There is a weird cultural contortion that tends to happen here in the US: young women here are pressured to have kids on all fronts. When I was young, I was undecided on whether or not to become a mother. Here are some of the things people said to me, and I want you to know it includes psychotherapists (one of whom never had kids herself):
- You'll regret it if you don't have kids.
- No one is ever on their death bed saying, gee, I wish I didn't have kids.
- C'mon, have kids so they can play with my kids.
- Wouldn't your nephews and nieces like cousins?
- Don't you want someone there to hold your hand when you die?
- You're gonna want someone to look after you when you get old.
- Hardest job but you'll love it.
- Childbirth is less painful than cramps and you won't care once you hold the baby.
- When are we gonna see more grandkids?
- Pregnancy is so easy - I felt great.
- If you want to hang onto your man, better give him a baby.
Many of the people who said these things knew I had endometriosis, ovarian cysts, autoimmune issues, etc. at the time. I caved to the pressure but I turned out to be seriously infertile and decided that given my doubts, would not go to full lengths to get pregnant (at the time it would have involved IVF plus experimental immunotherapies, for a cost of over $100,000 as insurance would have covered none of it). My husband and I decided to adopt. Foreign adoption, in fact (because we knew 2 families who were going through hell with private US adoptions).
Our daughter is now a young adult, and I love her dearly. Even so, if I could go back in time I would NOT become a parent, especially not here in the US. I have talked to my daughter frankly about this, and told her that it is HER life, and whether or not she decides to have kids or not is HER decision, and I respect her choice either way, BUT that she should consider emigrating and having and raising kids in another country, as this society makes it dangerous and difficult. Yes, I am one of the few who regrets becoming a parent at all, and I feel no shame admitting that if it saves other women the angst and anxiety I went through in my decision process.
ETA: women of color face the opposite pressures, btw.
@laura-f Both my sister and I chose to never have children (a very abusive childhood was the reason). My sister had her tubes tied when she was 26 (in the late 70s). When I asked her about it many decades later she said “I felt if I had a child I would beat it to death”. I was meticulous about birth control the whole of my fertile life (and perhaps was not particularly fertile because of large uterine fibroids and ovarian cysts). I also endured the endless “You should have children, you’d be a great parent”. I never wavered and I have absolutely no regrets and neither does my husband. Never let family, friends, nor society dictate your life.
I am post-menopausal at this point, but am friendly with several younger women who chose to never have kids also - they refer to themselves as "wine aunties". They enjoy the company of other people's kids occasionally (including spoiling nieces and nephews), but none have any regrets.
I envy their lifestyles - long/happy marriages, lots of travel, self-exploration, less stress, better ability to engage with their communities or be activist, better retirement planning...
My husband and I calculated in 2018 that the financial cost of raising our daughter by that time, all in, including the adoption, was about $400,000.
Some good news is that more men are opting for vasectomies than ever since the criminal SC decision.
More men are seeking vasectomies now that the Supreme Court has overturned Roe.
I completely understand your point of view. No woman should be pressured/forced/guilted into becoming a mother if that is not her wish. My sister loves being an aunt but never had any desire for children. I, on the other hand, became a mother through international adoption and feel it was the singularly BEST decision I have ever made. I got lucky: she is a great kid and we always had terrific "chemistry" from Day One. But then I ALWAYS wanted to become a mother, even as a very small child, and consider it to be my "higher calling" and a main purpose while in this incarnation... so for me it is deeply satisfying. But I recognize that not everyone feels the same. It IS extremely expensive and plenty of sacrifice is called for. People need to follow their own hearts and instincts in these matters...it's for no one else to judge,
"C'mon, have kids so they can play with my kids!" Yes, definitely a valid reason for reproducing lol 🙄 Having kids if you don't want them is the worst decision ever, not fair to the kids or the parents.
The intense societal pressure to have kids has always amazed me. People who either don't have them or don't want them are nagged, judged, guilted and made to feel like there is something wrong with them. Having children, or not having them, and the reasons involved are and should be private, requiring no explanation to anyone.
We have more than two children because we wanted them, same with our more-than-average number of dogs. It's a personal choice.
Women who struggle with infertility also have to endure some unbelievable comments. People are something else.
My sister and I never had children, precisely because of a traumatic childhood.
And, two years ago, I found out that I'm at risk of having Huntington's disease, a neurodegenerative disease that a child has a 50-50 chance of inheriting from the parent who has it. (My mother has it.)
If I test positive for HD in the future, it will confirm for me that not having children was the absolute best decision I ever made in my life. I wouldn't wish to pass this horrible illness on to any child of mine or for them to have to take care of me in the later stages of the disease, which are similar to the final stages of ALS.
Speaking of abortion and HD: Couples where one of the partners has HD can undergo the expensive IVF procedure of fertilizing several of the eggs. If a fertilized egg doesn't test positive for HD, then the mother carries it to term, thus breaking the cycle of the disease forever. (It can't skip generations.) The other eggs that tested positive for HD are either frozen or destroyed, I believe. Now this procedure could be jeopardized because of the extremist abortion bans out there. I can't express how angry this makes me. The way these extremists so cavalierly play with other people's lives is deeply insulting.
Yes, this happens. But keep in mind we don't know the whole story. There are abusive parents and there are unusually difficult kids. There is usually a major "back story" when you hear of this. I wouldn't rush to judgement.
@laura-f weirdly enough I sat down and wondered why we put so much pressure (as a society) on women to have kids. And honestly the only reason I can come up with is someone to care for us as we age.
As a society, we need a younger generation to care for us as we age and die. Whether we are talking about financially like social security, or physically like Drs and nurse to care for an aging population. We have been conditioned to see that future generation as the ones to care for us. But there is also the idea of a new supply of workers.
Even now some of the population worry about a “declining birth rate” because they are worried about not having enough blue collar workers to make life comfortable for the billionaires as they age (think Musk).
But I have known since I was in school that we are over-populated. And that we will eventually come to another bottleneck where a majority of the population dies off. But since we are not all needed to carry on the species, I don’t personally see any reason to continue to pressure women to be moms if they don’t want to be one.