When people feel regret about having children, it’s often a generalised thing too, rather than about their specific children. They aren’t saying ‘I wish I had different children to the ones I had’.
People can yearn for their child free lives of before or find all kinds of aspects of parenting difficult or almost impossible. Quite often, this doesn’t relate to the specific child but the issue of being a parent and the responsibility and tasks that come with it. They can dislike and wish they hadn’t got into all this, whilst at the same time loving their children dearly.
Sometimes, it is the specific situation and specific children which makes parents regret being parents. Some children have such intensive needs or disabilities which will never reduce as the children become older, that every single aspect of life is taken over. People mention relationships breaking down and no life outside the home being possible. Regret might well be felt then.
Or is regret the right word? In this scenario, people can be resigned to the situation…totally worn down and ruined by it, but not regretting either their child or them being a parent.
It’s a funny one. It’s different to regretting eating a bar of chocolate, or spending money on a new house because the consequence of becoming a parent is another human being. Until they are there with their own little personality, we cannot imagine them or love or dislike them. Once they are there and you are a parent, there is no stopping being one. You can’t diet to lose the chocolate weight or sell the hosue you regretted. Being a parent is so final and forever….moreso I think for women. Very few women have left their children through choice and have zero contact now. More men seem to. So I think people don’t usually regret the individuals which now exist (unless you have Kevin….who has read We Need to Talk About Kevin) but it’s about themselves and the impact on themselves…which is clearly tied up with having had children.