Do you regret not having children?

[flickerflame]

NC for this...

I have two children. My sister is younger than me (in her mid thirties) and has been debating children for a while. It has absolutely nothing to do with me and I would never push her in either direction. However, recently it seems that she and her husband have decided it's a firm no. Their choice, obviously. But I'm worried for her. I sense she's been swayed by her other half because she still seems wistful when around my children and still mentions her concerns about their choice.

If you have chosen not to have children, have you later come to regret it? Especially those who spent a long time debating it, rather than those who were always a firm 'no'. I suppose I'm looking for reassurance that she'll still be happy with her choice in later years. It just breaks my heart to imagine her getting to an age where it's no longer an option and finding that she regrets it.

I'm willing to be flamed for this and expect the 'nothing to do with me' responses. And I know that and would never say anything. But I do worry.

No, I don’t regret not having children.

I have three sisters who have children- two of them regret it massively.

I honestly don't understand how you can regret it. It's like saying do you regret having a brother or a mother. They are your family and the closest relatives to you. It's very hard to educate and raise them but they give you eternal enjoyment and at the end of the day your only insurance policy in later life.

No I don’t. There’s lots of areas for parents who regret having their children though and an awful lot of the posts begin with ‘I wasn’t sure about children’ ‘I didn’t really want children’ ‘I had children for my partner’ etc so I think she’s doing the right thing.

I'm almost 40 and yes I hugely regret it and feel very lost. For me, it didn't feel like a choice as I did very much want children, I just didn't find the right man to have them with and personally can't reconcile myself to using donors and being a single mother. I regret not dating furiously in my late 20s/early 30s until I eventually found the right man. I assumed it would happen as easily as it did for all my friends. I don't think I'll ever get over it.

I feel very much like an outsider as it's very difficult to meet other women who don't have children at my age and my friends are all tied up with their own young families. Many women seem suspicious when they realise I don't have kids and that can make it hard to make friends too. I've spoke to older childless women and they said it gets harder again when people start to have grandchildren. I have relatives in their later 50s who couldn't have kids and they considered adoption but decided not to. They've told me now that they hugely regret not throwing everything at IVF or adoption and they'll take that to the grave.

It's extremely unpopular to say any of this though. We're supposed to say child free life is amazing. For many people it is, but if you wanted kids...it's pretty soul destroying.

I have one friend who definitely regrets having her daughter. She thinks I'm nuts.

I’m sure you’ll get some negative comments but it’s reasonable to be concerned for your loved ones especially as she’s giving doubt over the decision. Though like you say you can’t do anything about it.

People regret not having children just as some regret having them. It’s hard to know if she’ll be one of them. Also people who have unfulfilled lives can often blame it on some action or lack of action in the past when really it might not have been that.

No, I don’t. If I had had kids it would have been with my ex husband. He is a narcissistic control freak, and my life, and theirs, would have been a misery!

I don’t know how to word this so I just want to say upfront I mean this nicely, not in a nasty way I promise.

If your regret/upset etc is ‘unpopular’ with anyone, then they’re an arsehole, you’re not childfree in the true meaning of the word, you’re childless by circumstance and it’s no surprise you find it soul destroying to be without children you wanted. I’m really sorry for your experience.

Experiencing regret doesn't mean the decision was wrong. It's just an emotion that helps us make sense of things.

I agree with this. You're in a totally different situation @SoOutingWhoCares and your grief is understandable and valid. You're not childfree, you didn't choose it, you have every right to express your pain.

DM has a friend, now in her late 60s, who was married to an older husband who didn’t want kids, so she agreed they wouldn’t. I know it is a big sadness for her now, especially as she also gave up her successful career to move to a different part of the country for his work, away from friends and family. He then died when she was in her 50s I think. She really got a raw deal with him. It really needs to be your sister’s choice and not one forced on her, if she is going to be happy with it in the long-term.

I genuinely don't understand how anyone can say they regret having kids? Surely you know the implications and sacrifices of having children before you have them, so what's to regret?

OP, there’s a ‘Mners without Children’ board where you will reach more people who don’t have children, whether by choice or circumstance.

Speaking as someone who debated it for a long time before having a child when I was about to turn 40, I’m glad I did have DS, but have no doubt that, had I chosen differently, I would also have had a good life.

Really, you can’t think of a single scenario where having children would lead to regret?

A child born with a disability that means a parent has to give up work, move house, become a carer 24/7.

A child who develops a serious illness and spends months or years in hospital while the parents watch them die slowly.

A teenager who develops severe mental illness and the parents get very little support, and have to sustain all types of abuse because there are no services to help.

A happy couple have a child and it turns out that the father isn’t cut out for it and takes off, leaving the mother with the financial, emotional, and practically burden.

A child who grows up to be a nasty person, commits crimes, brings trouble to their family.

I could think of hundreds more.

If you use Reddit or Facebook there are groups on both for people who regret their children, or just Google ‘I regret having children’ and there’s lots of articles and stuff, there are so many reasons. My friend regrets her child and sends me posts from both groups and articles and stuff she sees for me to read as she feels other peoples words express it better than she can and she feels better if she talks about it so I have read a few of them because she has a few reasons for regretting her child including she misses her old life so much, she didn’t really want children she got pregnant accidentally and her husband told her if she had an abortion he’d leave, when she was 8 months pregnant she found out he’d been having an affair for 2/3 months and left her and is now living ‘their’ childfree life with his new wife, she can’t have the career she had and loved as it’s long hours and lots of travelling, she finds her child more and more annoying as they grow up and struggles to stay patient and understanding and more, so just from one person there can be varied reasons.

This would be my concern. I’ve heard this kind of story before. It’s even worse when they split up and the husband has a child with someone else and the woman is now too old for her own children. I think people often just think of the present and don’t think about the long term.

Keltie Maguire "kidsorchildfree" on Instagram is hugely helpful for people who are on the fence. Not to push in either direction but just helps address the confusion/conflict of being someone who doesn't have that conviction either way.

The thing about having kids is that it's a total crap shoot. You might get lucky and have great kids and a wonderful experience. Or you might get the opposite. Kids can enhance your life, but by the same token they can ruin it.

There is no way of knowing how it will pan out until it's too late to change your mind.

I had honestly no idea how difficult my teenagers would be. No one could have prepared me for that. I don't regret having kids overall, although I have plenty of moments of regret and I can see being childfree as a totally understandable (and often enviable) option.
I am guessing your kids have been easy going.

I wanted children and tried for years, however am childless which I have grown to accept. Now age 45 I actually think it's for the best and am glad I don't have them. I have nieces and nephews to dote on, I also have complete freedom to go and do whatever I want whenever I want, which I now massively appreciate.

I love being able to just book a trip or theatre whenever I like. I love that I can lay in bed in the mornings. I just think I like my life and it might make me sound selfish but I enjoy just being able to do things that just make me happy that I enjoy all of the time. I also still enjoy spending time with my husband and doing stuff together. I look at my friends with children (which vary in age from newborn to 18yrs all sorts in between) and they're constantly tired, running around playing taxi for sports clubs, never being a priority in their own home, arguing and frustrated with their partners. It might be a sweeping statement but it just makes me think I'm now glad that children didn't happen for me. And believe me, I spent years grieving when I had to accept that I can't have children, so to feel like this now is actually a pleasant surprise!

I have kids
. However, my aunt who doesn't has always regretted not having them

I don’t regret not having children.

I was always ambivalent about them but never got with the right person at the right time - I suspect if I’d been with a partner who wanted them when I was in my 30s, I’d have tried.

I wondered if I’d get broody when a friend of mine had an unexpected baby later in life. I absolutely adore spending time with her child, but it has made me realise that although I still like the idea in theory, not having children was the right decision for me in practice.

I do regret having kids but that’s for some of the reasons already highlighted, disability, forced to become a lone parent…

Nope, none of those reasons would lead me to regret having a child that I love more than life itself!

I have children with disabilities and a child with severe mental health issues. It's never been a regret. My third child is severely disabled and I never regret stopping at two. I would never have my hand up for this but I don't regret my kids for a second.

Everyone is different. The only problem is that once you reach infertility you can never ever get another shot if you DO regret it. I think that's the cruel part. You could retrain fir a good carer, find a nicer partner, move to better area or house. But there's no go backs at kids.

I badly burnt my hand once and the nurse said to me it was her biggest regret in her fifties. She said she would regret it to her last breath. I often think of her. There's powerful regret and "meh, it's a shame but it is what is" regret too.

This thread is about regretting NOT having children. RTFT please!!