No, no children (got nothing against them, but I’m the wrong person for such a responsibility). Lonely? Maybe. Depends on how long I last. Bitter? Doubt that. I doubt that very much.
Im not bitter at the moment, but I’m pretty damn lonely. Now I must say this how I’ve always put it to other people when they say kids arent important to the state of ones existance. Ever since I was little, I never really wanted a career or a big house or a lot of money or anything terribly great. All I ever wanted was a nice husband, enough money to get by, and 2 kids a boy named Charlie, and agirl named Lucy. If I never get the few things that i set my life goal as, then I can say that my life is officially meaningless. But I’ll never lose hope at least not until menopause, then I’ll be really pissed off.
I am not sure I’ve been bitter a day in my life. Lonely and Childless looks like a distinct possibility. There is always hope that it isn’t the case, it’s what I cling to.
Another one chiming in for childless and quite happy about it, neither bitter nor lonely and not expecting to be.
I would the both of the latter two are to a great extent the product of one’s own expectations. Certainly if you decide you’re going to be bitter and lonely, it’s not hard to achieve.
Since this is basically a poll, I’ll move it to In My Humble Opinion for you.
Cajun Man
for the SDMB
Yes, I will die without ever having given birth to a child. And I am a woman who has always had enormous maternal instincts.
But life had surprises for me. My second marriage in my early forties was to a widower with three mostly grown children. And when they had children, I stepped into the role which is more fun than any other – grandparent. It has fulfilled all of my longings in more ways than I ever could have imagined!
They won’t have my genes, but they will have the most important parts of me – a little wisdom, lots of merriment, some disasterous recipes, and memories that I hope will last a lifetime – including a trip to Paris in April with my 16 year old granddaughter.
So you just never know.
But that’s not the way it used to be.
In my late teens and early twenties I began to experience a lonliness and bitterness that I didn’t understand. The bitterness didn’t last long but the lonliness would come over me again and again.
I felt utterly hopeless, unable to move or think clearly. Sometimes I felt dead inside – numb. I couldn’t concentrate. I had no energy. I slept as much as I could (which was a lot). And I lived on snack foods – lots of them. I didn’t even want to go out of the house.
And the worst part of it was that there seemed at the time to be no end in sight.
These episodes continued off and on into my mid-forties and then stopped. 25 years of feeling like the walking dead stopped within about a month’s time.
If you want to know why, I will tell you straight up. (No, it is not about my religious faith. No sermons here.) If you had rather not continue as you are, you may have an easier solution than you think.
Zoe , if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, would you please tell me how to get rid of the lonely, soul-sucking moods of nothingness? You can e-mail it to me if you’d like… please?
(I’m still years away from mid-forties - can it happen sooner?!)
Yes Zoe, whats the secret?
Yeah Zoe, you can’t do a teaser like that, then not follow up! Tell us the secret. I’m far from bitter and am so busy the lonliness doesn’t happen too often, but when it does it’s a real bitch.
I’d love to know your secret.
Therapy?
Seriously, I’ve felt like that for upwards of three years at a stretch, and I never tried to get help for it. It stopped for me, too, thank God, and although I like to think it was strength of will that pulled me out of it, I’m probably just fooling myself. Looking back now, I can’t help but think that if I tried to get help sooner, I might not have ended up hating the bulk of my early twenties. If I ever end up back in that mental place again, I’m finding myself a couch and a guy to talk to about it. It’s just not worth feeling that way all the time.
Never Have, if you feel this way all the time, get some help. There’s no more shame in going to a psychologist than there is in going to an optometrist, and they can really help you to figure out what you need to do to be happy.
And being happy is the most important thing in the world.
ggurl, Midwinter and lezlers, Miller has figured it out – therapy. But not exactly as most people might imagine.
Therapy does not have to cost an arm and a leg. I see my psychiatrist for twenty to thirty minutes once a month and sometimes I skip a session. Some insurance companies are beginning to pay a larger percentage of the bill and that makes it easier to afford. I don’t think that most insurance companies pay psychologists, but they are less expensive and often work with a psychiatrist to provide medication.
And it is the medication that has made all of the difference in the world to me. It is not a happy pill, but it allows me to be back to my normal self again. It doesn’t help if you are just feeling blue for a few days. All of us go through that as part of being human.
But when you get to the point of hopelessness, no energy, sleeping too much or too little, eating too much or too little, inability to concentrate – and you feel that way for more than two weeks, you may be dealing with something that needs help.
When you get to that point, you can’t think clearly and it’s tough to make smart decisions for yourself – but sometimes you aren’t aware that the part of your brain that makes decisions may be impaired. And you can’t even believe that you might be ill.
In you haven’t already guessed by now, I’m talking about clinical depression. It can be completely debilitating. I had to retire from teaching because of it in 1989. I received my state pension and Social Security. I continue to receive it because my doctor still thinks that I should not return to work. (But then my struggle with it had a long history.)
My depression also involved a lot of anger and problems with self-esteem. (That has been helped by the talk therapy with my psychiatrist.)
There are different causes of depression, so what worked for me might not be exactly right for someone else. But when it runs this deep, it really isn’t a matter of will power. It also isn’t a character flaw or a personal weakness.
Also, not all therapists are alike. I’ve have now the best I’ve ever known. I have also had some of the worst. You may have to find the one right for you.
Some kinds of depression are a “cousin” of Parkinson’s Disease and have similar causes.
If you can muster the energy, there are some things that may help you to feel a little better. Getting outside for a while may help – and exercise too.
Whatever you do, don’t blame yourself. And don’t let it go on too long. It can be a terminal illness.
There will be some here who will scoff at all of this. I’ve had the illness for forty years. I’ve tried everything including electo-shock therapy in the early 1960’s. At one time I became mute. Before that, my father had it – and his aunt before him. It was terminal for her. She set herself on fire and burned to death.
If those who scoff have more experience than I, then what they say may be worthwhile. Meanwhile, there are others here who have gone through what I have been through and they know what I’m talking about.
I speak only about clinical depression – not about any other mood disorder or mental health issues. And I am not a physician – just a grateful patient.
Miller
“Never Have, if you feel this way all the time, get some help. There’s no more shame in going to a psychologist than there is in going to an optometrist, and they can really help you to figure out what you need to do to be happy.”
There’s no shame in that game, but I don’t have the dough, guy. 
No don’t do that. Just get some really weird porn to put in with it. Sort of one last practical joke.
Never Have, I’m sure if you looked around you might find inexpensive doctors. When I was in college my GF needed extensive thearpy. (you would have to be crazy to date me) and we found a place that only charged her $5 a session. That was ::cough cough:: years ago but I’m sure there are places to find. Do you live in a metro area?
Anyway, there were several times in my life when I felt the way you do. Now I’m married and although we don’t have kids, we may someday and I’m never alone and I’m only bitter when I have to clean the cat box.
Thanks for the post Zoe.
Are you sure? Have you looked? I know some therapists will charge on a sliding scale: they’ll only charge what their patients can comfortably afford. Depending on your area, there may be telephone support lines that can point you towards an affordable therapist. If you’re still in school, the councilors there should be able to provide you with the same information. And, of course, there’s always the internet. A couple of seconds on Google, and I found this site, which could help find a doctor in your area and your price range.
There’re a lot of people out there who can help. All you gotta do is ask.
ya. my friend is convinced she’ll die an old maid with lots of cats… now there are two things you should know about her: she’s fourteen… and she’s allergic to cats!!! 
no one can die without having an impact on someone’s life. but thats just the optimist in me speaking… talk to me on a bad day and you’ll get a different answer.
There are lots of ways of dying alone and/or bitter. Childlessness has little to do with it sometimes. My poor grandmother, a widow these past couple of years, is dying essentially alone in a nursing home. I don’t know if she’s bitter; she’s pretty out of it. Her two children will have little to do with her beyond the barest requirements of respectability; part of this is her fault, and part is their fault. Or maybe it’s nobody’s fault. Who wants to spend time with a senile old lady who pees herself?
Death isn’t pretty. The last part of life, very often, isn’t any prettier. It’s a shitty, shitty world.
I’ll die alone, certainly; childless, certainly; bitter, who knows? Maybe they’ll give me drugs to make me not care.
I’m still waiting for the first person to come into this thread and tell us to buck up, chin up, and start enjoying life, gosh-darnit!
Midwinter, you’re welcome.
Never Have I, even a regular physician can prescribe anti-depressants. If there is a university near you with a medical school, there is a good chance that you would be able to see a psychiatrist at very little expense. Also, often there are community mental health centers that can help. Group therapy is less expensive also.
Don’t leave any stone unturned. You can’t afford not to.
Start with the phone book and the State Department of Mental Health. Just do that one step on Wednesday.
I won’t go that far, but I will say that one’s happiness is, to a great extent, under one’s own control. Of course, life events have an impact, but there has been at least one study showing that individuals each have a kind of ‘resting point’ of happiness (or lack thereof). Life events cause swings from this, generally lasting up to six months or so, but we tend to come back to our basic resting points.
I’ve noticed in the course of my life that there is a strong correlation between chronic unhappiness and deep self-involvement. I can’t speak as to which is cause and which is effect. But speaking as a person who has had some fairly severe problems with clinical depression, I’ve come to the conclusion that the best solution is to find something to take you out of yourself - to act “un-depressed.”
I consider the fairly recent concept of ‘visualization’ as a means to achieve a goal in general to be total bullshit. But for ceasing to be “lonely and bitter” (if not childless), I suspect visualization is indeed the best first step. You want to not be lonely and bitter? Picture yourself as not lonely and bitter (whatever that would mean to you) and take steps to get there! If you wait for the world to make you happy, you will be waiting a very long time. By and large, the world is not going to change for you. You have a choice to adjust yourself and/or your needs for happiness such that you can be happy, or to be miserable. Your choice.
I remember an old sort of joke: a psychotic is someone who can’t distinguish reality. A neurotic is a person who knows what is real, but just can’t stand it!
Most of us by that definition qualify as neurotic. And the unfortunate but real answer is: get over it. Basically, most therapies consist of helping you to find ways of doing that. But none of them will do it for you.
Childless - almost certainly. And I’m happy about this.
Lonely - I doubt it. Loneliness is a state of mind, not necessarily linked to how many people are around you. Some people can feel lonely in a crowd or in the middle of a large group of family and friends. Others are remote from another living soul and don’t experience the ‘lonely’ feeling at all. There are many times when I experience solitude, by chance or design, but virtually none when I feel ‘lonely’.
Bitter - I shouldn’t think so for one moment! I’ve had and continue to have a great life, and there is so much to enjoy and appreciate.