Anyone else read this shit?

[Orangeradiorabbit]

The Daily Fail. I shouldn't be surprised. Came here to vent. That is all.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-12243703/CLARE-FOGES-know-childless-women-30s-binge-drink-like-did.html#article-12243703

So women 30-35 without children are depressed alcoholics. Lovely

"I get why childless women of this age drink hard and fast. When I look back on my drinking days, I realise a lot of it was to drown out the mildly panicked feeling that I’d never settle down and have children.
A bottle of wine turned down the irritating ‘tick-tock’ of the biological clock."

Wow, just wow.

And in other Daily Fail articles we drink BECAUSE we have kids

We women aren't supposed to be childfree though according to DM. We're supposed to flaunt our figures and then easily fall pregnant, photos of us in lingerie with our baby bumps, then in lingerie after giving birth, and then post about how our MH has suffered post-birth. Come on childfree ladies, learn how to woman!

Surely the majority of women without children drink more than those with children...because they can? Nothing to do with trying to drown their sorrows over their childlessness lol.

It never ceases to amaze me how many people make a living from being completely unaware that other humans exist.

If they have a baby it's the most astounding revelation that must be shared with the world in a series of 12 articles, because nobody has ever done that before. Same if they take up jogging, get a job, lose a job, give up drinking...

And if they manage to scrape together a vague awareness that other people do exist then clearly they are all doing exactly the same things as the writer for identical reasons (and yet somehow still want to read about the writer's 'unique' perspective on that universal experience).

I can just about understand the existence of columnists self-centred enough to churn out this guff. The real mystery is why any editor commissions and publishes it.

I can’t even childless properly as I don’t drink!

What sort of woman even am I?!?!!

wails inconsolably

(Meanwhile there are authors literally publishing books called “Why Mummy Drinks”, what’s their excuse?)

Exactly.

I'm around 30 and have no desire to have kids. Always thought the time would come but I'm getting increasingly less keen with each year tbh.

No doubt I'd love them if I did have them, but there are already too many humans on this planet and I don't really want to lose my life/freedom just when I've got comfortable the past few years

Most of my mates with kids look much older than me too which puts me off.

I had a look at the research article to see what it actually says.

In addition to pursuing more advanced college degrees, more women are securing higher-income jobs, which are both associated with the decision to delay or not have children and increased alcohol use [39, 41]. Research indicates that increases in binge drinking among US adults are concentrated among women and those at the highest levels of income [39], education [39] and occupational prestige [42]. For working mothers, alcohol may be used to self-medicate from the stresses of ‘double shifts’ of paid and unpaid labor [43].

Basically, women who don't have children tend to have better careers, more money and drink more. Whereas working mothers drink to self-medicate.

I think a lot of people have children only because they think they're supposed to have children. Because if you look at it very closely, there really isn't much benefit in it for you as an individual. It's mostly sacrifice. So if you don't have that ingrained biological/animalistic urge that a lot of women have, then it's easier to look at it, see the reality of it, and think "naaah, that's not for me".

Man, I love being a smug childfree woman 🤗

clearly I'm doing it wrong as I didn't really drink till lockdown, at which time I was 44.

i know a couple of people who began day drinking after having kids. No judgement, just observing.

Pretty much how I feel. Sod not having lie ins and being unable to choose how I spend my evenings/weekends.

The only way this makes any sense is if the author is intentionally making a distinction between "childless" (no children but wanting children or not having ruled it out by age thirtysomething) vs "childfree" (everyone else with no children). Even then, though, I'd think that any accelerated drinking pattern was most likley a matter of getting one's fill before the children arrive and you're afraid to drink anything in case there's an accident and no ambulences and you have to drive to the hospital or something.

I don’t drink at all, I suppose I’m just not destined to fit in anywhere 😂

Gawd. I'm 60 and haven't had alcohol (which used to be one or two glasses of wine a year) since I was about 35. Binge drinking? Ffs.

*At one Downing Street Christmas party we went to a West End bar where I was so drunk I lost one of my shoes and picked up my boss on the dancefloor before promptly dropping her.

At another do, I collapsed onto a famous golfer who asked security to have me removed*

She was binge drinking every other night. She clearly had a huge issue with abusing alcohol and is now airbrushing her addiction under a guise of "but I was just sad I didn't have kids...now I have three kids I'm great! Honest!"

I always have to have a drink after I read anything in the Daily Fail.

I drank a lot in my thirties because I worked in the City of London and Down The Pub After Work was part of the culture. My reproductive status is and was irrelevant to my drinking habits (such as they are nowadays).

I read the DM but Thursday is a dead loss because it seems to have been designated Women's Day and they produce crap like this. If it's not women without children it's articles about yes, you can have a wonderful sex life after 60, ladies!

Yeah I read it yesterday and genuinely couldn’t believe what I was reading! I do go out more than my friends with children so I obviously drink more than them but I don’t do it to get drunk because I’m depressed I haven’t have kids, it’s completely bat shit!also wasn’t there a study during Covid that parents drink more than childfree?

This woman used to write speeches for David Cameron so she's obviously well versed in writing utter bollocks.

Love being able to come here for a moan. All these replies made me literally laugh out loud 😂😂. I'm glad I wasn't alone in my annoyance when reading the article. Thank you - I agree with everything said here!

hahahah!!!

I had a small glass of rosé wine with my dinner last night. I am a post-menopausal, childfree widow. Am I drinking like this because I know I will now never have children?

I can just about understand the existence of columnists self-centred enough to churn out this guff. The real mystery is why any editor commissions and publishes it.

It's the other way round. The editor wants something clickbaity to stick on the sidebar of shame, checks the rota (is it feckless childless women or feckless mothers this week?) then phones round the freelancers to see who fancies 800 words on How I Drank To Fill the Baby-Shaped Void in My Soul.

Agree. Dreadful article.

And so self-congratulatory on her "three successive pregnancies at 36, 37 and 39"

Round applause, what a hero.

Total load of crap.