Sadness over no grandchildren

[AmateurOwls]

First time poster so hope I make sense!
I have two adult daughters. One has never wanted children, but the other has always said she'd like them. Recently we were chatting and she said her and her partner have now decided against them. I kept it together while she was there but afterwards, the only way I can describe it, is it felt like a bereavement. I hadn't realised how much I was looking forward to being a grandma. I have a husband, friends, nice holidays etc but life feels pointless. My nephews aren't having children either so the family has just stopped. I see my friends with their grandchildren and the fun they have and my heart breaks. I'm on my own this evening and started crying while I was watching Call the Midwife. Please has anyone else felt like this and how do you cope with it?

I'm sure you didn't mean your message to come across as dismissive and even a touch sarcastic? Sadly it does have that flavour. You can be the most involved person in the world but the grief of not having any grandchildren is a natural thing. @AmateurOwlsi know exactly where you are coming from. There is nothing to be ashamed of or to feel bad about. You are human. How to deal with it? It's a hard one especially when the choice is there. I'm in this position because of fertility issues. It's a hard one - there's double generational grief there.

As someone who has no children by circumstance, losing my partner and being lonely in later life is my worst fear. I also have no nieces or nephews or wider family as I am an only child. I am hoping that friendships can go at least some way to shielding me from loneliness, and perhaps living in retirement housing with a built in community when I am older.

I am sorry you feel sad about this.

You say life feels pointless... these feelings perhaps need closer examination, possibly with a therapist?

You brought up your 2 daughters, who are (I hope) healthy, happy people functioning well in the world and enjoying their lives.

That is something you can feel proud of.

There are other ways you can feel you have a stake in the next generation other than through grandchildren and you might explore these.

It will be a process of adjustment I think

How old are they? All the way through my teens and twenties I said I didn’t want kids. I meant it, couldn’t imagine it.
Had DC when I was late thirties - just needed to meet a man grown up enough to be a decent parent and then those hormones came roaring in.
My parents were astonished but delighted. I’m pretty sure they had given up any ideas of being GP.

However you absolutely did the right thing by staying calm and not reacting. It still is completely their choice and you should never try to change their minds or show how upset you are.

Think about what you could do to enrich your life.

I would never EVER try to persuade someone to have children, even though I've loved being a parent.

My friend is going through so much pain and guilt after persuading her DD to have a child. The baby was born with a disability and will never be independent and it's unlikely to be able to communicate. My friend feels that she's given her DD a life sentence.

That's such a sad situation.

I read something on here once before where a parent had encouraged their daughter to 'have a child to look after her in old age'. The baby was born with a severe disability which means that the daughter will have to look after the child into her own old age. And presumably the daughter will now be too busy to support her own mother. So it didn't turn out as expected for any of them.

When my middle dc was newborn a lady in the shops popped over for a look at him and got quite upset, she apologised but had learnt that her own adult children had decided they didn’t want to be parents. It’s always stayed with me, she’d been so excited to be a hands on grandma after working hard to be in the position to do so when her DC were growing up. I think of her often, I hope she found other children to be around regularly. I’d love to be a grandmother someday but equally would fully understand in a climate of impossible house prices etc if my own dc would choose a life of some travel or luxury. The slog of kids with the cost of everything else isn't an inviting option is it? Many of my own friends have chosen to be child free for this purpose and I don’t blame them.
@AmateurOwls I hope you have some time to grieve what you’d envisioned and then continue a wonderful relationship with your DDs x

Please don't tell your children how you feel. I am more grateful than I can say that my parents never made me feel bad. I am single and assumed that my sister (who loves children) would do the needful, and then it became obvious that was not going to happen. I did donor IVF without telling my parents, on the assumption it was not likely to work (I had a few goes and was quoted a 4% chance success on the cycle that worked).

As it turned out my 39 yr sister got engaged the week before my daughter was born (I was 42). We all live within 10 miles of each other and retirement has not turned out as my parents were expecting.

Thank you for all your replies. I have absolutely no intention of sharing how I feel with either of my daughters. I'm here to support them, not to run their lives. I think I'll look into some counselling. I can talk about it there and try and find ways to move forward. I thought I'd been doing that until I suddenly started to cry last night and was shocked at my reaction. I'm aware that I'm already very fortunate but some help putting things in perspective is needed.

Lots of young people don't want children for very good reasons. My own DD does not want children and honestly I am fine with this. If she did have kids I would worry about their future in a heating world, and at the very least I am not boring my contemporaries with pictures of babies they are not interested in. I have a lovely dog and that is enough.

So have I! 😆😆

Goodness I couldn’t disagree with you more. I can barely get my head around your entire post.

I feel exactly the same. I look at young mothers with their babies and think how brave they are to have children but know how strong the biological urge is. I’m sure they must be anxious too.

I have two AC in their 30s who are highly unlikely to have children and I am so glad (not that I’d ever let on!). I worry about their lives in this overheating and warmongering world.

Plus - I’ve been happy to have more freedom and small children are exhausting! Some of us are more maternal than others and would be great hands-on grandparents but my nurturing hormones left as menopause hit and have never returned 😁

I think the worst is if OP has friends with grandchildren who of course talk about them, and that will make the loss more real. Better to have friends who aren’t quite as enamoured or have them at all, not that you can just go shopping for friends.

Of my two closest friends with gc - one is very involved yet we barely talk of them as we have similar interests including our shared volunteering. The other - her life revolves around her now AC and gc so it’s a different relationship. She used to help out a lot with dc and be put upon and I always thought how grateful I was that I didn’t have gc! Even now, they seem to cause her anxiety.

I hope OP you can find the support you need and thanks for raising this issue as I’m sure it’s one shared by many

OP, I really feel for you. PPs that say OP is not owed DGC and that she is not missing out and that world is a horrible place etc, etc are just expression their subjective opinions,
not addressing OPs feelings and I don’t think will help OP in anyway.

For many, as OP says DGC are an absolute delight and can be great
fun. What’s wrong with acknowledging that?

OP, there is little you can do, it is sad. Keep a little kernel of hope in your heart. Acknowledge your feelings, but try not allow the sadness to turn into hurt.

Maybe totally not possible but a couple of women in my reading group volunteer at the local primary school to read with the young ones and they have such fun.

What exactly do you think gives you the right to have any input into other people's reproductive choices?

It's absolutely none of your business.

It doesn't matter whether it's by choice or otherwise. It's still none of your business.

Do I sense a bitterness from the no DC consensus.

It is an emotive and existential subject. I guess the bitterness comes from perceived conceptions of societal demands.

No one has to have children,
no one is “owed” DGC,
no should feel or be made to feel
guilty for their decisions and choices.

But for some of us DC and even DGC are a necessity and we are not “idiotic” to express our feelings.

What on earth are you talking about? Of course it’s the OP’s business. It’s her own daughter she’s thinking about.

That's a very good idea.
Hope the counselling is helpful. I would be interested in the outcome.

It's idiotic to think that child free people need persuading that they should have children. It's incredibly misogynistic to tell women they don't know their own minds and having children is the be all and end all of female existence.

You can’t lose something you don’t have - and (grand) children are never guaranteed even if wished for. My kids are gay so any children they might want will be technically complicated to achieve (!) - however neither have this in their life plan and I’m good with that. So kindly I think you need to give your head a wobble, respect others’ choices and live your own life to the full and not vicariously through your children.

Bitterness? No. At 52 & in peri I know for certain now that I will never have kids & I also know that was exactly the right decision. At the same time I’m very happy for all the people I know who love being parents. Even if I also eye their lives, at times, with a kind of fascinated horror.

Anger? Yes. At the idea that those of us without kids are somehow ‘less than’ or incomplete & will hopefully change our minds. And the stories of women being pressured or persuaded into having children to make their parents happy.

I really hope you don't ever pressurise them or make them feel guilty even unintentionally or even tell them how great life would be for them with children (like someone up thread suggested).

As someone who never had children (I refused to bring a child into an abusive marriage and by the time life was sorted I was too old) and knew her parents wanted grandchildren i feel guilty that I didn't give them any and our family stops with our generation(my siblings and cousins show no sign of having children), a family that you can trace back 100s of years.

I think you need to focus on what you have and not pin your hopes and happiness on something which isn't your decision to make.

Can't you see your double standards in this post? You look in " horror" at other's lives but you object to being described as incomplete?

I think its unlikely I will have grandchildren, and I have pretty much accepted it. There is nothing wrong with how you feel op, it is a bereavement of sorts, you are mourning the grandchildren you wished for and now won't have. No one on here can tell you how you should feel, we have no control over our feelings, only over our behaviour. You will come to terms with it in time, and make the most of all the good things in your life.