To think this was an an awful comment to makr

[Misscromwellrocks]

A friend of mine is having her parents and several siblings and nieces and nephews for Christmas Dinner.
A few of us were out last night and one of them remarked how busy she was and how much she still had to do. My friend said something like Oh I know how you feel and the response was 'well in fairness you don't have kids so it's not the same stress and hassle'.

My friend would love to have children and is a brilliant aunt but just hasn't met the right person and is now 43. She went very quiet and I could see she was trying to force herself to join in and be sociable for the rest of the night.

Aibu to think it was an insensitive and rude comment to make?

Is that 'I'm SO busy and stressed' contest still running? Time to put it to bed, surely?

I see sb74's argument as all thing being equal, doing Christmas with kids is harder than doing Christmas without kids.

Everyone else who is barracking sb74 is saying but all things are NOT equal because I am single with a chronic health condition or I am a carer to elderly parents or I had a miscarriage etc.

It does not make sb74's statement wrong IF all things were equal i.e. if sb74 also had a chronic health condition, is a carer to elderly parents and suffered a miscarriage WITH a family to corral at X'mas to boot.

I would agree with the view that "all things being equal doing it with a family is harder" as being uncontroversial and self-evident.

Not that as a parent, I would say that to a childless person because that is insensitive.

Yep, insensitive.

When people say ‘you don’t know tiredness/worry/love until you have kids’ (boak) they mean - or they should say - ‘I personally hadn’t previously experienced tiredness/worry/love of the type I’ve experienced since having kids.’ I don’t know why people can’t phrase it as an observation about their own experiences.

FWIW, this is my first Christmas as a parent. It’s certainly more stressful and tiring than last Christmas, but I’m pretty sure it’s less stressful and tiring than many non-parents’ Christmases.

Really #blueshoes. You think, for instance, that losing a parent is easier for someone without children? Why??

There's so much competition for a hard life!

Your friend was insensitive OP, but I disagree with posters saying that it is your responsibility to pull her up on it. Sometimes you don't think of something to say quickly enough, and the moment passes.

Yep, it can be very stressful with children. My friend who does not have children due to infertility has been sad about it for years (she's late 40s) but is a wonderful, joyful person who also acknowledges the stress that people with children can go through. She offers amazing support when I struggle as a single parent (she is my boss). I acknowledge that her life without children is very difficult, and not how she had imagined it would be. I wouldn't want to swap and be without mine, even when times are hard.

I once had ex saying how I couldn’t understand about a problem he had with his mother because mine had died when I was a child. 😢😳 Emotional intelligence zero.

Gosh OP , you're very up for this fight!

I'm kind of on the fence.
Maybe it was a selfish "Talk about me, instead!" moment.

Still, just thinking that If someone lists 50 things they had to do in the last hour and then I interrupt and say "Oh I know just how you feel!" when actually my life is much simpler.... Then I can imagine someone coming back at me with the clumsy version of "You're talking shite."

Lljkk I'm not 'up' for any fight. Just annoyed that my friend was put down like that on what was meant to be an enjoyable Christmas night out and by the ridiculous assumptions by a very small minority on here that having children automatically makes their lives harder than those of childless people.

Most of us know that's simply not true. In fact I would imagine that emotionally life can be much harder and more heartbreaking for those who are reluctantly childless.

rain I HATE people like you. People like you have said things that have contributed to my years of mental anguish over the years due to my inability to have a second child. Stupid insensitive dismissive fucking idiot. A disgrace to the sisterhood. Feel sorry for infertile women who may have be unlucky enough to have known you. Bet you've really hurt people with your views over the years if you knew anyone who struggled to conceive

@TryingAndFailing39

That post was disgusting, and made on Christmas eve to someone facing their last Christmas. You should be so ashamed and I'm mortified that it was made on a thread I started.How could you?

You're calling lots of names at anyone who disagrees with you. If that ain't up for a fight, I dunno what is.

trying you are a nasty piece of work. If anyone is a bitch YOU are

What names have I called anyone. I confronted one poster who was being very provocative but haven't, that I'm aware been 'calling lots of names' unless that is how you describe disagreeing with some posters.

I've reported tryings post. I hope others do also.

Oh ffs. Well this thread went the inevitable way. I'll tell you what a stressful Christmas really is. It is watching your husband have a breakdown and slit his wrists in front of you on Christmas Eve because he can't cope with the fact that our final attempt at IVF ended in a miscarriage the week before.

It is the Christmas after that when your husband hung himself in your house on release from the psychiatric hospital where he had spent most of that year following said suicide attempt on Christmas Eve.

Your life can be harder yet also happier...if that makes sense.

My life is definitely harder since having children, but it's much happier for it.

It's hard because of different reasons, different personalities, different lives. Not having kids but wanting them, grieving, suffering mental health, loneliness can be very hard emotionally around this time. Having kids and been busy is hard physically, but otherwise if things are going well in life and you have good enough health I would say it's a happy kind of physically hard and yes sometimes mentally draining. Of course the latter can't be harder than the other. Insensitive comment to make, I would say very thoughtless.

Lots of childfree people have more to do, more stress and more physical work than those of us with kids. They may have elderly relatives to care for, a demanding job, lots of people to host for, friends or siblings who rely on them etc.

The difficulty is that the vast majority of breeders think they are something special.

Unfortunately they are just self obsessed arses.

I'll be deleted for saying it. Racism, ageism, sexism, misogyny, disabilism, all stand here. Criticise breeders and you're fucked. (Whether or not you have bred yourself).

@Leighhalfpennysthigh omg I’m so sorry that sound awful.

People on here stop competing. Christmas can be tough if you have children, don’t have children, care for other relatives etc. It’s not less difficult for either one.

If we didn’t have kids the human race would not exist. Someone has to keep it going and create the future generations to keep the world going when we are pensioners??

I don't believe anybody has children to ensure the continuation of the species. It's not as if we're in much danger of dying out any time soon.

People have children because they want the experience of being parents and because they hope they will look after them when they're old.

I would agree with the view that "all things being equal doing it with a family is harder" as being uncontroversial and self-evident.

Although it depends to some extent on the ages of the child/ren, I would not agree that this is necessarily true. If you are having a difficult time for some reason, the presence of a loving family to support you through it could well make it easier in some respects. Having children isn't just about having additional tasks to complete.

I think the problem with saying "all things being equal" is that it's almost impossible to compare 2 lives and say they're equal because there's way too many variables at play. That's why sweeping statements rarely make sense.