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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To feel robbed of parenthood?

251 replies

csm93 · 22/03/2022 19:19

Partner and I are late-20's/early 30's. Feel absolutely shafted with everything that is going on. Cost of living crisis, war, pandemic/lockdowns, stagnant wages etc. I know thousands/millions will be in the same boat. And I'm sure lots of those people view it differently. But we had a conversation last night saying that there is no way we could bring a child into this world, with all the uncertainty, the financial insecurity and the unknown as to what kind of society our child would grow up in.
Feel like our generation has been totally screwed over, and feel resentful of that.

Aibu?
Would you start a family in the current climate??

OP posts:
Pompom2367 · 22/03/2022 21:54

It is your personal choice to not have children for those reasons and that is your right but I don't think you have been robbed as you choose not to

Anoisagusaris · 22/03/2022 21:55

@GreenNewDealNow

I think people are being a bit harsh to the poster here. To have children you need to feel positive about the world and have hope for the future. This is extremely difficult at the moment.
No you don’t, you need to get pregnant and give birth.
Askingforfriend · 22/03/2022 21:56

Our kids are in their 20s now and we were in a very similar situation when we were in our mid 20s. We were really struggling financially, the 90s were not a great time and then the mid 00s weren't great either.

Laniania · 22/03/2022 21:58

I haven't given up hope in the world to the extent that I think it wasn't worth it having my son.

Hollyhead · 22/03/2022 21:58

I can understand where you’re coming from but given we rely on future generations to pay our pensions, your life will be even worse in old age if there aren’t enough young working people! If you want a family just get on with it!

Booklover3 · 22/03/2022 22:01

Yes I would

GabriellaMontez · 22/03/2022 22:01

I think people are being a bit harsh to the poster here. To have children you need to feel positive about the world and have hope for the future. This is extremely difficult at the moment.

No you don’t, you need to get pregnant and give birth.

Worth remembering you can even get pregnant your first time, standing up.

Favourodds · 22/03/2022 22:02

To echo the general sentiment, get a hold of yourselves. Absolute wet weekends.

Chickychoccyegg · 22/03/2022 22:03

How incredibly dramatic, do you think you're generation are the first to have struggles?

Kgutdfn · 22/03/2022 22:03

YABU most people I know are better off now than in the 80s.

DaffTheDoggo · 22/03/2022 22:07

Life is never entirely safe and for most of human existence it’s been a lot riskier than it is now.

Choose not to have children by all means but describing yourself as having been “robbed” is a bit crass given that some people actually don’t have that choice.

Charlize43 · 22/03/2022 22:09

You are being totally ridiculous!

In the 70s we had to wear awful clothes and it's amazing that anyone managed to get pregnant during that decade, but we did!

Apatosaurus20 · 22/03/2022 22:14

I don’t think our generation have been screwed over, it’s all relative but YANBU, it’s totally up to you whether you choose to have children or not and the reasons why.

DarkShade · 22/03/2022 22:17

What are you talking about, the only people robbing yourselves of it are yourselves. Do you really think that being alive now is so bad it would have been better not to bother? Children born in the UK today have some of the highest life quality of any child to ever live. Yeah, it's getting worse now, after a long time of improvement. Hopefully by the time my own children are in their 30s things will be looking up.

Macaroni1924 · 22/03/2022 22:18

It depends on what kind of person you are, glass half full and all that. Yes there is a lot going on, there always is it’s a mad world. But with that said be grateful that we are not IN Ukraine. Be grateful that we survived lockdowns and Covid. Be grateful that we wake up each morning. Be grateful we have a roof over our heads. Be grateful that we have people to love and who love us back. Life is for living not for having regrets.

spacehardware · 22/03/2022 22:19

NRTFT

you sound like the couple at the start of idiocracy

Greatexpectations77 · 22/03/2022 22:21

@Whatthefleckster Absolutely desperate times how?

WhereYouLeftIt · 22/03/2022 22:25

I get it. Your entire childhood and early adulthood has been in a stable environment. But really, the last thirty years or so has been the anomaly, not the norm.

I was a child/teen in the 1970s. Mass unemployment, double-digit inflation, large-scale industrial disputes like the miners strikes, 3 day weeks, rolling blackouts, the Winter of Discontent. Is today's cost of living crisis so very different from the one I remember as a child in the 1970s? Is the current oil crisis any worse than the repeated OPEC crises of that decade? The cold war and the proxy wars and the expectation of a nuclear WW3?

Lots of people thought "there is no way we could bring a child into this world" then too.

What I'm trying to say is, your despondency at having the world upturned is a perfectly sane response. Al the plans you had, all your expectations, all your assumptions - all your comfort - has been taken away and replaced with uncertainty. It sucks. But your current despondency shouldn't be the decider in what you do now.

Things got better then. They'll get better this time too. You're having a bit of a wobble just now, probably because it's all coming a bit thick and fast, new problem after new problem. But it will settle, you'll regain your equilibrium, and the world will feel good again. ((hug))

LunaAndHerMoonDragons · 22/03/2022 22:26

YABVVU

Even just considering recent history, if you'd been born in early 1900s and managed to survive to 1950 you would have been through 2 world wars, the Spanish flu pandemic and the great depression. If you don't want to bring children into the world as it is, I can understand that decision, though it's not one I'd make. But you need to own that decision, you're making a choice, it's not bring forced on you.

lottiegarbanzo · 22/03/2022 22:27

But we had a conversation last night saying that there is no way we could bring a child into this world, with all the uncertainty, the financial insecurity and the unknown as to what kind of society our child would grow up in.

These anxieties are ancient and perpetual. You are not saying or thinking anything that has not been thought before, a million times over.

No-one can ever know what society their child will grow up in.

Fcuk38 · 22/03/2022 22:28

Oh bless you. When your a little older and been through some rough times directly yourself not just heard about stuff happening on the news. You will realise that life goes around in circles. I was born in the 80s there was many many wars happening. My parents lived with the threat of nuclear weapons. But guess what we all had kids and for the majority of our lives shit has been ok.

SquirrelG · 22/03/2022 22:30

People have felt this way about bringing children into the world forever. You are overthinking it - if you want kids have them. No-one knows at any stage what is around the corner, all we can do is the best with the tools we have.

Echobelly · 22/03/2022 22:30

I get feeling that way, but my parents best friends had a very serious discussion about whether to have kids (in the 1970s) because clearly there was going to be nuclear war at any minute. So it's not always as bad as it seems.

TBH, I think the cost of living crisis is the biggest issue right now - childcare is mega expensive and a lot of people, even decently off ones, may find difficulty affording that on top of everything else; that's the thing that's really worth planning around.

RosesAndHellebores · 22/03/2022 22:34

My father arrived in the UK on Kinder transport in 1938 - never saw his parents again.
My parents lived through WW2; my maternal grandparents WW1 and WW2
I remember the 12 day war, the IRA bombing campaigns, the day the Wall fell, Tianemen Square, the Civil war in Iran (Persia), the Falklands, Iraq.........

Inflation going bonkers in the 70s, interest rates in the late 80s/early 90s, black Monday, 2008 crash.

My DC are mid/late 20s now - looking forward to everything life may throw at them.

Nothankyouv · 22/03/2022 22:35

You’ve chosen not to have kids, you’ve not been robbed

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