Notes from a Childfree Couple

The BBQ Pit
21

She’s the queen. No one tells the queen what to do. And this, of course, made me the princess. I often had to do the “Here’s Rilchie…see, I made that dress for her…Tell them about your grades! Oh, and about that ribbon you got for doing the most book reports! What do you mean, you don’t want to play the piano for them?” Kill me now.

And after that, I was on my own. She’d gotten her mileage out of me, and now she was going to enjoy herself drinking and gossiping. It sounds outrageous, I know, but she always did that 180: going from being outraged on my behalf that anyone would not want me to grace them with my presence, to “Rilch, you’re bothering everyone; please go read your book!”

22

Featherlou, you rock! May I copy this and send it to my mom? Of late, she’s taken it as some kind of personal slap if anything and everything I do doesn’t revolve around my brother’s kids. This has become especially difficult since my nephew has decided it’s a real laff riot to hit my dogs on their heads, pull their whiskers and tails and just generally annoy them (he’s 7 and really should know better), and I’ve suggested we’d all be happier if we socialize at my brother’s place rather than mine. I was trying to be diplomatic, but I’m almost at the point of just saying, “That abusive little bastard isn’t darkening my door again til hell freezes over.” But of course, I’m just a bitter, selfish childfree freak, so what I think doesn’t matter. Maybe seeing this coming from someone else will wake her up to the fact that it’s not just me.

23

While I’ve greatly enjoyed my kids (and pets), I have NEVER believed in inflicting them on people who didn’t want to see them, or taking them places where they were not invited and not wanted.

And even though I’ve greatly enjoyed my kids, I must say that if I hear ONE MORE TIME from one particular old friend about her children who are gifted & talented but learning disabled (HUH?) and all their medications and all their testing and all their special classes and all their…whatever, I’m going to shoot somebody – probably her! Her children are BRATS. End of story. Undisciplined, rude, obnoxious, nasty little BRATS. Although I don’t blame her for focusing on them instead of her fat, drooling lump of a husband…

Featherlou, you go right ahead and do what you think is right. Not all parents believe parenthood is for everyone. OTOH, I have friends who have produced more than their alloted 2.4 kids and are WONDERFUL parents and raising WONDERFUL kids, and those are the ones we SHOULD be encouraging to breed! Problem is, it seems like the ones who do the best by their kids are usually the first to either have none or not enough…we NEED bright people to have bright children and raise them well!! Otherwise we keep sinking to the lowest common denominator, which gets lower with every generation!

Of course, it’s nice to have bright friends who know how to enjoy being adults, too. :smiley:

24

I’d be asking my brother if he encourages his children to abuse animals or simply doesn’t give a shit, and ask him if he knew most serial murderers abused/tortured animals in their childhoods. Then I’d ask the kid if he thinks he’ll enjoy the stitches he’ll get when the dog’s finally had enough and bites the hell out of him. Maybe even show him some websites with pics of the aftermath of really really nasty dogbites. The kind that’ll give the little bastard nightmares.

25

Print away, people (assuming it doesn’t infringe any copyright laws of the Chicago Reader).

lizard, I see what you’re saying, but I don’t agree with it. We are a minority; we know that. I don’t think that means that our personal likes and dislikes should be completely ignored by the majority. crazycatlady got it just right; we feel it is a two-way street, and sometimes I would like the effort I make to meet my parent friends in the middle to be recognized (well, actually, it feels more like meeting them three-quarters of the way towards them, but I make the effort because I want to keep the friendships).

pkbites, that’s a very interesting point. I think I made my error because the people I know do seem to be making their kids the centres of their universes. I didn’t even know that it wasn’t supposed to be that way. So, if parents are supposed to keep their relationship with each other healthy for the good of the children, would it also follow that they should keep their adult relationships healthy as well? This is really intriguing.

26

desertrat it sounds as if your sister should be in jail.

I agree with your OP featherlou, my clock is practically bursting, and I can’t wait to have kids (which is a bit of a problem, considering I’m single) and so my friends who have kids and/or husbands (which seems to be just about all of them at this point) just serve to depress me and remind me of what I’m not even close to obtaining. Sometimes I wish they’d just shut up about it. :mad:

27

That’s the really sick part - my brother’s a cop, and I know he knows the link between animal and human abuses. But he suffers from “they’re different because they’re mine” syndrome - he’s a cop, so HIS kids won’t turn out badly, even if early signs show otherwise and nothing is done to curb it. And Nephew won’t be afraid of dog bite stuff - his sister tortured the family cat, got bit (cat was declawed, so couldn’t scratch; the bite was so mild that the slight red mark it caused was invisible in a matter of an hour), and the cat was immediately sent to be put down. So they both have the idea that they can do what they want, and if an animal retailates, the animal will just “go away.”

And my mom’s no help. I’ve pointed out over and over that as a small one, I bothered the family dog while she was eating, got bit, got sticthes, and nobody suggested that she be put down - conventional wisdom was that I got what I deserved.

Sorry for the hijack, Featherlou - this “you must revolve your life around my grandkids” crap on my mom’s part is a recent development, and your OP just brought it all to the surface. I hadn’t really realized how much I was seething til I started typing!

28

Well, then if the kid isn’t afraid of animal bites, smack the kid in the back of the head every time he bops the dog. If he doesn’t learn to fear the dog, at least he can learn to fear you.

29

Well, what bothers me most about what CrazyCatLady and others have said is they’re forgetting the people who are central to the whole debate: the kids themselves. Children may not be mature, but they’re not stupid. They will take note of your distaste for their presence, if they haven’t already, and remember it. And when they are old enough to understand what your behavior meant/means, don’t you think there will be some ramifications? Kids are not dumb animals, and it doesn’t take much from an adult to give them an impression that lasts a very long time. If you have something against them, even if it’s not personal (whatever that means, since a kid can’t help being a kid) it will kill any chance that they will want to be around you when they are older. And when that happens, are you so very sure it won’t affect how much their parents want to be around you, too? Realistically, who are the parents likely to be more loyal too, you, or their own children?

This reminds me a bit of my maternal grandmother. She was kind of “old school,” in that she believed kids should be seen and not heard. “Shut up when the adults are talking,” was her attitude. Now, 20 years later, not a single one of her grandchildren even remembers her birthday. I know I don’t have memories of a warm, loving person who welcomed me into her home. Instead, I recall a bitchy shrew, who made me perpetually uncomfortable for simply being myself.

Obviously, nothing you think or feel about your friends kids will have consequences like that for you. But just take a minute and think about how hostility, no matter how mild, well suppressed or lightly expressed, can bend back on you.

There’s more I could say here, but I don’t want to start a Pit fight.

30

Thanks, featherlou, for stating my own opinion so well. I like kids. I do. I just don’t want any.

My soon-to-be-sister-in-law has a son. I adore him. He was sick last week, and I wasn’t handling it well. She just smirked at me and said “Oh you just wait.” She knows full well that I don’t intend to have children. But mamma-in-law was there, and she thinks I’m gonna give her tons-a-babies, no matter what I say to the contrary. So they just look at each other and smile.

Maybe I will have kids some day, but I’m not gonna let a couple of hoity toity mommies tell me what I will be doing with my uterus. They’ll continue to dedicate their lives to their children, and I’ll continue to be able to do all the things I enjoy.

The pit. Right. Fuckity fuck fuck.

31

Christina Crawford, is that you?? :eek:

:wink:

32

Uh, Lizard, there’s a world of difference between having distaste for a child’s presence and wanting, just once in a while, to not have every single conversation you have with someone revolve around their child.

If I go around talking about my cats and their bowel movements incessantly, and constantly rehashing how I came to adopt them, and explaining how their last checkup went, and when they’re due for vaccines again, etc., people who actively love the cats are going to get sick of hearing it. They may be too polite to say anything, but they’re going to be thinking, “God, there she goes with the damn cats again. Can’t she talk about anything else?” It would have nothing to do liking or not liking the cats and everything to do with being beyond your threshold of boredom with kitty stories.

And, out of curiosity, who ever wants to spend time with their parents’ friends? Hell, my parents’ friends think I’m just fantabulous and I like them well enough, but I don’t want to hang out with them. The only thing we have in common is liking my parents, so why would I want to spend time with them?

Frankly, if any of my parent friends is rabid enough about the subject to conflate not wanting to hear all about Kaittlynn’s bowel movements, and how big the epesiotomy was, and what percentile her height and weight were at her last checkup with dislike or hostility for the kid, well, they’re not the sort of folks I can have a meaningful friendship with, anyway.

Oh, and one more thing to tack onto the original rant: For the love of all that’s holy, I don’t want to hear about your tearing, or your epesiotomy, or the scar, or any other labor/delivery TMI-fest while I’m trying to eat. I don’t talk about the maggots I picked out that wound yesterday when we eat together, because I know it grosses you out. The birth process grosses me out, and I’ve told you this many times, so please shut the fuck up about it while I’m eating. Thank you.

33

Absolutely. Now, I’m not saying that folks shouldn’t make their kids a big part of their lives. An adults life and point of views change when they have kids. But people who make it that their kids are almost the only thing that matters, well, those kinds of people are rather borish if you ask me. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard family friends turn down invitations to “adult” activities simply because it was a function they couldn’t bring their children to. It wasn’t because they couldn’t find a sitter, but because they won’t do something if their kids weren’t included. That’s ridiculous! I’m not saying people should always be dumping their child off at a sitter or Grandma all the time. There has to be a balance! I did not stop being an independant adult just because I had children. Whenever I meet some parent who hads their nose completely up their kids ass I want to vomit.
These are the kind of people who, when their own kids grow up, start badgering them for grandchildren right away.
Let me tell you from experience, other than parents who still love each other, the best thing you can give kids is roots, then wings.

And people who get wierded out about those who decided not to have kids are nosey control freaks. What’s it to them if others don’t want to reproduce? It’s none of their business. Why some people think that every marriage has to result in children is beyond me. Marriage is about 2 adults being in love. Children are only one of the many results of that love, not the sole result, and certainly not a neccessary result.

34

Funny, when my daughter was little and my husband and I got an invitation, I never assumed the kid was invited. In fact, I generally responded to an invite by saying “Let me see if I can get a sitter.” At that point, my friends could say “Aw, do bring her along.” or “OK, let us know.”

Simple, huh? Maybe it could work the other way: “Hey we’re having a party next Saturday and we’d love if you could come - think you can get a sitter?” Or is that too subtle?

And pkbites, we are of one mind. I don’t know who decided that children should be the center of the family’s universe, but that person should be flogged. We’ve made an effort to attend as many of our daughter’s school functions as we could, even chaperoned a few class trips, but I think she’s known all along that she’s a member of the family, not the focus of the family. We’ve also spent the last 5 years or so telling her that once she hits 18, she’s out the door, but that’s another topic altogether. :smiley: But the way it should be is couple first, then kids.

35

featherlou, I agree with your post 100%! Except for #6, because I have a kid.

I don’t really think your rant is “childless vs childed”, but instead “children are not the center of the universe vs look at the marvelous miracle I produced”. And along those lines may I slightly hijack this thread?

A friend’s daughter has a small child. In the meantime I am trying to arrange doing my job at home. Unbeknownst to me, they took my work at home plans and ran with them. J (the daughter) is now looking for work outside the home, because once I am working at home, I can babysit J Jr! Fuck the fact that I couldn’t babysit a brat and work full time at the office, what makes them think I can do it just becuase my desk happens to now be in a corner of my living room? And, guess what, J and J’s mom! I don’t like kids! Why do people automatically assume becuase I love my kid that I’m going to slobber all over their like they do? Heck, I’ve already warned my own kid that if he chooses to procreate, don’t ever think I’m going to play “grandma”.

Thanks, featherlou for letting me hijack with my own little related rant.

36

I knew a couple that both worked, but certain days of the week the man worked from home. Despite this, they employed a nanny to supervise the child while he was working (it was a two-year-old) because he couldn’t work properly and look after it. IIRC one or two week day mornings a week he did look after his son, but he scheduled it in properly, so the child had quality time with him. What they didn’t want was for the child to get bored and upset not getting enough attention, and/or for his professional work schedule to be disrupted. So working from home does not equal available for childminding, even with your own kids.

37

I have nothing to add except lorinada’s friend is being sucky. Who the hell would intrude on someone’s workday by asking them to babysit their child? I mean, would you ask a friend who worked an office job to look after little Dyllon or Breightannie while they worked? Of course not, and the same rules should apply regardless of where the individual is working.

38

I think I may be ill…

39

And in fact, istar, I worked at home when my son was J Jr’s age. And guess what, he went to day care!

40

I’m feeling your pain, sister. Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt. I’m sure there’s a whole subculture of older adults in my hometown who still bear a grudge against me even though I’m all grown up because I was <i>always there</i> when I was little and they were trying to have a good, grownup time and my parents wouldn’t leave me at home.