Family & Relationships Kids, want them, have them or not interested?

I am a mid 30s female so you can imagine how often I get asked about kids. I was never the kid that had dreams of weddings and babies and that hasn't changed as I've gotten older. I adore my nieces and nephew and don't mind kids in general, I just don't want them.

The idea of being responsible for a small person 24/7 for at least 18 years and worrying about them for the rest of my life makes me nauseous.
 

CazC30

Far from the madding crowd.
Jan 12, 2017
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I am a mid 30s female so you can imagine how often I get asked about kids. I was never the kid that had dreams of weddings and babies and that hasn't changed as I've gotten older. I adore my nieces and nephew and don't mind kids in general, I just don't want them.

The idea of being responsible for a small person 24/7 for at least 18 years and worrying about them for the rest of my life makes me nauseous.
The way I feel now, makes me want hate men but I don't. We felt we wanted a little family (And trust me, it will be bloody small) but your view is not unique many women have the same opinion. I did have a career but was made redundant last summer (yep pregnant... B'stards). But I always felt I want a couple of kids. My sister has three and my brother has two so guess it was on the cards. I do feel there is more choice for women to do as they wish.
 
I am a mid 30s female so you can imagine how often I get asked about kids. I was never the kid that had dreams of weddings and babies and that hasn't changed as I've gotten older. I adore my nieces and nephew and don't mind kids in general, I just don't want them.

The idea of being responsible for a small person 24/7 for at least 18 years and worrying about them for the rest of my life makes me nauseous.

Argh my uncle dropped the line "your parents are hanging out for a grandchild.. " yesterday to me. Jesus christ im 38 and single. Yeah it aint happening sorry for my parents but tough tiddies.
 
I am a mid 30s female so you can imagine how often I get asked about kids. I was never the kid that had dreams of weddings and babies and that hasn't changed as I've gotten older. I adore my nieces and nephew and don't mind kids in general, I just don't want them.

The idea of being responsible for a small person 24/7 for at least 18 years and worrying about them for the rest of my life makes me nauseous.

Yep same re. Last paragraph. I reckon i also have a strong fear of giving birth and being pregnant. I know it's just 9 months and a day- but i cannot shake that fear and i never will imho.
 
This is something that has always interested me.

I'm 27 and not at all interested in having kids. I've never really thought much about having my own family but I actually don't mind kids. I just find it hard to relate to them now being away from them for so long. People say that I will change my mind but I've never really had any kind of drive to reproduce. I wonder if there have been people in my situation who where adamant they weren't going to have kids and then ended up with them.

So the point of this discussion is;

Do you have them, and if you do did you always want them or did something change your mind?

Do you want children one day?

or

Are you completely uninterested?


I have been with my wife for 10+ years and ever since I have known her she has always wanted a biggish family, I was fairly undecided for a long time. my main hesitation was not knowing if I will ever feel 'ready' and of course the $$ side of it as well.

All through our 20's we ended up doing a bit of travelling, got a house and then my mindset changed a lot, I felt more comfortable with the idea.

We had some huge complications along the way but then we fell pregnant and now have a 4 month old boy who is simply amazing and I wouldnt change it for the world.
 
LMAO my cousins were here before.. my cuz whos the brother of my other cuz is getting married soon and legit went on a little rant about they need to get married soon bc he "doesnt want to be a dad at 37 thats too old" i just laughed.. he was bit sheepish when i said well theres no hope for me then at 38. I didnt care tho.
 
May 30, 2006
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They're only expensive if you're a dumbass with money.
Do you realise you're not allowed to send the little buggers down the pit any more?

Don't have, never wanted, way too past it for it to be a good idea now - dealing with teenagers was a campaigner of an idea when I was a teenager, would be a hooror show of way to spend my 60s.
 

Reynolds Number

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I know of posters on this forum who have become notably nastier once they have had kids. Obviously not the norm but proof that having kids is not always a healthy choice to make for everyone.
 
Sep 3, 2002
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Don't put them in so much childcare
Childcare is oversubsidised for kids under school age and not enough for those are primary school age. It's not (or shouldn't be) the governments place to let people pump out a kid, then straight back to work at the taxpayers expense. If you want both parents back at work straight away, that's your choice, but everyone else paying for your kid to be raised by someone else during the formative 0-5 years period is social engineering at its 'finest'.

When they reach school age, it's different as childcare is filling in the pre / post school care around work, where Monday - Friday teachers are the adults / role models providing guidance to kids. So it allows parents to work full time, rather than the very restricted number of jobs available that neatly line up with school hours. At this point with it covering the gaps, rather than all day, it's not cost prohibitive on the budget (or the kids emotional development).
 

Simon_Nesbit

Brownlow Medallist
Sep 26, 2001
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Childcare is oversubsidised for kids under school age and not enough for those are primary school age. It's not (or shouldn't be) the governments place to let people pump out a kid, then straight back to work at the taxpayers expense. If you want both parents back at work straight away, that's your choice, but everyone else paying for your kid to be raised by someone else during the formative 0-5 years period is social engineering at its 'finest'.

When they reach school age, it's different as childcare is filling in the pre / post school care around work, where Monday - Friday teachers are the adults / role models providing guidance to kids. So it allows parents to work full time, rather than the very restricted number of jobs available that neatly line up with school hours. At this point with it covering the gaps, rather than all day, it's not cost prohibitive on the budget (or the kids emotional development).

I agree - though I fear we are already WAAAY too far down the commercialism path to ever return to 'family life'. It's all about the bigger house, better car, longest holiday, coolest gadets, etc, etc. In almost all cases budgets are so tight both parents/couple HAVE to work. It's government endorsed tax-generation at it's best/worst. People spend what they earn, (which generates more business revenue, leading to more staff, creating more employment, creating more spending) is imperative to the government budgeting - they want people to live on little more than week-to-week financial security.

For our two children, we were in quite different financial positions - but looking back, it seems counter-intuitive. I regret the decisions I made, that were based on our (parents) selfish wants and desires - financial vs emotional and developmental needs of my children.

When my son was born (2006), we had a small house in an old area, old cars, but were comfortable with life. My wife was on 80k, I was self-employed on about 35k growing my business. The choice was obvious. My wife had her six months allocated leave, then I had 6 months at home, then another 12 months 'barely working'. My son was almost 3 before we had both returned to full-time work, had another six months with grandparents and child-care then started 'pre-kinder'.

He was identified very early as gifted, spent some time in a Mensa development program, accelerated learning programs at school, etc. At 8 he was at an equivalent educational level of a 14yo. Now (13) he's a 'top' student in his grade, but others have caught up. He loves school, is seen as a future leader and has positive relationships with his teachers and senior staff.

After a long period of being told we couldn't have anymore children, (but desperately wanting a brother/sister - to the point we were in adoption plans) my wife fell pregnant naturally. My daughter was born in 2012. At this time, we were both working (my wife now on 90k, me on about 140k) but had moved to a much bigger house (with big mortgage), new cars, had spent a fortune on IVF and medical bills, my wife's spending habit to update her wardrobe was extreme ($500pw) and unknown to me for another year or two (hidden in CC debt) - money was now tight.

There was now the government payment, so my wife took her 6 months, plus another 18 weeks (?), then returned straight to work as we were living on credit. I didn't have more than a few days off, as my business was booming. One set of grandparents were now both working full-time, the other sadly no longer well enough to care for a baby. She was in child-care full time before she was 12 months old. She also got fantastic 'reports' and write-ups from the centre, but by the time she was three, and we started to compare with my son's development (writing, reading, math) it was shocking how far behind she was. I took three months off work, just to work one-on-one with her. She actually failed her first two entry exams at the school. When she started school, she was so far behind the class that it was embarrassing to see her work on display (I still hate myself for this reaction). She hated school, would regularly come home in tears as she "couldn't do it". It took three years of remedial classes and extra attention at home before she is now comparable with her peers.

Last year, my son won a grade's award (best overall = grades + community + sport + etc) again - he's now been awarded this three times in four years. My daughter got her first "A", in a report, ever. We celebrated the A.

===========
We made a choice - we were lucky enough to have a choice, but still chose wrong. For a huge number of families, living costs are such that both parents have to work. It's wrong. There is no longer a 9-5 workday, so flexible hours, reduced hours working part-time are all options - yet employers are still very restrictive about longer-term reduced hour employees.

If there is anything I could 'do over' - it would be the decision to keep working, and not sell the house and/or car when my daughter was born. If we had sold, if I had spent the time with my daughter as I had my son, I feel she would not have had such a hard start to school life, and would have a very different attitude towards school and education than she does. It's now a priority of my limited personal time to spend as much with my children as I can.

As a society, we should be finding ways to encourage parents to stay at home longer, to spend more time with children. IMO we critically under-fund education anyway.
 
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