite severely. We are judged not so much for what we do, but for who we are. And one of the major ways that who women are (women's characters, the types of people) is judged is her status as a mother. OF course, women who are mothers get constantly judged for the ways that they mother.

But women who are not mothers are judged as fundamentally not really women. I think that's what Lottapianos means about "validation."

I didn’t appreciate tiredness until I had a newborn. Maybe you've never written a book. I have written several, and the relentless slog over two years, plus the last month of not sleeping, you've never experienced.

I didnt know what it was like to love someone unconditionally until I carried my baby and gave birth.
It would be rude of me to suggest that you must have been a pretty shallow person before you reproduced ...

Labour was the worst pain I have ever experienced ever!
Shall I tell you about an injury I had which induced pain to the extent that I threw up, had awful bowel upset, cold sweats, and needed morphine every 4 hours simply to make the pain bearable. How I didn't get that medication for over 48 hours? And how for 6 months, if I missed one of those 4 hourly medications, I experienced contractions of nerves and muscles that meant I could not sleep for the next 24 hours, as that's how long it took the pain sensations to subside under medication?

Your experiences are your experiences, but maybe they're limited.

Oh the “its made me a better person” crap is annoying too.

Yes! I'm guilty of having said this before now then thinking it over and realising what a twatty comment it actually is. I was a dick before I had DC and I'm a bit of a dick still.