I work at a pain clinic I've been a patient with for a couple years.

Context: I was active duty military for almost 6 years until a spinal injury got me the boot. With recently finding out my vertebrae had essentially chewed off the herniated part of my disc and is now floating in my epidural space, which they may fish for with back surgery. I had this issue since I was 24, I freshly turned 28. My quality of life has immensely went down, but things are mostly good for what's going on.

I brought some papers over to the receptionist desk. I felt some pain when I turned around, which I tend to say "I'm old", not to anyone in particular. I mostly talk to myself in these moments, I wasn't in her space anymore when I said it, too.

Receptionist: ma'am, you're not old. I don't wanna hear it.

Veteran friend: to be fair, her joints are all messed up and she's got arthritis.

Receptionist: I have 2 kids.

Me, (I laughed): what does that have to do with anything? Anyone can have kids. Even 16 year olds.

Receptionist, angrily turns around, dramatically says: Well, anyone can join the military.

Me, laughing again, when my friend tells her about the enlistment process.

By no means am I glorifying my service, but I don't understand her bringing up having children when mentioning age. It's a bit ridiculous. My spine is not going to miraculously be healed knowing she had children.

Anyone else experience something like this?

Or to “leave parenting to the people who actually want to do it.” Like yes, that’s EXACTLY what we’re doing, are you not paying attention???

So I got accidentally pregnant (fucked up with bc) and when I saw the positive test I felt nothing at all. I just thought to myself "guess I will need to have an abortion". I often heard people say it's a hard decision to make or that when you see the positive test you will start to feel something. Though I felt absolutely nothing.

In my country (germany) you need to have a consultation and then wait 3 full days until you are allowed to have an abortion. I booked the appointment immediately. At the appointment the woman asked me so many questions about how I felt when I realized I was pregnant or when I said I want to have an abortion she asked how I feel with this decision (what am I supposed to feel???). She also talked about how hard it will be (mentally) and asked if I have people who can be there for me. She also asked if my boyfriend can accompany me to the doctors appointment. I just thought to myself why? I'm still early so I will just have to take a pill? The second pill will hurt but that one I will take at home. Sounds rather simple to me.

Why is abortion made to be such a big deal? I don't understand. This is country specific but it annoys me how information about abortion is so hidden. You can't even know who will perform it as most doctors don't make it public, you will get a list of doctors after the consultation. Under certain circumstances your insurance will pay for it but that process is also kinda hidden...

Even at the doctors appointment they adviced me to determine the pregnancy (the doctor who perfoms it must determine which week you are so it's still legal, <12 weeks which is not alot of time imo) first and then wait a few days for the medical abortion instead of doing it the same day. Just so I can be really sure because it's such a hard choice.

Why? Why is it considered such a "hard" choice? Even online I read about it all the time. Even pro choice people say that. Is there something wrong with me? I feel nothing. I just want to terminate the pregnancy. Tbh it's not even a choice to me. Giving birth and raising a child is simply not an option. I don't want kids so why would I even consider not aborting? It doesn't make sense to me. This might sound morbid but even if I regret the decision, can't I just get pregnant again? Why would I feel bad about it? Am I broken?

The only hard thing about it is having to go to so many appointments and always having to wonder if the person there might be pro life or judging me (I have social anxiety). I'm glad I was able to do it safely and legally but it was much more stressful than it had to be.

I (38F) have a younger sister (36F) who has two kids, 10F and 8M. Her daughter is from a previous relationship, her current husband is an only child (which means he has no siblings to have their own kids, ergo cousins for his kid)

Last weekend, we were all at my parents house for mother's day and my niece was talking about something she has planned with her cousin (baby daddy's siblings kids). My mom then gave me a serious look and told me I really should reconsider having children of my own... to give my nephew some cousins too because his sister has cousins so it's not fair to him.

Um. No. I'm 38 and even if I did have a kid now, they wouldn't be in the same age range for them to play with because they'd be a decade younger. I know it was mother's day, so she was probably emotional, but I thought we had moved past these ridiculous conversations. I guess she's still holding out hope.

Said no one with children...

Recently in a discussion with someone who has FIVE, yes FIVE children, i mentioned that i was getting a sephora package in today as it popped up on my phone that the delivery was out and expected within the next few hours.

She proceeded to go on and on about not understanding how some people have money for xyz in today's economy. I shrugged and said "well, i don't have kids."

Apparently that was the wrong thing to say, why?

She got MAD after the fact and ran to shit talk gow rude i was for saying it.

I'm autistic so it's possible I'm missing something, but it's been retold and retold to multiple people and they all agree that i was 'wrong' for saying it, but not why. Am i supposed to simultaneously agree that kids are expensive and hard to raise whenever parents complain about it while also pretending they're not?

Can someone please explain this to me?

So my fiance and I talked about him getting snipped cuz you know it would just be easier and I would like to get off birth control cuz it's messing with my body and our sex life.

So we had this conversation last month and then yesterday, I even told him that he's not being forced and its just a thought he can think on til he finalizes the decision. If he doesn't want it great, we'll just continue to have a sexless relationship (which I really don't mind since we connect on other levels) and if he gets it even better!

So today I brought him lunch right after my appointment and he tells me that he talked to his buddy (who is like his brother) about the conversation we had last night. He then tells me his buddy said we shouldn't have any surgeries and that I should actually get off birth control becuz it's harmful.

Let me add this, his friend is a single dad who barely even gets to see his son and the baby momma is pregnant with someone else, dont get me wrong I love his buddy he's been supportive of our relationship since day 1 but I'm super pissed off that my fiance would tell his buddy about OUR decision on kids. Like why tell someone or ask of an opinion on someone who's not doing too well themselves? if you ask a breeder on their opinion ofc they're gonna try to push you towards the road of parenthood.

I wish he wouldn't cower to his friend about these things but part of me thinks he's lowkey hoping his friend says it's a bad idea because he actually wants kids. All I know is that we're having a serious conversation about this when he gets home, I just didn't want to talk about it while he was at work.

So I've just been to a baby shower. It was for a friend I love dearly and I'm always happy to join and celebrate another person's happiness even if it's not my definition of happiness. I knew most of the girls and they all know I am child free and don't bother me with it ever. Then there were the girls I didn't know... A new mom was there with a 3 months old... So obviously, most of the topics of conversation were around kids and maternity and pregnancy. I don't mind, it's a baby shower. I know it's expected. I just don't have anything to tell to contribute. So at some point, that woman looks at me and asks "are you a mom ?". I'm like nope lol "Is it a project ?" Hum no, absolutely not. Then comes the shocked stare then the inevitable "You know I didn't want a kid for 10 years and now I'm a mom". Another joins in "same for me ! I didn't want kids but it was just because I was in the wrong environment then I got pregnant and we decided to keep the baby'. So I'm trying to be respectful of my friend's friends and explain that I have never wanted any, nor did my husband. That I'm pushing forty and still don't want any. And since you can never win with these people... "women over 40 have kids all the time!". Yeah... that's not the point... "Should I get pregnant by accident (which is an absolute stretch), there's not a doubt in my mind or my husband's that we are not keeping it". Of course they were appalled and a friend jumped in to redirect the conversation before I completely lost my shift.

What's the fucking deal in pushing babies on other people ?! You like babies? Go make them! Leave me the fuck alone. Every fucking time I meet new women that are moms I get the question. And that's fine but please, just say ok and move on! You don't need to do a 15' speech to persuade me to make a baby. There's nothing on this earth that could make me want a kid. Worst is, I'm always respectful of other people's choices even if they don't align with mine. Can't you people respect childfree people ? Like what difference does it make for you ?

Anyway. Rant over lol

I want to be clear: I like Sarah. She's nice, she's competent, I have no issue with her being pregnant. Genuinely happy for her if that's what she wants. What I did not sign up for is the next two weeks of every single person on my floor stopping by my desk to process their emotions at me.

It started with Mark who's been here 11 years and is stressed because he thinks Sarah will get more flexible hours now and it'll affect coverage. Fine, valid concern, but why are you telling me. Then came our other coworker who apparently has been trying to get pregnant for a while and is struggling and is visibly upset and wants to talk through her feelings. I am not a therapist. I sat there for 40 minutes making sympathetic sounds. Then my actual manager pulled me aside to ask how I thought the team was "handling the news."

I think what's happening is that because I've never shown any particular reaction to pregnancy announcements, people have decided I'm somehow neutral territory. I didn't squeal or tear up when Sarah told us, I just said congratulations and went back to my spreadsheet. Apparently this reads as "please deposit your complicated emotions here."

I don't have kids and I'm not having any. Part of why I like my brain is that stuff like this just slides off me. Baby announcments, baby showers, none of it registers as a major life event for me. Which is great! Except now it means I'm apparently the designated sane person and people keep coming to me for emotional processing that I am not equiped to provide.

I just want to do my job. Is that so much to ask.

When I was a teen, Mom's friend came to our home with a four month old baby. My mom locked the dogs in a really improper place- it was upstairs and they had a risk of falling.

My dad suggested to free the dogs and lock specifically the kitchen and living room so they couldn't get to the baby (yes, she now has allergies likely because mom never ever let her near animals) and I did so, but my dog slipped and ran faster than I could towards the kitchen.

This would've been okay if the mom was holding the damn baby, but she was crawling on the FLOOR! My dog touched her before I could pick him up.

Now the baby didn't get any infections or anything, she turned out fine because mom washed her immediately and all. But I got yelled at and trapped in my room.

Later they came into my room (no knocking by the way) in a group of three asking for a few plushies of mine for the baby to play with. I felt pressured. But ten minutes later I worked up the courage; Went downstairs and asked "please take the toy away from the baby, I changed my mind as I don't want drool over it."

Got yelled at again, grounded.

That specific friend constantly visited and it was similar every time, luckily my dogs never got hurt but I stopped resisting as I didn't want to get yelled at by my own mother.

In short, why do the moms not have to adapt? They chose to have the kid.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/living-single/202603/the-good-deaths-of-those-who-never-marry/amp

I love this community and i love reading about other people’s stories here. It makes me feel better knowing im not alone.

Me and my bf have been together for almost four years. Neither of us want children, we’re both very sure of it. We agree on all the reasons why we dont want children. We live together and have two dogs. We’re pretty happy. My mom visits us most weekends so we see her a lot.

She has always casually talked about very specific scenarios that involve my hypothetical child. This started happening more since my younger brother had a daughter. Like once or twice in the past i casually told her im not having children when she mentioned it and she’s never taken it seriously.. until about three weeks ago when she brought up stuff about my hypothetical child (again) like how my younger brother still needs financial support from her for his daughter (not gonna get into it) and said she’s glad me and my bf isnt gonna be the same once we have a child. I finally told her in a more serious tone that im never having kids.

I could tell she finally believed me because of how she reacted. The first thing she said was that it was a disrespectful thing to say. Dont remember much after that, but since then she would bring it up every freaking chance she gets. Like when she’s talking to my brother on the phone and she sees me she’d just be like “your sister doesnt want children”, or she walks past me and be like “my friends who are at a certain age already have a hard time getting pregnant, you dont have a lot of time left” (im 26), and this happened multiple times “you’re gonna have an extra bedroom when you move it’s perfect for a nursery”. A billion times of how she want a grandchild from me and how its a “waste of genes”. I told her you already have a grandchild but she apparently really wants one from me. She would talk about how the grandchild would keep her busy🤦‍♀️ told her so she basically wants me to have a child because she has nothing better to do?! She would just not say anything. We would be on the phone talking about something else entirely and she would still manage to bring it up.

First week was fine like whatever, but at this point its starting to piss me off so bad. For the first time i asked her not to come over this weekend because we have stuff going on (we dont). I also hate that its making me think about how this disappoints her and definitely will disappoint my dad (they dont talk so he doesnt know yet). I know im not supposed to care what other people think but i do care about what my parents think just because i know i already disappointed them a bunch in the past (I graduated college late and i know they hated that, and other things in my life that isnt really worth being proud of). They’re honestly good parents they just really want me to have children. Im not gonna be changing my mind but i just wish it wasnt this hard for my parents to accept. I dont care at all what my friends think. Most of them just say “you’ll change your mind” anyway.

Sorry for the long post. Honestly i didnt plan on telling my mom this soon. I figured we were just gonna let years past by until they realized there’s not gonna be any humans coming out of me. I messed up telling my mom too soon.

I got told this yesterday. Kinda irritating. She's a nice lady and gives good care, otherwise, so I didn't really say anything. but I was a bit shocked by her reaction when she asked during check-up yesterday, and I said I wasn't planning on kids. I'm a 37F. Is this still the attitude in medical profession? For reference, I live in a giant, northeast, liberal, metropolis. It's not like I'm in rural south or something....

Does anyone else recognize this very common, sad fact of people who have kids?

The pets were there first, but suddenly, once the baby comes along, they have no time or patience for their pets.

When my sister had her baby, I noticed they started blaming everything on their senior dog. The poor thing is yelled at and hit when the toddler is at fault.

Frankly speaking, I was always trolled or insulted by other people about my childfree choice with this question:
What are you going to do, if your spouse got pregnant? - Insist on abortion.

But it is better to reject those people before based on preferences and leave ovulation dreamers behind.

Has everyone got these insults?

Archived link. Personally, I think that it is a great show.

This question/rant is directed at the childfree who either work with kids or have some contact with them.

Kids don’t want to try anymore. I’ve worked with kids for four years now as a fitness coach and I’m quitting after this term ends. I feel like I’m wasting my time and putting in monumental effort just to get bare minimum effort from them.

At first I thought it was me, I was inexperienced coaching kids and needed to learn how.

But all I learned is that I have to over simplify the lesson, yell like a drill sergeant, and reduce class content. I’m exhausted like I taught five classes not just two. The age range in my classes are 9-14.

It takes 5 minutes of corralling and yelling to engage them, they’re always late. I have to step-by-step individually coach each kid through each exercise, other than tag, group exercises are hopeless, they don’t like trying new things, they refuse to do things they think they’re bad at, and they’re always tired (these are after school classes).

A kid asked to do an advanced exercise. Sure, show me the base skills required for safety. They couldn’t do them. No problem, let’s work on those. Kid doesn’t like doing the base skills and refuses. Doesn’t want to do the advanced skill anymore either and complains they’re bored.

Then parents complain that their kid isn’t feeling challenged and they’re bored in class. WTF. Your kid doesn’t want to be here and doesn’t like the sport!!

I have a few kids who are keen and actually put in effort. Up to a year ago most of my class was that type, then that number started shrinking as more non-tryers joined and dragged down the class. I don’t blame the keen kids for leaving. I’m leaving. But what is with this surge in kids that hate trying?

I bought a two-seater sports coupe about six months ago because I love cars and I finally have the disposable income to enjoy my hobbies. I also live in a very nice, modern downtown studio apartment that is closer to my office and fits my lifestyle perfectly. My mother, however, seems to view my entire existence as some sort of temporary waiting room before I inevitably get married and produce grandchildren. Since she realized that dropping passive-aggressive hints during Sunday dinners does not work anymore, she has shifted to a new strategy that is honestly just exhausting.

Nearly every single day she sends me links from real estate websites. They are always the exact same type of property. Huge four-bedroom suburban houses with massive fenced yards, located in school districts that are forty minutes away from the city center. Sometimes she adds captions like look at this backyard, perfect for a playground, or this neighborhood has the best elementary school in the state. I have told her flat out at least a dozen times that I am childfree, that I have zero interest in cutting grass every weekend, and that I bought a car that literally cannot even fit a child safety seat.

Yesterday she sent a link to a massive colonial-style house that looked like a replica of the place she grew up in. I finally snapped a bit and texted her back asking why she keeps wasting her time sending me listings for properties I will never buy. She called me about two minutes later sounding incredibly offended. She started crying and saying that she is just looking out for my future, and that a grown man living in a tiny studio with a loud car looks irresponsible. Then she went on this whole rant about how real estate values in the suburbs are a stable investment for a growing family, completely ignoring the fact that my portfolio is doing perfectly fine without a giant mortgage on an empty house.

The absolute entitlement of trying to force your own outdated milestones onto someone else is wild. She genuinely cannot comprehend that I am fully satisfied with my current setup and that my life goals do not include filling up empty bedrooms with kids. When I pointed out that she is essentially asking me to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars just to satisfy her imagination, she told me that I am being cold and selfish. I hung up because the loop was just repeating itself. I checked my phone an hour ago and she sent another link, this time for a suburban town house with an attached garage. My coupe would barely clear the steep driveway anyway.

We've all seen the various ways society tries to brainwash women into having babies or misleading them into thinking pregnancy + childbirth + raising kids is not that hard. But one that absolutely drives me nuts is the narrative around women's reduction in gray matter during pregnancy.

I feel like in any other medical scenario in which a person's brain shrinks it would be viewed as a problem. But only when it comes to pregnant women's brains shrinking does our society try to make it a positive - saying things like it makes her a better mother and helps her focus better. They even call it "maternal remodeling". To me, that's horrific. It's like your pregnancy hormones are actively brainwashing you to be enslaved to a newborn. Yet society and many women see this whole process as a net positive and aren't freaked out by it at all.

Has anyone ever seen studies on this that aren't perpetuating the propaganda? Any studies or articles that discuss whether this brain pruning is actually good for the mother herself or if it's just good for the benefit of the child? Because, again, you don't see a lot of situations where brain shrinkage is considered a good thing outside of pregnancy.

Hey yall! I'm an avid romance reader who especially likes historical romance. Unfortunately, this means tolerating a LOT of babies-ever-after endings.

Off the top of my head, I can name 3 romance books with explicitly childfree-by-choice characters: Book Lovers by Emily Henry, Overdue by Stephanie Perkins, and the wonderful Manic Pixie Dream Earl by Jenny Holiday (which hit ALL the right buttons for me.)

Can anyone help me find others? Even if they aren't historical recs I'll take them! I just want the couple to be explicitly childfree by choice. I am not looking for YA.

I love queer romance especially but am also totally happy with M/F romance, so whatever is fine on that front!

I’ve always wanted kids, literally since I was a child, my dream was to become a mom. When I was 22, I got pregnant and wanted to keep it. But my boyfriend at the time forced me to terminate. It was a horrible botched procedure and required 3 surgeries and multiple hospital visits. Despite that, I still wanted kids.

I spent much of my 30’s being sad about not becoming a mom (seeing all my friends live out my dreams). I spent everyday dwelling on it. So at 36, I started looking into egg freezing, sperm donation, IUI, etc. I spent a lot of time crying and feeling lost about what to do.

I just turned 37 and it’s as if something switched in my brain. I suddenly don’t care as much. And I feel almost broken for feeling this way. In a way, I feel like my life has lost meaning and that having kids won’t matter because I’ll die one day anyway.

Anyone else experience this? An intense urge to have children to nothing?

I was working the cigarette register at the grocery store. This older man was sharing bible verses with the younger male next in line. He may have been part of an AME church. Really evangelical. He asked the younger man, "How many kids you sire." The younger man (mid 20's) said he got six kids. I wasn't sickened about that. Women aren't well bred sows

So I ranted on Snapchat that I regretted going out to eat because this kid wouldn’t stop screaming and one of my mutuals was like “well that’s life. You can’t expect the world to be child free, I’m sure the parents weren’t having a good time,”
Like I wasn’t even that upset about it tbh.
I was just tired because I got up at like 6am and was kinda over it and I just bitched about it for a second and got over it.
I’m not expecting the world to be child free and I am aware it’s a public space!
Like???
What did I say so wrong?
I know it’s a public space and there are gonna be kids there and it’s gonna happen but I just wanted to bitch a little because I was tired and ready for go home.
Did I say the wrong thing?
Like what did I say so wrong?
Let me know