Stay out of my Uterus!!

The BBQ Pit
1

Disclaimer: I’m new to the whole message board experience, so please excuse any screw-ups on my part. But please don’t hesitate to tell me about them. After all, how is a Weevil supposed to learn? Also, please forgive the grammar (I’m an engineer, enough said). I’m not sure if a rant is a good idea for a first post, but why not jump into shallow water headfirst. After lurking for a month I decided to give it a shot. So here it goes…

Why the hell does everyone need to tell me that I need to settle down and start a family? Boyfriend_Weevil and me have been together for 2 years now. We’re not engaged and really aren’t in a hurry to get that way. Kids… don’t even come near me with that crap. I’m 26 years old and have plenty of time to decide if I need to further over populate the world. Plus, I’m firmly of the belief that squeezing a football out of my nether regions is one of the most unnatural things that could ever take place. Shove the Jaws of Life up a man’s ass and start spreading… that’s torture. But because I was born without a penis, I’m supposed to consider it to be a blessing. FUCK THAT SHIT. If I must nurture/corrupt a young soul, I want them delivered nice and neatly in a basket by the stork. As the only non-medicated member of my family (not saying that I shouldn’t be… but I’m not), I almost feel a responsibility to help purify the gene pool by keeping mine out of it. But I digress from the intent of the post… why doesn’t everyone back the hell away from my uterus. It’s empty, stop trying for force me to fill it. Thanks to my family and just about everyone I work with, I must be the first woman on this planet to actually celebrate her period. It’s like the big FUCK YOU to everyone telling me to start popping out little monsters.

**Transcripts of an actual conversation with Evil_Mom: **

**EM: ** So you and Boyfriend_Weevil have been together for a while.
**EW: ** Yeah, a new record.
**EM: ** Do you think your sister will adopt?
**EW: ** Huh… uh… <recovering from conversational whiplash>… I don’t know. She’s mentioned it, but said they weren’t really comfortable with the idea.
**EM: ** I guess you’re brother won’t be having kids
**EW: ** He’s gay, not sterile. Plus, he could adopt too.
**EM: ** I doubt it.
**EW: ** You never know.
Here comes the line every daughter dreads…
**EM: ** So you’re my only hope for grandkids.

<insert sound of mental tires screeching, me hyperventilating, panicking, and looking frantically for adoption information to send to my siblings> :confused:

**EW: ** Do you know what you just said? I think you just broke every single “no pressure” promise you ever made to me. Sister_Weevil has been pressing for a ring, but even she didn’t approach the kids yet.
**EM: ** I’m just saying that if an accident were to happen I wouldn’t think anything less of you… that’s all.
**EW: ** You’re suggesting that I get knocked up… this conversation is SO over *<click>

< Evil_Weevil dials Sister_Weevil>*

**EW: ** Mom just called and informed me that I’m her only hope for grandkids.
**SW: **Hehe… really?
**EW: ** Then she said she wouldn’t think less of me if I “accidentally” got pregnant.
**SW: ** You could always give the kid to me. It would save a lot of paperwork and money. Seriously though we’ve been talking and would you consider being a surrogate?
**EW: ** Aaaaargh!! :eek: *<click>

<Evil_Weevil crouches in fetal position rocking back and forth in the corner>
<Boyfriend_Weevil comes in> *

**BW: ** Talk to your family again.
**EW: **Yeah.

<Boyfriend_Weevil goes to closet and gets out “special people” helmet>

**BW: ** Here, put this on. You don’t want another concussion.
**EW: **Thanks.

<Straps helmet on and continues to bang head helplessly until time to go to work the next day>

**Worker_Weevil: ** The baby’s due in a couple of weeks. I’m officially on pager status now.
**EW: ** Isn’t that four now. Why hasn’t your wife castrated you yet?
**WW: ** Having kids is wonderful. You should be finding out soon.
**EW: ** I may have put on a couple of pounds, but let’s not get insulting.
**WW: ** That’s not what I meant. You know you’ll be having them soon. You don’t want to wait too long.
**EW: ** I’m 26. I’ve got a few good years left in me. BW and me are going to Germany in September. What are you doing this fall?
**WW: ** Sigh… point taken. :smiley:

2

Welcome aboard, EW. Looks like you’ll fit in here just fine.

You are definitely not alone – do a search on “childfree” here and you’ll hit the mother lode, including a few recent threads. All of us childfree-by-choice people have been in your shoes.

3

Welcome to the boards, Evil_Weevil!

4

Best break up line ever.

5

I have to admit, for a “newbie” to the SDMB that was one of the best damn rants about the pressures people place upon women about having children.

I am one that does not want children and when my brother and sis-in-law were having problems back in the early 90s my dad started in on me. I had a a boyfriend but told them since I was about 16-18 I didn’t want kids. I don’t want to pass on my genes, God forbid I had an evil child like me. No thanks.

Bravo.

< clapping >

Welcome to the SDMB, I am sure you will find this a nice place, glad I read your post.

6

Welcome to the boards, Evil_Weevil :slight_smile:

I think it’s time you started telling people bluntly “My reproductive choices are none of your business, thank you.”. You want to go for a bland, broken-record kind of attitude with it. They won’t get the hint at first, but if that’s the only response they get from you, they’ll be sick of hearing it and stop bringing it up. Only include the ‘thank you’ on the first rendition :wink:

(except for the co-worker incident. You kinda opened yourself up for that with sticking your opinion about their choices in. Live and learn !)

7

Actually, Goo, sometimes being outrageously rude about people’s pushiness is very effective. After 3 years of constantly being harassed about when **Dr.J]/b] and I were getting married, I started telling people “Actually, we’ve set a date. It’s the Saturday after Hell freezes over. You should try to make it.” Yeah, I’m sure people thought I was a colossal grade A bitch, but it shut them the hell up, and by that point that was all I cared about.

You’ll notice, as you get closer to getting married the more intense the pressure gets. It slacks off a while in the wedding-planning stages, but it never really goes away. And trust me, every single relative either of you have will act stunned to hear about it, no matter how long you’ve been announcing your intentions to be child-free. Some will even be…almost offended, I guess, as though they’re being cheated out of something rightfully theirs. People like aunts and cousins, who you wouldn’t expect to be all that emotionally invested in your kids.

Good luck!

8

That was great! Welcome and all.

What? No. I was NOT looking at your uterus. It was… uh… a glint of light reflected off your belt buckle! [sub]yeah, that’s the ticket.[/sub]

Gotta go, boss is calling me. 'Bye!
Welcome again.

9

It never ends.

The husband and I aren’t childless by choice, we would have liked to have kids, but it didn’t work out that way. So… typical comments:

“I’m sorry to hear something is wrong with you dear” - first of all, why do they always assume it’s a woman problem?

“There’s this artificial insemination, see, you take the sperm from another man and —” Yes, we’re well-educated adult Americans. We have heard of artificial insemination. Maybe we’ve considered it and rejected it for our own reasons - but you just assume we’re stupid and ignorant, right?

“There’s this fertility clinic --” Uh-huh… the success rate is what? 15%? 20%? And that’s after multiple, expensive go-rounds with hormones (which can have very strong side effects) and procedures costing tens of thousands of dollars. Where’s the money going to come from? If we go into near-bankruptcy just to get pregnant how are we going to be able to afford to raise the kid? (And I’m sure afterward we’d be hearing “When are you going to get a little brother or sister for the kid?”)

“You could adopt” - you realize that not everyone is comfortable with that? There’s reason to be believe that one side of our combined families would never, ever accept an adopted child as a “real” family member. Is that a reason not to adopt? Maybe maybe not - it’s a factor to consider. Also, due to reasons I don’t want to go into we’d be seen as less than ideal parents and many adoption agencies would not consider us for parents.

So… no matter what you do, someone is going to criticize you, tell you how to live your life, or otherwise try to mess with you.

I’ve gotten to the point of telling them “It’s none of your business - fuck off” Because it isn’t their business.

10

Thanks for the warm welcome.

I’m not sure that I don’t want to ever have kids, I just don’t want everyone else telling me that I should right this instant. I get most of it from the family. I speak to my mother 3 or 4 times a year. “I want grandbabies!” shouldn’t be the first thing out of her mouth. I’d settle for “why don’t you ever call me” (read previous sentence for answer).

My sister isn’t that bad. She asked about the surrogate thing once and dropped it. More like bad timing on her part with that specific question. She’s still focused on getting me that ring… sigh.

I took some liberty paraphrasing the conversation with the co-worker. The kids vs. no kids conversation with him has taken on a life of its own. One person at work realized the thought of marriage and kids made me unconfortable, so it’s kind of became a game around the office to see who can make me cover my ears and scream “La La La La”. Most of the involved are friends and can handle my teasing them back. Especially the co-worker in the OP. At least once a week he comes in after 2 hours of sleep and tells me that I’m making a smart decision. :slight_smile:

Off to work now and thanks again for welcoming me.

11

Just wait Evil_Weevil… it won’t end with marriage and kids. There’s always something :slight_smile:

Like a house and a dog and career choices… I’m forever telling people to back away and swallow their advice.

Good luck and welcome to the boards!

12

Gotta admit, that was a funny conversation set.

And EW got the coding right, too! How’s that for a newbie.

We have a child, and knew we’d want them. But we didn’t have one until we were 33. There wasn’t a lot of pressure but now that we’re 36 we’re feeling pressure to have kid mark 2 right away. There’s only so many years of fertility for us (we want to stop by 40 not so much for health reasons as that they’ll be out of the house when we retire!).

So wait, or don’t wait. There are 10,000 ways to look at Mount Fuji…and each of them is right.

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tell 'em Evil Weevil!

be the voice for all us independant, no-mother-to-be, women!

I must say, my family does not put pressure on me like thta, but that’s mainly cos whenver they use the words “kids” and “you” in a phrase and it’s starting to sound like a question, I put my hands over my ears and go LALALALALALALALALAL i canthearyoui canthear you LALALALALALALA

:slight_smile:

they got the drift after a couple of years
Live your life for yoursel, not for somebody else! You’ll be tied to your child for the next 20 years if you get one!
Horror!

:slight_smile:

14

Nice rant! It gets a 9.5. It would have gotten a 10.0 but the French judge was cheating. :smiley:

I’m 32 and I’m still not ready for kids yet. My mother mentions it sometimes, but there’s no pressure. She also know that my brother’s wife has a lot of female problems and a serious aversion to pain, so that leaves me.

Nope. Not gon’ do it.

15

[nitpick]

Not just women. I get it quite often, too. I’m told i will be a “lonely old man” by people who seem to find it impossible to believe that the elderly actually have friends just like everyone else.

[/nitpick]

Nice rant, weevil; welcome to SDMB.

16

I think one of the reasons we have a lot of unhappy family relationships is that people who maybe didn’t want children feel that they have to, and then end up being mediocre-at-best, inattentive parents. I’m not saying that there have never been unplanned pregnancies where the parents suddenly realized how wonderful their baby was and welcomed the child into their lives, but the people who push others to have kids when they show no interest in it aren’t doing any favors to anyone.

My husband and I have little interest in having children, and are fine with the idea that we might never have them. I just deleted a long and venomous rant about my inlaws’ and their desires for us to have children. Let’s just say that their attempts to convince us have had quite the opposite effect.

17

Welcome, Evil Weevil! Is there room on this bus for me?

(You do know, of course, that it’s the bus to Hell, right, because failure to provide grandkids gets you instantly damned in my family. ;))

18

It’s not really related to the OP, but it was the first thing I thought of when I saw the thread title:

U.S. Out Of My Uterus!

19

As others have said, the attempts at meddling don’t stop after you’re married. For some people, it gets worse. “Why aren’t you having kids yet?” “Is it his fault or yours?” One response that sometimes works is complete silence for a minute. As the silence grows uncomfortable, followed up with, “Why would you want to know a personal thing like that?” Another is “That’s a rather personal issue.” One of the advice columnists suggests, “When we are ready to announce anything of that sort, we will let you know.”

I didn’t have children until I was nearly 30, and although some of that was due to physical problems, we have never, ever been sorry we waited. We had saved and planned carefully so that I would be able to stay out of paid employment for a number of years. We traveled, went out to dinner and the theater a lot, bought furniture. As a result, I never felt deprived when for 10 years we did not do those things.

Stick to your guns and do this on your own schedule, whether that’s now, later, or never. In some cases you have to do something that’s bordering on rudeness, but then the people making these demands and asking those questions are being rude first.

20

Welcome to the Straightdope. I re-iterate the well done rant, you’ll do fine here. I’m a wee bit younger, but I also don’t want kids… and don’t want people telling me I want kids, either. How obnoxious. Good luck with fending off the evil relatives.