Be honest: Do you judge married women without kids?

[oxymomon]

When you meet a woman who has been married for years, and doesn't have children, do you (A) make assumptions about why they don't have children; (B) ask them why they don't have children (feel it's your place to seek answers); (C) judge them for not having children; (D) all of the above; or (E) none of the above? Be honest. What do you really think...

A, I would assume it's either because they don't want children or just because things haven't worked out for the couple to have children. I wouldn't ask about it either way.

None. What is there to judge? I wouldn't judge and I wouldn't dream of asking.

This is really interesting, I feel similarly.

Although people don’t tend to ask me about kids, it might be because I’m in a same sex relationship so children are less automatically assumed? (though in fact the majority of female same sex couples I know either have or are planning to have children).

I feel asking anyone, male or female, single or married about reproductive plans or decisions is awfully bad manners. I never asked my two closest friends who had no children. It's their business and I might wonder, but I definitely don't judge.

I don't ask questions unless they volunteer the information. If you get to know someone well, it's fine to ask, I think (but they will usually have told you themselves, if you get to that point of intimacy).

Getting annoyed at people for wondering stuff in their own head, is weird, though. I'm sure people wonder stuff about me all the time ("Why did she marry into another country?" "Why did she have such a big gap between her two children?" etc.) That's OK. It's normal to privately wonder about other people. Just don't ask rude questions or questions where you might regret the answer.

"Either you must hate kids or you must be really devastated about it and you’re hiding it."

This is so true. There is a big grey area when it comes to not having children. I know several women who would have been open to having kids but didn't find the right person and other things didn't work out, or they married late and had a go but things didn't work out, and in both cases, they have said they are broadly at peace with all this, so I believe them. It's not a clear-cut division between the ChildfreeByChoice crowd and the women who did everything to conceive and are silently grieving about it.

I couldn’t agree more. I couldn’t conceive but life has otherwise really worked out quite well for me. I ‘m not sad.

If I thought anything and it's a big 'if' it would be a fleeting "I hope it was a choice"

I'm sorry to everyone who is posting that they are dealing with rude, snoopy people. My best advice is to come up with one terse, direct response. I like "I can't imagine why you think that's any of your concern" and say it like you are shocked that anyone would be so ill-mannered as to not know basic rules of social interaction (think Lady
Violet in Downton Abbey). Practice in the mirror. Stone cold. Don't be upset, don't be emotional, don't be irked. Just be sub-zero, arctic- permafrost, stone-cold. Deliver the line, say "Excuse me" and walk away. Shut that shit down. You don't owe anyone anything and every one of you is too good for that nonsense. Deliver that line like a boss once or twice in public and word will get around. I leave it there, but I've seen people go straight to a good friend/confederate, start a quiet conversation and the confederate made a shocked face and said something a little loudly like "Oh how rude." Didn't say anything else (could have been talking about anyone) and the snoopy person slunk away.