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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to be a bit scared to have children because...

41 replies

InMyLittleHead · 30/09/2009 23:54

in all likelihood the world will be totally buggered in 50 years time? Climate change, terrorism, economic gloom and doom and general crap.

Does anyone with children ever watch the news and get genuinely scared about their future?

OP posts:

blueshoes · 01/10/2009 10:12

YABU.

If you need something to worry about, worry about the present and how you can make a difference to things that need fixing now.

QuintessentialShadow · 01/10/2009 10:16

When you have children, your worries become a little bit more down to earth, and more based in your own little microcosmos.

I think, until I had a family, I also worried a lot about the world, the environment, war, life on other planets. There was nothing else to really worry about.
I just dont have the energy and inclination to worry about that now.

When you are young and carefree, unless you have other substantial worries in your life, such as uneployment, serious illness, then you worry about animal rights, free range chicken, war and freedom of speech.

thehairybabysmum · 01/10/2009 10:24

When you have your children you wont actually have time/headspace to worry about this.

Personally i go for the ostricth approach, head in sand and dont think about it. Also dont watch the news.

I am pretty green, cloth nappies, cycle/walk everywhere, allotment etc (again head in sand over holiday flights).

Blueshoes makes a good point i think.

minervaitalica · 01/10/2009 10:32

Well imagining what life will be like 50 yrs from now is futile I think - 50 yrs ago people worried about the Cold war, space and arms race etc. 100 yrs ago it was day to day survival - but I bet none of them imagined the situation in which we are now (good and bad points).

Of course we worry about what the world will be like for our children; however, I do take comfort in the fact that humakind has survived epidemics, countless wars, natural disasters, financial crashes. Things may have been hard for a long time, but each generation has rebuilt their own world.

I do find my mother still worries about the world I am going to live in - what about house prices, swine flu, no pensions, terrorism etc. However, for me it's just the world I live in. I suspect it will be much the same for our children.

wasabipeanut · 01/10/2009 10:33

I do worry a little yes but I also have great faith in humanity. We've survived quite a bit so far.

Worrying is fairly pointless - you just have to do what you can (recycle, grow your own etc. if climate change is what scares you) and crack on.

nigelslaterfan · 01/10/2009 10:41

It is very hard to look at the future with optimism I agree.

But I can't not have the two I've had so I have to make the best of it. They've given me incredible happiness too, maybe it is selfish to have had them but I guess we should all do our best to make the world safer in the future!

Most of us are not doing as much as we could, I include myself. We should stop flying and making unnecessary car journeys..... But it's hard when we've all got such a taste for the easy life!

beaniesinthebucketagain · 01/10/2009 11:40

i agree with pp the minute children arrive so many 'worries' have to shift and make space for is he to hot, will he get into the right school, am i doing this right blah blah etc and so on!

KERALA1 · 01/10/2009 21:31

Gosh OP is a cheerful soul! Every generation has its end of the world fears - Cuban missile crisis, cold war, we are all doomed etc.

I am an arch worrier and as a teenager used to torture myself with worries like this before realising that life is precious and you really should make an effort to enjoy what there is around you rather than fretting pointlessly. Alternatively if something truly awful happens in your life that quickly eclipses abstract worries outside your control (beyond being as green as you can.

paisleyleaf · 01/10/2009 21:36

I do worry that there are too many of us, but also have a nice life and lots to offer DCs.

scottishmummy · 01/10/2009 21:52

cannot live life based upon fatalistic what if's

i trust my abilities,my partner and the majority of people are decent

ManicMother7777 · 01/10/2009 21:59

I don't worry about those things at all, but I do worry about the here-and-now like ds riding his bike to new secondary school and showing off to his friends by fooling around in the middle of a main road. Several times. Apparently.

LynetteScavo · 01/10/2009 22:09

I do worry about the future of the planet...but I think the next 100 years won't be too bad.

BexieID · 01/10/2009 22:18

I do worry, but hope that one day my children will do something good for the world.

joolzr · 01/10/2009 22:18

The only thing that is certain in life is change. For better or for worse. Everything has elements of challenge and opportunity.

I think climate change, terrorism etc are all major worries. But we will adapt. I worry more that DD will want to rebel against us and be a merchant banker instead of something worthwhile .

mrsruffallo · 01/10/2009 22:21

I worried a lot more about these issues before I had kids to be honest.
I feel like they have so many opportunities and such a full life that they'll be fine.
It'll all work out, of that I 'm sure

defineme · 01/10/2009 22:22

my mum debated for years before she had me in 1974 - friends were telling her she was selfish to want 2 children because they were all going to die because of the bomb.
It's a genetic impulse to reproduce and I don't thonk logic comes into it that much for most of us.

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