How do you feel/cope when someone announces a pregnancy? (Childfree section)

[Possimpible]

Reluctant to post this as I know it makes me sounds like the worst person ever. But yet another friend announced her pregnancy this weekend and although I'm happy for her, I also have some unpleasant bitter feelings. If it was jealousy I'd at least understand my feelings, but I'm not jealous. I just find babies so dull. My best work friend is on mat leave. Lots of other friends are pregnant or have new babies, so all conversation and activities revolve around this. I'm not saying I want to go drinking every weekend, but I just want to go to nice restaurants or interesting places and talk about something else.

End of self-indulgent moan. I know it's awful, I'm just putting it here because I can't say it in real life. It probably means I need a change, a new job or new hobby or something, and I'm sure once I'm past 40 it'll stop. But does anyone else have a few days of feeling gloomy when another friend announces? How do you deal with it?

I genuinely don't feel this; I'm just happy and excited for them (assuming it's what they want and they are happy about it too).

Are you definitely 'childfree' OP? I am, and have always known I didn't want children. When I hear announcements I know that it's not something that means anything to me personally, if that makes sense.

If you're not jealous, genuinely do not understand why it would affect you in the slightest?

Lots of my friends are getting dogs. Cant' think of anything worse so it's just a quick 5 min chat and then I literally forget about it and that they've even brought it up.

Are you 100% certain you don't want children?

Your feelings are perfectly valid, as are anyones. I felt angry, defeated, jealous, frustrated because it wasn’t me having ‘the perfect family’ and because yet again having to sit through the pregnancy/baby/toddler etc etc chat.

I am older now, and it is easier as friends/colleagues enter grandparent stages plus I’ve had decades to deal with it and build a child free lifestyle.

I used to allow myself a day to scream/shout/argue about how I felt - but on my own, so I had those ‘chats’ with a different, internal version of me. Get it out my system chats before I inadvertently said anything to anyone in real life. Wierd I know, but it made dealing with the day to day talk about such things easier to deal with without being stressed/angry/depressed.

I also got out there and made friends with other child free adults - to balance out the friendships, surprisingly few parents of young children go to adult education/dance classes/other hobby groups and from their you girls on to have a circle of friends you can go out for meals with/coffee and chat with about anything and everything that doesn’t involve pregnancy or children.

I know exactly where you are coming from OP, I will be very happy for them but also a bit sad that it is another friend who is going to be pretty unavailable for any activity we might have previously done together for the foreseeable future, be it weekends away, nights out or theatre trips, as their priorities will massively change.

I feel sad as it usually means I'm about to 'lose' my friend for the next 12+ years as they turn into a baby/child bore and no longer have time or inclination to do anything vaguely adult. On the positive side, once the kids get to mid-teens my friends have come back and suddenly all want to go on weekends away with me while leaving the teens at home.

I totally get what you're saying (I have kids, so not the same, but previously felt like this over other "milestones" that took people on a different path to me)

But unfortunately the thing that you need to accept is that this is going to be intensely all consuming for them - definitely tedious for you, I totally empathise - so you need to find some new childfree friends. And that's work. No wonder it prompts feelings of irritation.

Yes this is how I feel. I'm certainly not jealous, I've never wanted kids of tried to have one.

But it does mean that your friendship changes a lot, and it's difficult to have the same kind of relationship with that friend.

A few of my friends have had kids and all they do is talk about them/nursery/school/parenting. I find it deathly boring. I nod and smile of course, but it's so boring. I just have zero interest in babies/kids, hence not having any.

I think I know what you mean. It's not jealousy, but more like resentment over them choosing to do something that is going to change their lives which means your relationship with them won't be the same anymore. Like someone above said, you're going to lose a friend for x-number of years. Same feeling you get when a friend announces they're emigrating or even just moving to another town. It changes the friendship.

I usually feel happy for them, just the same as when my friends or family get/do/achieve anything they want. On occasion (and this probably makes me a bad person), I have felt sorry for the baby, or one of the parents for various reasons or rolled my eyes.

I’m genuinely delighted for them, because they are usually very happy about the news, and that’s great to see. I also hope everything goes well with the pregnancy and that the baby is born healthily & uneventfully.

Simultaneously, I’m very relieved that I am not in their position.

Your feelings are totally valid @Possimpible. Am I right in guessing you're childfree not by choice?

Don't feel bad for feeling.

Ignore me, I just read your op properly 🤦🏻‍♀️

Still, you're entitled to feel however you want to feel!

I just feel relief it's not me 😂

I feel the same as when a friend orders tuna in a restaurant.

I don’t like tuna so would never order it.

Happy for them that they get to have what they want.

I suppose you are mourning the list of the kind of friendships you had with your friends which you know will change with a baby. Their lives have altered forever, their priorities have changed. If you choose to remain child free it's kind of inevitable you will find old friendships wane and you will gravitate towards those who also choose to remain child free or those who have accepted that they aren't able to have children (different groups but result in the same thing)

I'm finding I'm at the next stage, I have adult children but no grandchildren yet, more and more of my briefly carefree friends now are committed to childcare again.

Very happy for them, sad our going out days are probably over - for a few years if not for good.

Yes I understand this @Possimpible

When I was early forties my best friend unexpectedly announced she was pregnant (a happy accident for her) whilst I was delighted for her I knew things would change massively and its one less person I can talk about what its like not to have children - moan/rant about people we know with kids etc

I just realised the other day I've never spent a single second with her for the last 3 years without her child. I love their kid but so tricky to have a conversation uninterrupted or to make any arrangements. Probably says more about her partner not stepping up and doing his share.

I remember that I can still go and do those nice things with my other friends and soon hopefully my mate will be more available as they grow up.

I feel indifferent. If it's a work colleague, my brain's response is to work out if and when their going on ML is likely to affect any work I'm involved in. I congratulate them, of course, and hopefully make the right noises, and 'ooh' and 'ahh' if a scan picture is produced. But, for me, it's really just like any other not-very-interesting news that people might share.

I think my only worry is that my friend will turn into one of those people who thinks mothers are inherently better - more selfless, empathetic, caring, mature - than people without kids. I’ve had a few friendships turn out this way and it’s always devastating to discover that my friend who was always lovely and non-judgmental has secretly been harbouring smug tendencies.

Other than that there’s the sinking feeling that the friendship is fucked for a while, and a huge sense of relief that it isn’t happening to me.

Can you make friends with older women whose DC are almost grown and who don't want to talk about them any more? I am in my 50s with grown DC, but I have a lot of childfree friends in their mid thirties with whom I do fun things.

Completely hear you OP. Its like that person just won't be in your life in the same way for a long time to come and that's a big loss if you're fond of them

I have also felt the bitterness and envy, although it's getting much less as I get older. I felt very ambivalent about having children - I know that staying childfree was the right decision for me, but I really did want children very badly at times and hearing about other pregnancies was very painful. Being childfree isn't clearcut for all of us

Thank you so much everyone, it feels nice just to get that off my chest and know that I'm not the only one. It's the sort of thing you can't confide in anyone in real life because it's just so nasty. I thought I had gravitated towards people who plan to be childfree, but one after another they're falling pregnant. It's my age, I'm 33. I am definitely childfree by choice for now, I don't know how I'll feel in 2/3/5 years, but I find pregnancy, babies and children incredibly boring so it's not something I can see for myself.

'I thought I had gravitated towards people who plan to be childfree, but one after another they're falling pregnant.'

I used to feel so bloody disappointed when this happened! Like, I thought you were my people, but it turns out you're not. I accept that this is 100% my issue and my problem, and that getting pregnant is nothing to be ashamed of! My friends now are either childfree and 45+, or mums but with much older children (late teens or adults)

If it’s someone I’m close to, outwardly I’m thrilled for them.

Inwardly I know that this is, in all likelihood, another friendship that bites the dust. Very few of my friendships have survived the other one having children, no matter how vehemently they swear blind that absolutely nothing will change, we will still do all the things we did before, and anyway they have loads of babysitters lined up. (None of this is ever the case.)

For very close friends I’ve genuinely been very upset on occasion, not that I’ve let on to them. It was almost like grief, dramatic as that might sound.

To be honest. I have a similar reaction when close male friends get married. I know our friendship is about to change drastically and may well be gone forever. With close female friends, the marriage doesn't really affect our friendship but instead a pregnancy kicks off the drastic change process.

I agree with @GrannyWeatherwaxsHatpin that it's a form of grief. Whilst I'm pleased for my friends being happy and achieving what they wanted from life, I privately grieve the once close friendship that I'm losing.

'It was almost like grief, dramatic as that might sound.'

It is grief - you're losing a friendship, or at least the friendship as it used to be