Category: Childfree Living

Part 1/5: Why you don’t need kids to be fulfilled.

The Myth: “Your life just doesn’t have meaning until you have kids.”

One of the many warnings matronly women like to give childfree women and couples is that their lives will be shallow without children. Sure, you can do whatever you want now, but all the glitz of travel and caviar will wear off one day, and then you’ll be alone. Alone with no real meaning in your life, because you spent your youth focusing on yourself (and/or your spouse) instead of something greater.

This has a sobering ring to it, but it’s hardly a criticism exclusive to (or necessarily of) childfree women. I’m sure we can all think of people who had children and still find themselves alone in their old age when their children have gone on to have children of their own.

The idea that only children can give a woman’s life a deeper, lasting meaning implies that most childfree women are too self-absorbed to have any greater purpose in life than their own gratification. That’s to say nothing of the fact that children don’t exist just to provide meaning to an adult’s life. They’re individuals in their own right, who shouldn’t be treated as a means to an end (the end being the fulfilling life and happy retirement).

The Reality

Women are realizing more and more that the idea that was broadcast to the Victorian woman and which persisted until the late 20^th century is wrong. The idea that the only way for a woman to feel fulfilled and receive lasting love was to have a child.

Not only are there other ways to obtain love and fulfillment, but the belief that children = happiness has led to generations of unfulfilled and dissatisfied mothers feeling like they got a raw deal. Their children grow up and – of all the nerve – have lives of their own. At the end of her life, she’s left alone, and shifts her desire for love to the hope of grandchildren.

Yes, maybe I’m painting an overly dark picture. After all, most people move onto other things in their later years, like volunteer work. Once they get over the sadness of an empty nest, many women find a job, or if they have a career already, move into community service after they retire. A woman who raises children can still find fulfillment after her children have grown up and moved away.

Which of course begs the question, is doing good in the world just a poor substitute for the love of a child? Or does it just take most people that long to realize that they can get true, lasting happiness in other ways?

Children are not the only means to a meaningful life. There are many ways for childfree women to contribute to society, improve the world in which we live, and find genuine satisfaction.

This week and next, I’m going to look at several ways to lead a fulfilling life without having kids. Coming up next: Part 2/5 – Volunteering Like You Mean It.

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“Maybe you just don’t realize you want children.”

If you’re a childfree woman, you’ve almost certainly been told that having children is normal. That you’ll regret it if you don’t. That you secretly want children deep, deep down inside.

If you’re beginning to feel like it might not be so bad to give in to the pressure and have a kid, stop. Before you make any irreversible decisions, consider the following.

Maternal instinct isn’t universal.

In an interview on NPR, childfree author Ann Patchett shares what it feels like when friends, family, and strangers tell her she wants a baby, but just doesn’t know it yet.

It would be like if somebody said, “Your car keys are in the drawer.”

And you go and you open the drawer, and not only are your car keys not in the drawer, there’s nothing in the drawer. The drawer is empty.

And you come back and you say, “The keys aren’t in the drawer.”

And they say, “No, go back and look again. They are in the drawer.”

And you go back and you open the drawer and it is empty. And that’s how I always felt. Like people were always saying to me, “Go back and look again. Examine the inner contents of your heart, you will find it.”

And I never did.

Fortunately, Patchett’s self awareness exceeded her self-doubt, and she didn’t give in to the insistence of others. Whether your mom friends understand or not, the truth is for some women that desire really and truly isn’t there.

If you don’t want them now, you likely won’t regret it later.

If you can convince someone that you really don’t want children, the next thing they’ll probably say is “You’ll regret not having them when you’re older.” But let’s look at this. For me personally, there’s never been an instance in which I had no desire for something only to regret not having it later.

To be clear, I’ve wanted things that I’ve talked myself out of.  Sometimes I’ve wanted things that I was unable to have. And occasionally I’ve wanted something but been unwilling to admit it. But I have never been wholly indifferent to or repelled by some Thing and later found myself longing for it. Most often, this regret in later life is due to placing your hope for happiness in someone other than yourself.

Having children isn’t the default.

Finally there’s the idea that having a baby is just something a woman should do. I fervently disagree. No one should have a baby unless they deeply want one. Having a child you don’t really want (even if you plan to love and care for as though you did) is like switching the career you like for one that you don’t enjoy because other people tell you to. They say that you’ll like it once you have it, and you’ll regret it if you don’t switch now. Imagine the following exchange:

Person 1: “But I don’t want to be a marine biologists. I don’t really have a passion for sea life at all. I’m pretty indifferent to it.”

Person 2: “Listen, your window of opportunity is closing. If you don’t quit your job, go back to school, and start this new career now, you’ll regret it later. And besides, you’ll love marine life once it’s in your care.”

You would think the second person is crazy, and that the first person is even crazier if she takes this advice.

Devoting the next 18+ years of your physical and emotional life to something you don’t actually desire, but worry you may regret not having later on, is (I’m sorry) very foolish.

To use Ann Patchett’s analogy, the keys aren’t going to suddenly materialize in the drawer just because someone else expects them to. Even if you are persuaded to believe that they’re actually there, and open the drawer (for the hundredth time), this time fully expecting them to be there, they still won’t be there.

What it all boils down to is…

Creating a new human being and raising it isn’t like buying a blouse that you’re not sure about. You can’t just send it to the thrift store a year later when you realize you only bought it because your friend swore you’d look great in it.

In fact, it’s not even like buying a house. “It’s an investment!” people tell you. “You’ll save so much money in the long run, you should buy one now.” If you buy a house when you don’t want one (or really can’t afford one), the very worst scenario is that it goes into foreclosure and you file for bankruptcy.

And if that sounds like a pretty bad worst case scenario, pause for a moment and consider what you’ll feel like  when you realize you’ve spent two-hundred and forty-five thousand dollars on something that, though it’s nice, you never really wanted.

The financial and emotional costs are worthwhile if it’s for something you genuinely, deeply desire. But if it’s for something that someone else tells you you might regret later? That there is just a bad decision, any way you look at it.

When it comes to creating a new human, the rationale “People are telling me I should. How bad could it be?” is not a smart approach. If you don’t want children, for the sake of yourself and your unborn, hypothetical offspring, don’t be bullied into it. Your friends may never understand, but they don’t have to live your life.

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Now that I’ve reached the big 3-0, maybe people will begin to see me as a childless woman, rather than a woman who simply hasn’t realized she wants kids yet.

I don’t dislike kids. I get along with most kids very well. I’ve simply decided not to raise them. But this decision has perplexed some people.

For a while, they could come up with excuses for me. At 25, I was ‘still young,’ in a new relationship, and simply hadn’t settled down enough to realize my inner, procreative desires. At 28, I was at the age where I should have come to terms with my biological urges, but somehow still hadn’t. How could a uterus-bearer not be trying to get pregnant?

It’s as though children are iPads, and if you don’t want something that trendy and fun, you’re off your rocker.

But even if children were iPads, an iPad just doesn’t fit into everyone’s life. Believe it or not, some people have different desires than other people. To those women who just can’t understand how someone with a womb could possibly not have, at the core of her very soul, a burning desire to make a baby, I say this: just because you feel a certain way does not mean that all women feel that way. We don’t share a hive mind. The whole thing seems very similar to me as a straight man saying, “I just can’t understand how a dude would want to sleep with another dude. I could never, ever want that.” Well, of course. But isn’t that’s how many a gay man would feel about sleeping with a woman?

Just because you feel a certain way doesn’t mean everyone else does.

And the fact that not everyone wants what you want doesn’t make you wrong. It makes you an individual. And that’s okay. Did you have children just to prove me wrong? No, of course not. Likewise, I did not abstain from child-rearing to prove you wrong.

I did it because I’m a free woman living in 2016, and I had the choice.

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Are childfree people selfish? This belief seems to be widely accepted, even though there’s not much evidence for it. The idea that not having kids makes you a bad person is harmful, and not just to childfree people. I believe it could sway people who don’t truly want kids to have them, and that doesn’t help anyone.

Childfree Myth #1: Not having children is selfish, so having children is unselfish.

The idea that parents are unselfish simply because they have kids is pretty nonsensical. Some parents are genuinely selfless people, but popping out or adopting a baby doesn’t make them so.

If we look at this realistically, people sometimes have very selfish reasons for having children. Reasons like, “I want to be a mom,” or “I just love kids,” are fine and good, if you can—and do—take care of your children. You might say the selfishness of having kids for your own sake is cancelled out by the selflessness of actually providing for them. Then of course there are the more obviously selfish reasons, such as “It’ll help my marriage,” or, of course, “He’ll marry me/stop cheating on me if I get pregnant.” I don’t think I need to elaborate on why these are terrible reasons to have children.

Having children doesn’t make someone a good or selfless person, so choosing not to have kids doesn’t automatically make someone selfish.

Childfree Myth #2: Childfree people are selfish for acknowledging their limits.

Once, in my church-going days, I listened to a pastor’s sermon on birth control. At the end of his sermon, during which he noted that that children are sometimes a blessing (Proverbs 17:6) and sometimes not (Luke 23:29), he said “It’s alright to use contraceptives, as long as you don’t do so for selfish reasons.”

It’s a reasonable statement, but his idea of “selfish reasons” is not my own.

If someone doesn’t want the “bother” of having a child, that’s exactly the sort of person who shouldn’t have a child. That’s not selfishness, that’s responsibility. It’s important for young couples to see that having a child isn’t all about attention, cute clothes, and sweet-smelling baby. We should applaud people who realize that being a parent is a vocation, a full-time, lifetime, till-death-do-us-part commitment, and can acknowledge that they’re not up for that challenge.

Praise the childfree people who choose not to have kids at least as much as you condemn neglectful parents.

Childfree Myth #3: Childfree people are selfish for spending their money on themselves

I’ll be the first one to say that it’s important to spend money responsibly and consider the needs of others, both within one’s own community and outside of it. I think a lot of Americans over-consume. But I also think we should be avoid the allure of martyrdom whenever possible.

Clearly, if a parent regularly leaves their child to go clubbing, globe-trotting, or vacationing, they’re probably exhibiting selfish behavior. Likewise, it’s selfish for a parent to buy new clothes and electronics without providing for the needs of their child. But that doesn’t mean that parents don’t deserve to have fun or nice things. The financial strain that comes from having children can require parents to go without, but it shouldn’t.

For childfree people, going clubbing and globe-trotting is not selfish. I’m not saying it’s wrong to criticize over-consumption and reckless spending. I’m simply saying you can’t neglect a child you don’t have.

So, if you’ve been worried that choosing not to have kids makes you selfish, you can relax. Choosing the childfree lifestyle is often a responsible decision. If you’d like to learn more about how you can create a fulfilling life as a childfree person, including giving back to your community, check out my series on How to Have a Meaningful Life Without Kids.

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Who is the cool aunt?

Lots of families have one. You may have had one growing up. That one, childless aunt who always gave the best presents. The one who, in contrast to all the other grown ups, paid attention to what you were saying and listened to your side in a dispute. The one whose life you wanted to have when you got big.

This is the cool aunt, and now that you’re grown and childfree, that can be you. How? It’s actually pretty easy.

Step 1: Pay attention.

This is the most important step in being The Cool Aunt. It means you know what your nieces/nephews are interested in and what’s going on in their lives. Parents tend to have, for better or worse, pretty fixed ideas regarding their child’s likes and dislikes, as well as the motives for their actions. You, on the other hand, claim no control over your niece/nephew, and no responsibility, so you can listen without ego or bias.

Step 2: Apply the resulting knowledge toward gift-giving.

What makes the cool aunt’s gifts so cool isn’t the amount of money she spends. It’s about how well she knows her niece or nephew. Don’t try to compete with their parent for greatest number of gifts, and don’t buy them that expensive electronic device they’ve been dropping hints about. That’s in the parent/grandparent sphere.

Instead, look for something unusual that caters to their interests. Maybe your niece has a peculiar interest in furniture. Buy her an interior design drawing book. Or your little cousin has a real fascination with the planets. Buy him the original Cosmos series on DVD.

Why we all need a cool aunt.

This is what makes you the cool aunt. You know and encourage your young family members’ interests. Even the interests that seem strange for a child, and especially the ones their parent dismiss as silly. Because you aren’t their mom, you haven’t fallen into the habit of assuming you know them. You can still see things from their point of view. To a child in a world of busy and bothered adults, your interest in them is priceless.

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