To regret having children?

[Cinderellasslipper]

Anyone else miss being childfree?

YABU - no way

YANBU - yes I have regrets too

I can follow my own posts just fine, you were the one struggling with comprehension and I am the one refusing to spoon feed a grown adult on a forum for adults. That doesn't make me goady.

Well, I’ve just spoon fed you your posts, feel free to do the same…

Loved having young kids, would totally do that again, but for me the teenage stage is the worst. I am constantly worried about them as they make their way out in the world - parties, drinking, smoking, etc. And driving - jeez!
This stage won't last forever either, but then they'll be gone.
Cats though, never ever regret getting cats!

Quite a few blame the breakdown of their marriages on having children.

They also say that their children/grandchildren cause them a lot of stress and worry.

That's really sad. I can imagine that parents will never stop worrying. I think there's a lot of truth in that old saying about how you'll never be happier than your unhappiest child! So I suppose it is exposing yourself to more risk in that way as you never know what life will throw at a family. I'd pick my kids over marriage though, any day!

And then they'll be gone

This is one part that does worry me actually. I want to do a good job and watch them fly off to make their own lives, but having been a lone parent by then for nearly two decades, when I get the time to myself that I currently crave, will I be desperately lonely? Selfishly, I hope they don't move too far away.

For me, children have been the most fulfilling part of my life, I feel really lucky. And one of them has severe special needs and high care needs, I have been broke, a single parent, had my career curtailed, had horrible strife over co parenting with exes…
And still I feel this way!

There are compromises. My career is the big part of that. But I have kept my brain active through studying and part-time work. Now looking to go full on back to my career. It was horrible having to co parent with a bitter ex.

But I have done loads of things! I’ve travelled all over with the kids on my own.

@Bananasinpyjamas21 Just a question which you don't have to answer but through all that and it sounds like a lot how did you maintain your a sense of positive mental health? It seems very easy to slip into a downward spiral faced with all those challenges. I guess what I'm asking is how did you not?

I often think this too - there's often a sort of Scooby-Dooish 'if it weren't for those pesky kids!' thing where people think that if they hadn't had children they'd have stayed at the age and life stage at which they did have them forever but also somehow achieved all their career and life goals. Childfree women in their 40s don't live the lives - or have the bodies - of 25 year olds either. Very few of them are CEOs, or spend their lives travelling the world, or skip from party to party.

I think having a child has shown me how much I could have been doing. I pay over £1,000 in nursery fees a month but I never remember having that sort of money before. I could have been having weekends away every month but we didn’t. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

omg yes same. We are dreaming everyday almost on how to use the money once we pay off the nursery fees in a near distance future! 😂

Don't regret them for a second, they are absolutely the light of my life.
So incredibly hard and I had crippling PND after having DS but now I'm out the other side they give me so much love and joy.
I do think it helps that I'm an older mam (for me personally). I'd already done everything I wanted to do as a childfree adult, travelled the world, partied, relationships, nice home and car, and had an established career and part way through my second career. I've never felt resentful or that I've had to give anything up, I was totally ready for a different stage of life.
I had DS at 39 and DD at 42 and me and DH just have so much fun with them. Love our weekends and family holidays. They're just so funny and lovely.

@theholidaymum - I am hoping I am better with it than I was before!! Bring on those 30 free hours.

Pretty harsh. It’s really tough and first time parents will feel trapped.

OP may not have family support nearby or may have a very unsettled baby, lots of things could be going on.

@Hardbackwriter I think you also see it on the single threads, where married women/women in a LTR seem to think all single women are living the lives they were when single in their late teens/early twenties and it just isn’t the case for most women in their thirties and forties that weekends are spent going round bars and clubs and having girly holidays or travelling on a whim.

I was thinking about this thread earlier and I think what having a child has meant to me - apart from love which is (hopefully!) obvious - is a sense of belonging and stability within a family and a community. Of course, you don’t have to have a child to have this but personally I feel that’s the real up side.

I hated the first five years of parenthood, but found once my youngest got to 3, it got much easier and I started to enjoy it. My DDs are 14 & 16 now, and my favourite people in the world! I love spending time with them, DH and I have so much fun with them and even we're starting to feel sad about the eldest heading off to uni in a couple of years - I really never thought back in the dark days of those early years, that I would feel this way, but there you go. Motherhood is hard, but it does have it's wonderful bits too, and although I may have regretted having them when they were small, now I think it was the best decision we have ever made!

I'm hoping this will be me, I have a nearly 5 year old and a nearly 1 year old and I'm struggling.

Especially as the 5 year old has three weeks off over Christmas and the 1 year old is getting molars.

I don’t mind being asked at all. I found the antagonistic Ex the hardest, that really got to me and I did have several periods of feeling quite down. Struggling with money and no support.

I think one of the main ways I coped was by realising I couldn’t do it all, I tried holding up the big career, single mum, mortgage and keeping everyone happy for a few years. Realised I was going to break. I thought about what was really important to me. I swapped the big career for a lower paid job term time only, that allowed me to drop off and pick up the kids every day. I stopped most contact with the Ex, simplified the arrangements. I moved nearer family, and got out and got more of a life for myself with fantastic friends. So I gave up career, money and pleasing everyone for feeling better as a parent, closer to my kids, more time, better family relationships and also became a musician again so I had something else to fulfill me.

I’m still broke. If I hadn’t given up my career I’d have paid off my mortgage, had a fantastic pension and be quite respected. But you know what I don’t regret it at all. My kids and me are very close, we have a great relationship and my child with SEN is doing really well. We are all quite close to my family. We’ve loads of great memories to look back on. I will just have to get used to porridge and soup and working into my 70s, but for the emotional security it’s worth it!

@thermostate 1 year old is hard! It was once teething ended, they could speak properly, sleeping full nights, more "with it".. 3.5ish was the turning point. Hang in there ♥️

@QueefQueen80s - A few people have said 3 is a turning point, I really hope so. I don’t want to wish his childhood away but I am looking forward to him being more independent and hopefully a little more reasonable.

Yes, it's all the concealment of the truth! I'm brutally honest with people, including pregnant women, about how it can be. It took me a long time to get over this after my first pregnancy, even a really close friend was ah well, you know I didn't want to say....why??? Why do women all lie to each others faces about how relentlessly challenging the whole experience can be?

Yes, you love them with all your heart, and would fight to the death for them. But would I choose to do it again, not likely. (Having a 2nd during a pandemic with no one really capable of offering us any practical support anymore really impacted on this).

Exactly.. you can reason with them, they understand you and you them, you stop worrying they're gonna constantly hurt themselves, all teeth in, sleep 10 hours all way through, get up later, they are more aware of danger, they move less clumsily, less or no tantrums, you can have fun chats with them, no more pushchairs and equipment, toilet trained, I get lie ins, they can entertain themselves more, no more hair pulling or drool everywhere.. they want holding a lot less so easier on the back and you don't feel overtouched.. can you tell I love it 😂 It was a gamechanger for me! And then I could find myself again (as cheesy as that sounds) and feel I'm an even better mum now as I don't feel I'm drowning.

This was mine and my friends experience, not speaking for everyone.
Raising a child from baby to that age is fucking hard work (as well as very very cute) but this too shall pass.

@QueefQueen80s - thank you it gives me hope!

@WinterSnowing Thank you. All I can say is more power to your elbow. Huge life sacrifices but here you are to tell the tale!

I should never have become a parent - it's the hardest thing I've ever done. They're older now so easier but if I had a Time Machine then I wouldn't have them again. I feel my life is paused whilst they grow and I cannot wait to hit the 'play' button when they've flown the nest.

Miss sleep and unlimited time to my self but defo no regrets. They r my world x