When I was a little girl, I assumed I’d grow up, get married, and have children. Oh, going to college should be in there before the getting married bit. In fact, that’s where it was assumed I would find my husband. This was just a given, and it did not fill me with any joy.
Some women say that they’ve wanted to be mothers since they were really young. They played with their dolls and pretended the dolls were their babies. It was the main goal in their lives, which I accepted was the norm. I never felt the urge myself, but I resigned myself to having children.
Then, when I was in my early twenties, it hit me that I didn’t have to have children. I no longer know how that thought came about, but once it entered my brain, I was so relieved and happy, I’ve remembered it for the rest of my life. It really was a pivotal moment and still the best decision I’ve ever made.
I don’t think about it that often because, well, quite frankly, why would I? People rarely think about the absence of something they never wanted in the first place. The whole discussion about childfree versus childless is necessary and good, but I don’t care for either label because it still puts an emphasis on something that has absolutely no effect on my life.
I’ve said in the past that I’m as likely to call myself childfree as I am to call myself dogfree or guitarfree. I’m not equating children to dogs or guitars, of course, but just pointing out how little I think about any of these things. No shade to having children, but it’s nowhere on my radar.
Here’s the thing. When I hear or read about people having kids and what their daily lives entail, it’s so foreign to me. There’s a thread on Ask A Manager weekend post about life with young children. Reading it has been eye-opening to me as someone who has very little experience with children. I knew that there wasn’t enough time and that you had to give up a lot to be a parent. My bestie, Kat, has a child and I was with her (Kat), when she had troubles as a mother. I babysat once in a while, but her child was a dream to look after and I never had trouble with them. My favorite story is still how they went through a phase where they were knocking things over deliberately. They were about to push a handmade miniature house their father had made (he’s an artist) off the shelf. Kat looked at them and said, “If you do that, you’re going to your room for a timeout.” Their child looked at them, thought a moment, then pushed the house off the shelf. Then, they marched themselves into their room and shut the door.
I know it had to be frustrating as hell, but I loved their child for doing that. They weighed the consequences of their actions and deemed it acceptable for doing what they wanted to do in the moment. I had to admire that. But, I had no idea what I would do as a parent because you can’t really just say BECAUSE I SAID SO and expect it to carry weight for very long.
I’ve also freely admitted that I had it in me to an abuse a child, which was one reason I never had one. The first reason is that I didn’t want them, of course, but the abuse fear was 2nd or 3rd on my list. I have a low frustration tolerance, which is not something you can get away with when you have kids. Plus, there’s a darkness inside me that bubbles up. If I can’t find ways to tamp it back down, then it’s going to explode. And by ways to tamp it down, I mean getting away from whatever is making it bubble. I used to joke that I wasn’t having kids because I couldn’t barricade myself from then for a week, screaming for them to get the fuck away from me because I can’t stand them. And then have to pay for therapy for them ten years in the future.
It wasn’t a joke, though. When I read the thread I posted above, the one constant was putting family first, then work, and that’s it. All of them mentioned letting housework slip and giving up on me-time to some extent. Anything other than family had to be filled in around the edges rather than fully embraced. And I get it. It’s time-consuming to have kids. But I never really understood how all-consuming it can be, especially when they’re young.
How can I when I don’t have any kids? And never wanted them? Part of the reason I didn’t want them is because I did not want to have to constantly have to defer to them. It’s actually one of the reasons I don’t want a long-term, monogamous relationship. I like doing what I want to do when I want to do it. I don’t like being interrupted and I resent something pulling me away from whatever I’m doing.
In other words, I’m an intensely selfish person. It’s funny. I used to be accused of being selfish when I said I didn’t want kids. I’d cheerfully say, “Yup!”, which really disconcerted them. I do think, however, it’s more selfish to have children when you don’t want them, but I usually kept that to myself.
I’m fascinated by the life of parents when I actually think about it. Just because it’s so completely different than my own life. And the parents I know well don’t really talk about their kids all that much. When Kat had her child, I told her she had a year in which she could talk exclusively about her child before she had to broaden her horizon, but she didn’t need it. We talked about her child, of course, but we also talked about what we always talked about–politics, personal life, work, family, etc. She told me that she liked being able to talk about other things because she was so steeped in actually raising her child, which made sense to me.
I try to imagine what it would have been like to have a child, but it’s nearly impossible because, again, how do you realize the absence of something? More to the point, while it’s interesting to contemplate that life, it doesn’t really do anything for me as it’s never going to happen. Just as I am a weirdo to the normal people, they are weirdos to me–and I wouldn’t have it any other way.