Seconded. Although when the Sheckstress 1.0 and I figured out we’d never be able to have kids, it also meant that I had no more reason to do nice things. Like exercise, or recycle everything.
Well I certainly don’t think that having children is an obligation or onus! Therefore, I don’t think the term burden is appropriate.
I don’t want you or anyone else to jump for joy that I’m not having kids. What I do want is for everyone to shut up and go away and leave me alone about not having kids. And for parents to stop expecting me to jump for joy because of their allegedly noble decision to reproduce.
BTW, nobody gets to do whatever they want whenever and however they want–painting the childfree as selfish and hedonistic people with no real responsibilities is a tired, boring, patently false straw man. My husband and I have more flexibility with our scheduling than most people we know, partly due to not having kids, and partly to our particular jobs. But we have these habits like sleeping indoors and eating and not living in an utter pigsty. So we do what needs to be done, even though it’s often not what we’d like to be doing. I want to spend this afternoon curled up on the couch reading in front of the fireplace, but what I will actually do is change the cat boxes, do some laundry, deal with some leaves, start dinner, and then go back to work to do evening walks and meds.
Oh god I’ve never seen a full list like that spelled out. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t really drink much and I go into a smoky bar maybe every few months but…few exercise classes, no sushi, no sleeping on your stomach and ESPECIALLY no hot tubs sounds completely horrible.
Frankly, IMO, the people who make out the best are the ones with great nieces and nephews, like tdn. My uncle is 60 and does whatever the hell he wants whenever the hell he wants, a freedom that so many people don’t have. He’s spontaneous. He has me, his niece, who he’ll offer to fly to his house (no wife, no kids), where I lounge in the pool and read all day and when he comes home from work, I’ll help him with anything technology related. We go out to dinner and walk around his neighborhood, maybe go to the beach. He loves my stories about college and grad school and work and plans, and I feel he listens to me in a way my parents can’t or don’t. His work life is extremely full; he does things that attentive parents would never have the time for. He gives me advice and exposure to a well off, freewheeling lifestyle that I otherwise wouldn’t have. I would never be able to get that from so many people, because how else would I know adults who don’t have children?
Seriously, ‘don’t expect us to jump for joy’ is a peculiar request given that parents generally want the entire world to not only jump for joy every time they have a baby, but buy it stuff, too.
It’s also easy to reserve a car seat along with your rental car. My wife and I have done this a number of times now, while traveling with the Firebug.
Traveling by air with a young child can be difficult. Others’ MMV, but for the Firebug, it seems to have a lot to do with age. He’s 3 now, he’s bursting with energy, and it’s difficult for him to stay still on even a 2-hour flight, let alone a much longer one. Traveling with him last fall and winter was much easier, and he was hardly any problem at all on the trip home from Russia - but of course, that might’ve had something to do with his still being shell-shocked from being out of the orphanage and with these two strangers all of a sudden.
I suspect traveling with him will continue to get more difficult until he learns to read, since he’s only going to get more energetic, and until he can read, nothing’s going to occupy him anymore than it does now. He’s already learning to spell some simple words (yes, no, cat - stuff like that) so maybe by this time next year…
Well, yes, there is that whole “birthday” thing too - but it isn’t really limited to babies. It is more a sort of demand to jump for joy at the existence of another person, whom you are expected to care about because of social proximity - being a friend, family or co-worker.
Really? It’s because they’re people, and not babies? Because I’m expected to contribute to every baby shower for everyone I’ve ever known, but nobody is contributing to the “Send DianaG’s 19 Year Old to College” fund, not even the people who didn’t get the pleasure of buying DianaG’s kid a gift when she was born.
Really? You never get asked to contribute to birthday presents for anyone, or retirement gifts - only baby showers?
That’s not been my experience.
That’s the WORST (my foot is bandaged right now from tripping over said chewie thingie)
[QUOTE=Leaffan;12989965OK. I sounded crass, but how are we parents to feel when people start talking about their marvellous life without kids and all free time and money they have?
QUOTE]
Boo-freaking hoo.
At work? Nope. Dear god, I can’t imagine being expected to acknowledge every birthday of every coworker. When the hell would anything else get done?
Here’s another look at it. We have birthday parties at work. What they generally end up being is a party for everyone, with a convenient excuse. We keep the cost down - no more than $20, including cake, cards and gift! The cake is paid out of petty cash as is the card. That leaves a tiny gift for people to give. AND we only have 5 people in our office at the most, so it remains absolutely small. Currently we have even less than that.
Whereas a baby shower is just for one person, and they certainly don’t try to keep the cost down. And everyone is supposed to give that one person gift.
Obviously not every co-worker. Just as not every co-worker, when they have a baby, demands your attendance at their baby shower.
It is really simple: generally speaking, people like (or at least, there is social pressure to appear to like) recognizing important rites of passage for folks that they have reason to care about, in certain stereotypical ways.
Thus, when a close family member of a person dies, those who care about that person are expected to offer condolences - even though, in some cases, the person being consoled may have hated the person who is now dead; and converesley, when a person is being born to someone, people who care about the parents are expected to offer congratulations, often with presents. As the person grows up, they get the presents from people - at first, from people who care about the parents, and later, from people who care about them - to mark the anniversery of that happy event.
It is simply part of being social.
Mmm… it would be part of being social if it only happened with people I socialize with. These are people I work with. Frankly, I don’t care about their babies.
Again, I am a parent. It would never occur to me that anyone in the world besides my near and dear ones should feel compelled to buy my kid stuff, or to especially care about her existence.
In general, in my experience, the cost of stuff like birthday presents goes down as the recipient gets older. Ditto with Christmas presents.
I don’t see any unfairness in this. If a kid has a more elaborate birthday or Christmas experience than me, I don’t feel left out.
After all, there are other rite-of-passage items, like anniverseries, weddings and the like, where adults typically get the big-buck presents and elaborate parties.
Sounds to me like your real complaint is that you aren’t close enough to these people to participate in their rites of passage. Fair enough; don’t go.
Don’t generalize that every parent does this, though.
I have to figure out what to do with all that money. Plus, it’s probably the most eco-friendly thing I could ever do.
DianaG, I don’t quite see what the problem is. If you don’t feel like participating/contributing then simply don’t, as Maltus points out. Just like you aren’t jumping up and down for joy at their life events, I don’t think anyone will be crushed by your choice not to participate. I think you are overstating the importance of the whole thing.
Haha, spend it on yourself of course! Otherwise, what would be the point? 