Why did you choose not to have children

[hotcoffeebeans]

Hi everyone just a random question really.
If you have never had kids by choice not because of anything else but you chose not to have any.
What was it that made you decide that motherhood was not for you.

@MrsDanversGlidesAgain

No I like my kids. They don't pick up on anything. I do everything for them. They don't do a single thing. I'm autistic and if anything they rule me. They talk to me about everything. They are pre teens now and don't listen but when little were never whiney, nasty, lied, screamed, all the stuff kids do that out people off.

I've never been that happy about being born so I wouldn't force it onto someone else. I consider the fact I've never wanted kids (so haven't had that longing for them) an absolute blessing. Plus I saw what worry and grief my siblings gave my parents. Literally my dad once told my brother "son you'll be trouble to me til my grave"-he was right as well. Absolute bullet dodged.

Same here. I didn't like them much when I was one. I don't enjoy their company now .

You're not wrong! I've just come off seven years as my mother's carer. God knows that was bad enough, looking after an infant/child would have been even worse.

I do have two little freeloaders, but they're cats. I don't mind that sort of servitude. Wish they could get jobs though! 😻😻

There was just never a good enough reason to have them although I did wonder whether I would regret not having kids when I was in my 30s.

This isn't one of the main reasons for not having them, but I was just reading one of the (frequent) threads on here about school gates politics and cliquey groups of school mums and realised that is part of it for me. I never fitted in at school, and still don't have many friends now. I can just imagine that if I was a parent, I would be exactly the same at the school gates and I would hate that to impact any child I might have had - it would be devastating. Or passing on my social awkwardness to a child - I'd hate someone I loved to go through what I did.

We are strongly socially conditioned to believe we will regret not having children. Fear of possible future regret is often given as a reason for having them.

I am also relieved to have missed out on the school gate/school mums thing! It sounds nightmarish.

I'm not one of those who was born 'destined to be a mother.' Kids were always something I saw as nice to have, but I had a full life without.

I was with my ex husband for 10 years and we always had/found reasons not to, and then by the time we started discussing it seriously, we broke up not long after. We were never meant to be parents together. Had we gone through with it, I'd be a single parent. There's nothing wrong with that, but I'd honestly be dreadful at it. I require a village.

My partner now has a child, seriously doesn't want anymore, and my position on my own not being something I need hasn't changed. I'll happily be involved with his, and genuinely don't feel like I'm losing out or missing anything.

We are strongly socially conditioned to believe we will regret not having children. Fear of possible future regret is often given as a reason for having them.

Very true but, the more you think about this, the more insane it is. If this is your rationale for having kids, you're creating an actual human being, on the off-chance you might have some hurty feelings in the future. And they call childfree people selfish!

I know quite a few childfree couples and none of them say they regret their decision.

Lots of my friends with children (all grown up and some have grandchildren or even great grandchildren) say they regret having them.

Many, many parents do not put their kids first.
There was just thread deleted about abusive partner but of course the OP was heavily trying to ttc.

This is the thing. Childfree usually put quite aome thought into it at one point or another. Many parents do not. It just something you do or must do no matter what cost.
The stats about abuse towards children are quite a show that many who have them are selfish and seriously bad people.

We are not the selfish ones.

That’s definitely on my list of reasons to be very grateful I’ve never wanted children, not just the school gate mums but also just having to do the school run in general.

Much like some other PPs, I never wanted children in the same way that I've never wanted to live in Australia / own a giant African land snail / appear on a reality TV show. It's never appealed to me, so I didn't do it.

Additionally, I'm not especially fond of babies or small children either - even the stuff that parents claim are the 'good bits' look fairly horrendous to me - so I am happy in my life and with my choices, as I hope that people with children are with theirs.

Oh for goodness sake! The majority of parents are not abusive and my comment is about them.

Having more children when you can’t cope with the needs of your existing children isn’t putting them first, neither is leaving/engineering an accident when you want another child and your husband doesn’t, both of which I have seen advocated on here.

I agree with that!

Unfortunately lots of parents are selfish to varying degrees. But one of the ways some are selfish which doesn’t affect their children is when they say things like ‘since I’ve had a child I can’t watch news stories about the abuse of children anymore’ or ‘since I had a daughter I realised I treated women so badly’ - you really needed to create a whole child to have empathy or be a better person?! And yet I’ve been told I’m not a real woman, I lack empathy, I won’t be a full person unless I have a child etc. but I can tell you now I don’t need to create a child to not be able to read about the parents and step parents who abuse them or to treat sections of society like a person etc. Which is why when people tell me I’m selfish because I don’t have children I struggle to keep a straight face.

I've never had the urge. I've never liked babies - they sort of repel me, whereas I adore cats and kittens. Always hated the idea of being pregnant / giving birth.

Didn't have a normal background - illegitimate and neither parent ever prodded me in terms of when kids or marriage or, indeed, career. Just floated on for years doing fuck all.

I had an abortion late 20s. Condom broke and morning after pill failed. Never once regretted it, and really glad I don't have an adult child.

If I don't have a child and later regret that, only I get hurt. If I have a child and later regret that, the child gets hurt too. It's kinder and more ethical to only risk hurting myself.

@VitoCorleoneOfMNMafia well said.

It's not that you need a child to empathise about child abuse. Most normal people empathise with a range of sad things. It's that humans naturally emphasise more deeply with something that they have direct and every day experience with.

For example, if you have a parent with dementia, any stories or films about it will hit more close to home because it's easier to imagine yourself in that situation or relate it to the person you love. So, although I empathise and feel very sad when I hear stories about elder abuse, I can imagine that it would be even more difficult to deal with if one of my parents was going through the situation. Similar to hearing about cat abuse - very upsetting even if you don't have cats, but doubly so if you have a cat yourself. That's what parents mean when they say this. I have a toddler myself and before having him I would feel very sad when hearing stories about young children being abused. Now it's unbearable because in every story I see his face and hear his voice.

Many people don't want children BECAUSE they were victims of child abuse. But of course parents come onto a child free board and thread and chastise child free women for not being able to be 'empathetic'.

We are strongly socially conditioned to believe we will regret not having children.

The older I get, the more I know people and the more I am on MN the more I realise that humanity would be a lot happier if we ignored all we're socially conditioned to believe and stopped caring about what people think of us.

Most people wouldn't go bananas, they'd just quietly follow their hearts and live out the happy, individual lives they were destined to live.

And that proves my point.

Most normal people empathise with a range of sad things. It's that humans naturally emphasise more deeply with something that they have direct and every day experience with.

Empathy is not fitted as standard on a fixed setting. Some people never get it despite having been exposed to daily experience, others are steeped in it without any experience of the situation.

The RNLI raises millions every year from people who never go to sea.

I've never kept a pangolin but the suffering they endure breaks my heart.

Mother Theresa didn't have children.

1. Circumstance. Never met the right person at the right time.
2. Don't like them - especially babies. Find it hard to interact with them. They slightly repel me, tbh.
3. I lack emotional resilience and am prone to anxiety. I like to do my own thing and am not great at compromising.
4. I know I would have been rubbish at it, and resented every minute. Not fair on them.

5 I can't abide noise and chaos 6 I prefer to have a larger disposable income. 7 Dogs and cats on the other hand

@Words are you me? 😄