Besides, you don’t have to promise the boyfriend you won’t have kids. You only have to promise you won’t have HIS kids.
Working with children at my jobs has actually made me want to have kids/family. Of course there are a couple of complications along the way (being a guy).
Though while I would like to have kids, I’m also aware of happy I am right now. I know if I had kids I would have to give up my current lifestyle, and chances are I’d miss it. Now it is very possible that I could be in a much more financially secure situation, ideal for raising a child, and change my mind. But I figure that I have plenty of time to make up my mind when the opportunity arises.
I’ve known for as long as I can remember that I did not want children. I’m 43 and this has never changed. Everyone told me it would change as I got older (or, “It is different when they’re yours.”) It never changed AND it would be cruel to a child to have one just to see if “It is different when they are yours” only to find, why no, it still isn’t something I want. You aren’t too young. You may change your mind, but in my case, nope, don’t want them, never did.
thank you ALL. This is why I love it here. honest answers to any and all of my questions. 
For some reason, that image of C3’s son handing her soggy, ketchupy bread made me giggle and kind of think I wanted children.
fishbicycle’s point of going instantly bankrupt woke me up and I considered the closet full of shoes I own and all the trips I want to take.
Oh, and FYI, I am 24, he’s 45 his youngest being 6. This post was a result of a discussion I had with him yesterday after talking about his son and his plans for retirement.
It has also occurred to me that I cannot have children… Lectures on safe-sex aside, there are a few times when I *could * have gotten pregnant and a few where I **should ** have gotten pregnant and didn’t.
Not to hijack my own thread, but for those that have decided NOT to have children, how do you deal with the pressure of others? i.e.: parents wanting to be grandparents, married coupled pressing for when, when when? co-workers nosing in?
You might want to ask yourself one more question: If boyfriend told you he wanted to have another baby right now, would you become pregnant? It may help you sort out whether this decision is for you or him.
Not to hijack, but I had this same exact thought before I had kids. I was rarely very careful, and there were certain times when I thought for sure I had gotten too careless, but until I actually started trying to have kids, I never got pregnant. Just a cautionary tale 
Stunted? Gee, thanks for the drive-by insult.
It may seem a little stunted to you, but this says more about you, and your inability to appreciate any view or opinion except your own, than it does about myself and others who may choose not to have children. While you’re enjoying all that ‘richness’ and ‘perspective’, maybe one of your kids can teach you that there are more views and opinions in this world than the one you happen to have, and that if people think differently and arrive at different conclusions, it doesn’t mean they are in any way ‘stunted’.
I long ago realised that whether or not I happen to want to have children is only part of the question, and the rather selfish part at that. The other part is whether any child would want to have me as his or her father. Since I know (or at least am pretty sure, as far as I can tell) that I wouldn’t be very good father material, I felt it would be unfair on any child to lumber him/her with me as his or her Dad. So my decision is based, at least in part, on consideration for someone else’s p.o.v. (that of my hypothetical child).
I don’t think that trying to consider other people’s views and feelings, and not just making decisions based on what I may happen to want, is even remotely ‘stunted’.
Even those who decided to have children feel this before it happens. I didn’t, because my parents and my in-laws both had kids late and felt this pressure, so didn’t bug us about it. However, and I guess this is my geezerdom showing, but wouldn’t they be bugging you to get married first?
BTW we had kids starting when we were 30, which was plenty young enough. You’ve got a lot of time, so don’t worry about it. You’ll know when you are ready if you ever are.
I am curious as to why you would let anyone pressure you into anything? Honestly it is no one’s business except your own and your partner. I remember when I was in my twenties, nosey co-workers would come up and ask when we were going to start a family, and with a cold, blank stare would tell them I was sterile. I am sterile, by my choice, I had my tubes tied at 27.
As for parents, none ever questioned of why I didn’t want kids. I point blank said producing offspring was not my thing and left it at that. So they enjoy the “other” grandkids by my siblings.
Just because they had kids does not mean you are obligated to have them. I chose a career over raising a family. I enjoy traveling, I enjoy being able to go anywhere at any time without having to drag kids around. I love my independent lifestyle and in 45 years I have yet to regret the decision I made long ago.
I am sure for those that have children they are a blessing. I find them annoying at best, which is the very reason I chose not to partake in motherhood.
It’s your body and your choice. You have to really want kids deep down in your heart, otherwise you both will suffer regret.
Exactly, how I determined not to have kids. I did not want my “kids” to suffer from what I went through growing up. So I side stepped motherhood and built a career.
It is insulting to have some outsider deem you "stunted’ because you chose what you felt to be best for not only yourself but any offspring you may have had.
Your example was one I immediately thought of as a counterpoint, too. To be fair to jarbabyj, she did preface the part you quoted with (bolding mine):
I’m skeptical of the idea that not wanting to have children makes me less fulfilled or lacking in some fundamental part of the life experience. I certainly don’t feel that way. I’m guessing the number of reasons for people remaining childfree are as numerous as the reasons for people having children, positive and negative.
HAHA I will have to use this one. People are so rude, about this issue. No matter what you say, they just come back with, “You don’t know yet. When you have them, you’ll know.” It infuriates me just thinking about it. I know what I like thank you.
As for pressure, well I get plenty of pressure from my family. My mother comes from a family of five kids. There are three daughters amongst the whole family, and 6 sons. Holy crap, I just realized I am the only daughter still unmarried! Anyway, I am expected to fulfill the family obligation and become a breeding machine just like everyone else. They are my family, so I politely either don’t talk about it while admiring their kids, or just say I’m not interested right now. If they keep pushing, I just keep answering the same thing politely, I’m not interested right now.
Friends…if a friend started pushing me to have kids we wouldn’t be as close anymore, I’m afraid. Besides, I’ve already lost touch with a lot of my friends that did get married and have kids…they only associate with other parents now. Oh well. I just ignore them.
As for co-workers, I tell them flat out I don’t want to have kids. Some of them try to sell me on it, some don’t . I just say “I don’t believe I’m ready for kids, and I believe no one should have a kid if they’re even a little bit doubtful.” That usually shuts them up.
You know, I ignored this, but I think this is really insulting and apparently a drive-by comment too. With the accepted order of life being:
grow up, go to school
get a job
get married
have children
grow old
I think people who manage to break out of that rut don’t deserve to be called “stunted”. It’s not everybody’s obligation to be a breeding machine just because society decrees it. I’m a little suspicious of all parents, because I wonder how many of them really truly wanted to be parents and how many just became parents because it was the “next” thing to do?
Is that what it is to you?
If breaking out of it means never having kids. I’m taking the rut!
[QUOTE=alphaFemaleIt has also occurred to me that I cannot have children… Lectures on safe-sex aside, there are a few times when I *could * have gotten pregnant and a few where I **should ** have gotten pregnant and didn’t.
[/QUOTE]
Also a caution. We spent about three years trying to concieve, including using fertility drugs, AIH, ovulation predictor kits. We adopted.
I have a bio daughter a year younger than my son. We call her “Baby Surprise” (she is five now).
BTW, If my husband were 45, and I were 24, I would seriously consider before I had kids with him. If you ever decide your really want kids - especially if its several years from now, think hard. If he is 50 when you concieve, he will be almost 70 when the child graduates from high school. College will be hard to pay for on a social security check. There is a better chance he will die while you still have a minor child in the house than if your boyfriend where closer to you in age.
As I said, my sister just had her first - her husband is about the age of yours, and has some health issues as well (morbid obesity - and his body is starting to give out from it). I don’t envy her - there is a fairly good chance her husband will die before the child graduates from high school.
Heh - that’s what I tell my inlaws when they badger us - Mr. Kat is free to have as many kids as he wants, but he won’t be having them with me.
I was 10 when I told my mom she’d be having grand-dogs instead of kids. Here I am 36, and she has 3 grand-dogs, and even proudly keeps an “Ask Me About My Grand-Dogs” mug on her desk at work.
That’s what it would be to someone who truly doesn’t want kids. To me, it looks like a life of nothing but drudgery. That’s why I’m not doing it. YMMV.
I did not want children until I was in my late twenties. Before that I was pretty sure I did not want to ever have even one. If I had been incapable of having children, I think I would have been fine with that, happy even. About 28 a child did not seem a bad idea for someday. At 30 I put have a child on my five year plan. My daughter was born May 1, 2003 and I am estatically happy with her and with being a mother. I would even have more had the well not dried up.
I don’t think 18 or 20 is too young to make a descision that you will have to live with the rest of your life. I committed to my husband when I was 18. Unless you are very sure you will want to forever be child free, don’t commit yourself to that now either by committing to someone who absolutely does not want children, or by getting sterilized, especially the latter. Marrigages can end, and people can change their mind, but sterilization is permanent. What if you marry this guy and a satellite falls from the sky killing him? Would you be pleased then that you had had yourself sterilized? What if you met someone that did want children and more importantly, that you want to have children with?
My sister has a couple of cow-orkers who hassled her about being so selfish, not wanting children. From what she tells me, they believe the light of heaven shines out of their uterus. Everybody else leaves her alone, and since I feel the same way about having children, I can report the same. Maybe we just hang around with folks who respect others’ decisions, maybe it’s becoming a more popular decision, or it’s very obvious we’re not mom types. Whatever the reason, I’ve never had anyone give me a hard time.
I say don’t worry about what others want or think. It’s your life you’re going to be living.
Neither should everyone who has kids be characterized as being in a “rut.” Haven’t you just committed the same offense you’re criticizing me for? Obviously, judgments are being made in both directions.
I touched a nerve with my remarks, and the replies have been interesting. Do many childless people feel very defensive about issues of character, conformity, and familial expectations? The anger behind some of the responses to my (I thought) mild-mannered remarks in reply to the OPs call for opinions seems to suggest that they do, which is something else for the OP to consider–having to live with the real or perceived sting of judgement. Of course, as Elenia28 and ianzin demonstrated, judgments are flying in both directions, so perhaps it doesn’t matter.