Do you know someone who didn't change when they had a kid?

[clottedcremer]

So what I mean is someone or a couple who has more or less stayed as they were, but their kid just joins in with what they're doing.
So my friend has a 3 year old, and her and her Husband have never really dived into the "family" life, they have kept their childless friends, and they spend most of their time with these people, the 3yo will either go along or will be looked after but GPs etc.

When we had kids, we really immersed ourselves in it, we did NCT, we've stayed in touch with the group years on, our friends have become 'friends with kids', and we rarely spend a weekend away from them.

I wouldn't want to be like my friend, and hence never chose to be this way. But I'm starting to wonder, does this make a happier life? For everyone?

Men often stay the same!

Women and couples, less so. I think it's horses for courses. When DD was young I changed things. But I kept my pre-kid friends. I now travel to weird places with a childless friend on occasion. So I think I'm a mixture.

@clottedcremer “they have kept their childless friends”

why does this warrant comment? Were they meant to dump them?

I know quite a few people that have done this. Predominantly people with one child as it's quite easy to do so
I have a mixture of friends who have and don't have children but that seems relatively unusual.

Yes, I have one friend who continues socialising with us. Usually they brought the child along and occasionally she or her husband would stay at home, but they still socialised more than the average parent.
The child is just now able to be left alone and until recently there was the odd complaint when one of them would turn up with the child unexpectedly.

As a childless person I can attest that many parents do dump us. In fact, quite a few dump their single friends as soon as they get into a relationship, others when it gets serious and others again when they have children.

Perhaps I did in those terms.

A huge amount changed for me personally in that I had a person depending on me for their survival. But my friends stayed the same people (I was the first to have children), and I really loathed all those baby /mum activities. I had nothing much in common with the other new mums I met, other than we were all new mums. Was I happier for not doing those things? Well I found them boring so probably.

I wouldn’t want to stop being friends with someone because I had a kid and they didn’t. I would hope someone didn’t want to stop being friends with me because I had a kid. If I had grandparent help over the weekend, I would definitely use it. Maybe not every weekend (which it doesn’t seem like they do) but I would love to dump DC with parents and go do something as a couple. How do you know they don’t have friends with kids though?

To be honest, I don’t really like the martyrdom of having a kid and I need to devote my whole life to them, I should only ever do kid friendly activities, only see friends with kids the same age and never be apart from them. So I guess I would prefer your friend’s approach, if I had the support.

We kept our old friends, some with kids, most without. Made new friends through the kids.

Dh and I still went out regularly both together and separately but we were very lucky to have local very involved GPs.

Life changes but doesn’t have to become unrecognisable!

I will say that we don't have much/any help. So I guess we've 'had' to become this way.
I guess part of me would have liked to keep my old life a little more, but I suppose I hope that it has given my kids more 'kid time' as a silver living - iyswim?

As a child free person my experience is the same. I wondered if OP was prepared to admit it!

I suppose it depends what your pre-child life was like.

I'm friends with a couple, and she's pregnant with their first. Currently, there is rarely an evening where they stay in - they're always out, either together or separately. Almost never a weekend where they aren't away.
It's not possible for both of them to continue with that with a toddler. You'd need a babysitter every night.

I’m a lone parent to an only and Dd has a mix of things ie I take her to play dates and we do kiddie stuff at the weekends, but equally she comes out to dinner with my child free friends, she comes to dinner parties and goes to bed upstairs etc.

I don’t feel like I’ve had to give anything up and Dd loves going to the grown up stuff as much as she does the kid stuff.

I find the idea that as soon as you have children you abandon your hobbies, your friends, your social life and set up an entire new friendship group where the main (often only!) thing you have in common is having children the same age to be bizarre. Firstly, anyone who ditches longstanding friendships because one of them has a child now and the other one doesn’t can fuck right off - they are not friends! Secondly, if you stop doing the things that made you ‘you’ before you had kids, what the heck will you do with your life ones the kids are grown up and left home?

We've always maintained social lives as a couple and separately. We were the first to have children by a good ten years though so we kind of had to with regard to friends. We've been gently annoyed as friends who didn't give two hoots about us having kids when planning things became parents of PFB's with elaborate routines that simply couldn't be disrupted!
NCT wasn't for us, I felt judged and patronised as a young parent and once the babies were born couldn't afford to keep up with the endless classes and meet ups.
I've got some 'mum' friends now made through the children who are among my best friends but we rarely socialise with the children anymore.

If by change, you mean give up everything in favour of NCT and soft play then I haven’t changed at all.

I tried NCT, it was awful. I also tried baby groups and found them boring. So I stick with my regular friends and usually just socialise without the DC’s.

I didn’t give up my career and I also haven’t given up hobbies. My DC’s are wonderful but they aren’t my whole life, I have a fulfilled life outside of them too.

Our pre baby life was like this. Out with friends, out at work events. Children plus Covid meant that it's now very unusual for one of us to be out on a week night!

I don't think your life can fully stay the same. As a minimum you have a fully dependable human to consider. Even leaving them with a babysitter takes more coordination than just waltzing out the door care free.

A lot of my life didn't change with child 1. I was a young mum. Mostly kept my same friends, who due to our ages, did not have kids. Didn't seek out mum friends as even now I find that a strange concept.

Many places I went baby came with. I finished university, worked part time ( lucky my work had a crèche), went on holiday with a her quite a lot. When baby was around 2, both sets of grandparents would regularly have for Saturday night.

I think things changed more when number 2 came along (although still no mum friends thanks) and children were at school. It was the structure of school and full time work that curbed my carefree spirit.

I don't really understand your post. We have the same friends we had before children, I wouldn't drop my friends just because I had kids. Some of our friends have children, some don't.

We tried NCT classes and it wasn't for us. Too many people judging those who didn't breastfeed one the group. I did breastfeed but couldn't get on board with the judgement.

When we had our first, we carried on with stuff like travelling. By the time we had our second, out first was in school so we couldn't travel as much but still did in school holidays. Life goes on with kids, it's good for them to experience life.

Obviously. They are feckless scumbags 🤷‍♀️

Us. Our baby fitted in with us. Travel, eating out, day trips etc. our friends were the same. Babies would be passed around and played with amongst gatherings and all the kids are still friends now! Never went to NCT classes or anything similar, never read a parenting book or magazine and I never took him to any baby groups!

I never gave up any of my friends/hobbies after DD was born...Hell it was those that helped me keep my sanity at times. I never attended NCT meetings as I knew I would be judged for FF and I really couldn't be arsed.

ETA I had friends who had DC and friends who didn't/never had them.

Yeah and they are very shit detached parents.