More properly entitled, "Bitter? I Hardly Knew 'Er".
Jan Barden on the couples who are happy to live without offspring
Wow, Jan, thanks for enlightening us. I did not know couples COULD be happy to live without offspring.
Cuddle a baby, scented and sleepy fresh from the bath, and you feel you could die of joy. BINGO! Lessee, that's what? Like 5-10 minutes out of a day?But catch a fractious toddler kicking the corner tin out of a stack of baked beans in the supermarket and you could kill from rage. And that's the other 23.80 hours of the day, and you're wondering why folks aren't clamoring for a slab of that? That's parenting: a seesaw of emotions that can have you acting like Mother Teresa one moment, Pol Pot the next. And, like a runaway train, once you step aboard this ride, there's no getting off. Ever.
Imagine that, not EVERYONE wants their lives turned completely upside down to make society, or Jan Barden, happy.
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Yet some of us go along with it again and again. Biology is to blame. Once we are caught in the blinding headlights of hormones, we rarely stop to think if children will change our lives for the better. BINGO! We simply want a baby. And what our generation wants, it just has to have.
Yet some of us just don't have the ability to say "no" to our biology. Must. Have. Baby. Now. Damn the consequences! Don't forget to pity me because I have no control and have no ability to think ahead.
But the downy babies grow into bum-fluffed teenagers and fill our homes with cheesy socks and atmospheres as tense as a dentist's waiting-room. Our finances dwindle and then vanish as we face up to the chilly reality of school and university fees.
You are correct!! And yet, you seem cheesed that everyone hasn't just put on the ol' blinders and jumped in like you.
We try hard not to resent our childless friends, who, in comparison with us, breeze through their lives flashing more cash, getting more sleep and having more fun and freedom. "Marrakesh next weekend?" they murmur to each other. "Why not?"
And again, Bed. Made. Lie. So you've chosen to remain friends with people you obviously resent? Why should I care? Oh, and thanks for painting the childfree with the broad brush of wealthy irresponsibility. Listen, bitch, I work hard for the meager pittance I receive. I won't be going to Marrakesh next weekend because I can not pay for it. In fact, there are LOTS of things I can't pay for...a house, a new car, a dog, dental care, a new computer AND, gasp, even a baby. Of course, I don't want a baby, but I couldn't pay for one anyway.
They must be so happy. Or are they? BINGO! Could they just be filling their empty days with conspicuous consumerism to mask an aching loneliness and fear of a solitary old age? BINGO!
Wow, could I have some crackers with that tripe? Who will take care of me when I get old? I'm terrified! You must be so lonely without children hanging off you 24-7. What on earth do you do with ALL that free time you have, cry in your soup?
Apparently not. Those who have chosen not to become parents are, on the whole, pretty pleased with their decision. At the extreme end of the scale, some are smug and others are aggressively evangelical. Many prefer the term child-free to childless, which implies, to them, some sort of loss. It's quite the opposite, they insist in large numbers in internet chat rooms.
How DARE you be happy to not have children!! How DARE you try to connect with like-minded people!!! Mothers NEVER do this...NEVER! and then she adds the "You doth protest too much" b.s. "It must be the opposite if you say you're happy without children...no one could possibly be happy without having complete and total responsibility to raise other beings."
There's certainly a lot of them around: projections by the Office for National Statistics suggest that, of women born in 1973, 23 per cent - nearly a quarter - will not have had children by the time they hit 45.
And the point is? No really, what's the point? I'm surprised she didn't go on about the evils of feminism, birth control and working.
These are not the sad old "aunties" of yesteryear. Take 43-year-old Karen Sparey, an account administrator for a recruitment company. Child-free and fresh from an off-peak holiday in Cyprus, she says: "I feel I have a nice life. I have never felt I was missing out. Happy with your life? You selfish bitch!
"I don't think that it was ever a conscious decision to not have children until after I was 30. I have about five girlfriends who don't have children and none of them is bothered about it. It did start out as joke that we would wait until after the millennium as we thought it was going to be such a big party and we would never get a sitter. BINGO! Yes, most people decide to not have children simply because they're irresponsible party animals.
"There has never been any pressure from my family. My mum's cool and never asked about grandchildren. Anyway, my sister Helen has two boys.
"Despite working full-time I spend lots of time doing things I like. I swim at least two mornings a week and play netball, which if I had children I could maybe still do, but not be able to sit in the pub afterwards - guilt-free."
BITCH!! WHORE!!! HARLOT!!!! What a piece of work! She dared to not just have children the moment she was physically able, and in fact just let it slide like crap out of a goose? Her horrible parent's aren't DEMANDING grandbabies from her? And to top it all off, she's not a sad, lint-knitting, cat collecting, lonely spinster!! MONSTER!!
Sparey, who lives in Beckenham, Kent, says her partner, Redmond Prendeville, is equally happy with her choice and she faces the future without fear. "I can't say whether or not I will regret not having had children or grandchildren when I am older. There's nothing to say that those children you cared for and looked after are going to be there to do the same for you. And if they are, will they do it out of genuine love or just because that's what's expected?"
AND she's not filled with abject TERROR at the future? I mean, who will put her in an old folks home and force her to spend the last years of her life waiting hopefully for the obligatory yearly visit if not her children? WHO?!
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Many child-free women are resentful that the workplace often seems skewed in favour of mothers, who may appear to work "kinder" hours or get extra time off. But Sparey has a more generous attitude: "I am sure they're not going home to put their feet up, unlike me. When I have a day off work, it means time to do nice things, not catch up on the ironing or take a little one to the doctor for an ailment.
"That's not to say I don't go 'Ahh' at the Johnson's Baby advertisements, but I do that over kittens and puppies, too. I just like my life and am not sure that a child would improve it - but I know it would change it."
How DARE you not want your life changed! How DARE you like your life!!!
It's a seductive argument and recent surveys in the US and Europe have indicated that childless married couples are "happier" than those with families. Yeah, put that "happy" in quotes Jan, after all no one can know true "happiness" until they have children, right? But research can work both ways. A new study at Texas Children's Hospital in Houston has shown that a baby's smile gives its mother a natural high, triggering parts of the brain that deal with sensations of reward and pleasure - the "feelgood" parts that also respond to drugs and drink. BINGO!At least a baby is legal.
Mmmm, my bingo card is filling up quite nicely. I'm sure that Texas study has NOTHING whatsoever to do with natural endorphins any humans body releases after something completely and horrifyingly painful. I'm sure it has NOTHING to do with the fact that some of these women might actually have wanted a child. Yesssss...I'm sure it just magically becomes all different when it's your own, even if you never wanted it, after all no parents ever abuse their children.
And it brings with it hidden advantages. Breastfeeding, for instance, reduces a woman's chances of rheumatoid arthritis as well as breast and ovarian cancer. It also helps to maintain bone density. BINGO!
And that's the PERFECT reason to have a child, to keep YOU safe and healthy. She doesn't mention that women who have children have greater amounts of tooth loss, or higher rates of obesity, stress or poverty. Two things to know... 1. breast feeding only reduces CHANCES and 2. there is NO escape from death.
That may offset to some extent the broken nights, toddler tantrums and teenage terrors to come.
Suuuuuree. It makes total sense to do something completely voluntary, permanent and life chang-upsetting that you have no desire to do in the off chance that it might reduce the mere chance that you might die of some illness. And totally selfless as well. "Honey, I had you to decrease the possibility of getting sick from something".
WHY
Seriously? She's listing these as reasons for creating new humans? Is there any way she could be more flippant, selfish or thoughtless?
You will:
WHY NOT Wow, she says these like they're BAD or something. You can: |
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