List to that doubt
It’s not that I MEAN to constantly discourage folks from having kids…I just think (my experience of mainstream US culture has been) the pressure to have kids, or more so the assumption we all will, that it’s the default of adulthood, is so loud, someone’s gotta be like HEY Y'ALL! WHAT IF THAT DOUBT SHOULD BE LISTENED TO.
I had almost no presence of someone telling me it’s fine to not have kids, so figured I’d try to be at least 1 voice out there that allows people who have the same doubts I did, to see those doubts as at least “normal” and worthy of listening to and pausing.
There is a very plain truth here: intentionally creating other humans is a really big deal. Like the biggest. If you’re unsure, it’s a “no for now”
I don’t know how to tell another human being what a “full body yes” means to them but whatever that phrase might mean to you, it needs to be present when you decide to create new humans.
For me, as long as there were still significant doubts in my mind, that represented a lack of a full body yes. So my stance was “I probably wanna have kids, but not yet” for a long time.
For me, that meant that by the time that I was 35 I realized the full body yes was never going to arrive and there was no YES. It wasn’t right for me. Simultaneously, I watched so many of my friends who had been unsure realize that it absolutely was a full body yes for them. But for me, some ideas about having children might always appeal to me, but I could tell in my gut it was not FULLY AND EXACTLY what I want, therefore I should not have them. I imagined for years and years that my yet would turn into a now and it didn’t and that’s OK.
I believe that in some ways, no matter what path you choose ever, if you know about an alternative path that you didn’t take, it is very easy to romanticize it and think of things with a little bit of regret. Do I still wonder what it would’ve been like to bring a little human being in the world that does look like me and my partner? Of course! That’s completely natural. But it doesn’t mean that we should’ve parented because we knew it is not something we were choosing with extreme enthusiasm.
People who have kids and are not pumped about it can often turn into incredible parents. I 100% don’t mean to imply that all reluctant parents are harmful towards their kids, but I can sure tell you that many reluctant parents are harmful toward their kids without even realizing that they have brought in a level of resentment against somebody who has no reason to bear that burden from them.
When I was around 25, my mother-in-law kept saying things to me about how I was never going to actually feel “perfectly ready” to be a parent and we just needed to take the plunge before I would arrive at my “yet.” She had her kids at 19 and 22 and loves being a mom above all so for her that was her experience and it made sense. For myself and my partner, it would have meant having kids we actually did not want. Meanwhile, many of my friends that I mentioned above did end up in their 30s deciding they do want a parent.
Anyway, all this to say that I think that if you’re gonna plan to intentionally bring a new human into this world, you better be doing so with a ton of gusto behind it.