Worst comment you've had as a child free woman

[derekdied]

I'll start. Someone I had literally met about fifteen minutes previously. One of her first questions "do you have kids?" Me "no.." her "oh could you just not be bothered with the responsibility?" 😮

Couldn't disagree more with that quote you posted. I remember talking to a cousin, probably in the late 1980s, he was telling me I was selfish to not want children. I disagreed and said that actually, it was selfish to have children. Children don't ask to be born, in most cases, the only reason people have children is because they want them (or worse, want somebody to look after them in old age). So you are bringing another human being into the world entirely for our own gratification.

And I have children now btw.

Thing is, both those statements are true.

Just like it's true that the tax and NI I've paid since 1975 helped pay for their (and their parents) schools, libraries, dentists, doctors, hospitals and teachers. To listen to some people you'd think people retiring now are freeloaders who've never contributed a penny.

People get so indignant when I post this article demonstrating just how much you’d have to drive, fly and eat red meat to get even close to the carbon footprint of one child.

But they are all doing it so they can selflessly produce people to wipe out childfree backsides when we are old and infirm remember. Not because they, you know, wanted a baby 🤷‍♀️🙄

Hadn't got to this one when I posted 🤣

Particularly given that she was one for 25 years (I don’t think you count as childfree under 25. It’s not the same when it’s the norm for your age group)

Apparently it’s sadder to hear about children being neglected, abused or murdered when you have children. Which is confusing because those children being discussed were neglected, abused or murdered by their own parents.

Yes I’ve been reading that too. 🙁

I considered commenting but I just couldn't be arsed. I grew up in an abusive house and I would love to have the privilege and luxury of not realising just how bad child abuse is until I had my own child, but I didn't get that luxury.

I think perhaps some of the posters are not very deep thinkers if it takes having your own child to realise that. Like men who suddenly only realise how bad all the sexism that they have been going along with is when they have a daughter and see it impacting her.

Where as actually empathetic people can empathise even if it doesn't directly relate to or impact on them.

There is some level of mental masochism involved there with all the reading about it and past ones and most likely following some accounts on sm or looking at things (so algorithm brings the videos up) , to bring up more distress imho.

Someone posted this on Facebook.

Celebrate your children.
They are the only people in the world your heart loves unconditionally.
They are the only people who you can truly call your own.
They are the reason you work hard, sleep late, wake up early, tolerate things that you wouldn't have tolerated otherwise, they are the reason you forgive, forget, and do wonderful things in life.
Be proud that you have those beautiful people in your life.

Parents are truly superior beings. We should worship them.

Well, good for them that they feel like that. So happy for them. Though I have to say as a CF person (am I still allowed to say that?) I've done all this - work hard, sleep late, wake up early, tolerate things that you wouldn't have tolerated otherwise, they are the reason you forgive, forget, and do wonderful things in life.

Such things are not exclusive to parents, after all.

People you can call your own? Nobody is a possession, nobody owns another person. My parents certainly don't own me, and in some ways don't even truly know me.

I mean it is Facebook, so full of rubbish, would take with a pinch of salt etc. But imagine being such a weak person that without children you don't even have your own motivations for doing things!

Facebook/social media always makes me very grateful for my mum because I’d hate to have one like that.

Ah, the stomach turning ,over sentimental, postings on Facebook- where would we be without them?

Presumably whoever wrote this thinks children are little angels who never grow up. Never read such idiocy. And such possessiveness ... "only people you can truly call your own". And "only people your heart loves unconditionally"? Does that include when DS has turned into a violent drunk? Was my mother supposed to love him unconditionally after he broke her jaw?

Another one I saw was “grandchildren are the reward for everything you’ve done right in your life”. I mean, what the actual? Does that mean people without children, who will not have grandchildren, have done something massively wrong?

@KimberleyClark and that women are required to have children to provide their parents or parents-in-law with grandchildren?

I wish my parents had read the memo about unconditional love - no evidence of that in my childhood.

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/crazy-parking-near-school-forced-9069114?fbclid=IwAR0JJTXnRygJtq80j229vyp3QSixX5Bz8nkXwKLBz_o5ADiJVXxtpqDtSAU

This person really loves stereotypes, don't they?

First, the stereotype that all mothers are selfless creatures worthy of praise, no matter their motivations for having kids, their circumstances, how well they take care of the kid-they're women to be revered as the selfless beings they are.

Second, the stereotype that the opposite of having children is excessive shopping (someone please define excessive) and jetting off on holidays. I really didn't get the memo that our options were just limited to those two things.

But of course, jetting off on holiday for two weeks out of the year, is absolutely more damaging to the planet than churning out multiple children and all the resources that will be used to nurture those children and their children should they go on to reproduce.

But it's the CF people who are selfish and destroying the planet.

As for the point of that thread-it absolutely is selfish to have a child at 50. I don't give a flip if that's an unpopular opinion, but it is the truth. Some of these people who does this want to put the blinkers on and pretend that it's not selfish when it is. Having a child at 50 is setting that child up to be a carer or have to deal with ageing parents long before they're due to.

It's impossible for me to see that setup as anything but selfish.

@clairelouwho indeed. It's not the child free who are putting 10+ non biodegradable nappies into landfill a day, endlessly purchasing Chinese made plastic shite that will be played with a couple of times and left on the planet to degrade with a half life of several thousand years and clothing tweens and teenagers in seasonal changes of wear once fast fashion made in sweatshops.

Re the worst comment you’ve ever had, this wasn’t directed at me as such but was said to me about another childfree woman, one who was recently widowed unexpectedly… the person said that once this woman’s elderly parent dies “she’ll have nothing to live for”. I was stunned. Is that how she (and all unpartnered childfree women) are seen- having nothing to live for?? Because we are single and have no kids? I choose to be single and I chose to be childfree. This is the life I want to lead and it’s very much worthwhile. I pity those who only get a sense of worth from their relationship to others. I am enough, on my own, I am enough.

I heard a pretty awful one today.

I heard over Xmas that an acquaintance (single, 53, female, no children), had been recently diagnosed with uterine cancer. She was going to have to have a hysterectomy, plus exploratory surgery as the oncologist suspected it had spread to her lymph nodes, followed by chemo and radio therapy.

Mentioned it to a mutual friend to explain why she wouldn’t be at a wedding we are all attending , who said “oh, how awful”. And then after thinking for a nanosecond, “Well, at least she doesn’t have any kids”. Because of course she wouldn’t have anyone else important to mourn her if she died would she?

I had several comments along those lines when I was diagnosed with cancer a number of years ago. It is incredibly hurtful thing to say about so,some and to someone at what js probably the most vulnerable and terrifying point in their lives.

Even now, after knowing my story, some of the nurses (not nurse bashing but it is a few nurses in this case) where I work will let slip some little comment about a woman we may have on the ward and what a shame she's got cancer as she's a mother, or lucky for her she doesn't have children if it's a terminal case. If I point out to them how insensitive they are they just tell me I couldn't possibly understand as I don't have children....err, no. That's because I had cancer which left me infertile (and I didn't want them anyway but that's irrelevant).

They just don't get it. Obviously it's that magical empathy that only mothers have that us barrens are missing out on 🤷‍♀️