Already Decided I Don't Want Marriage And Kids. Does Anyone Else Feel The Same?

[Philippa]

Thanks November Star. I think I meant selfish in the sense that I chose my life over giving it up for the required 18 years that it takes to fully raise a child or children. I see the other reasons, like not wanting to dump my stuff on my kids to be unselfish, which it is. But I was always a very aware person. Not everyone is that aware as a teenager or young adult.

I am nearly 40 this year, and I won't lie...the whole "biological clock ticking" thing is very real. But the fact remains I have not met anyone I would have a child with, at this stage, and the men I did consider it with were younger than me and realistically wanted a younger woman to bear them kids. I'm not sure I would have the energy at this stage...but who knows? I still have a bit of a blase attitude though...if it happens, it happens, if it doesn't...meh.

 

[Ketamine Dreams]

I think it's fine to decide not to get married and have kids. Being honest with yourself is important, as is not lying to another person who is interested in marriage and having kids. Keep an open mind about it though since you are young and could change your mind later.

 

[Tinyflame]

I didn't want to have kids because we have cancer in our family (genetically), and I didn't want them to get it or be left without a parent. Now I realize you can't control everything. But I've never felt a 'biological clock', probably because I did not want a child to be like 'myself'.

In terms of relationships, I know the difference to what is good or not, but also have to counter it with what a partner would have to deal with with me. So it's not really something I can speak of or imagine in generic terms, only in a day-to-day reality of choices.

 

[mytai]

I've already gone through the "baby craze" phase in my life. The majority of my friends were getting married and starting families when I was with my ex. I had a huge desire to hurry up and get married and start having kids. But that's changed, for me thinking about getting married and having kids is an instant moment killer. I may be considered selfish by my family, but it isn't their life and it isn't their choice. I'm tired of doing things because it is expected of me, or my family wants me to. I haven't told my family about my choice, and I probably won't because I don't want to be asked over and over what is wrong with me that I don't want marriage or kids. This is the one thing I will not cave about with my family - I let myself be pushed around and influenced by my family all too often - but this is one thing they don't get a say in.

I will not make a child feel unloved like I have felt my entire life. I will not make a child feel unworthy or undeserving of my affection. I've experienced this my entire life and I won't subject a child to that. Take all the traumatic events out of my life and I think I would still have issues with my mental health - my anorexia was entirely influenced by my mum making me feel inadequate as a daughter and human being. I like kids, I like babysitting kids, but I also like knowing I will be giving them back at the end of the day.

 

[Echo]

@mytai - whatever you decide to do about children is your affair and no-one else's. BUT (and it is a very big BUT), please do not believe that you would make a child feel unloved or unworthy or undeserving of your attention, or anything like that. Given the care and attention you give to your animals and other people, you would be exactly the opposite. I am completely the opposite to my abusers. Long before I remembered consciously what they had done to me, I actively chose all the time to do things differently from them. But even before choosing, I WAS and AM different from them. I do not abuse other people; I don't take the abuse I have suffered out on anyone else. That is not a choice, though I would choose it; it is just who I am. And it is just who you are, too. You are not an abuser. You are here to counteract abuse and to thrive.

 

[NovemberStar]

I still don't see it as selfish to not want to 'dedicate' your life to another human being in the unrelenting, demanding way having a child can do. I know that is the sentiment we in society are trained to believe - that having children is selfless and not having children is selfish. I just think it's responsible and its just another decision in life, not one needing to be related to a moral highroad - if that makes sense. No one would say buying a house or not buying a house is 'selfish' or 'unselfish'. Or getting married or not getting married is, or isn't either.

;)

 

[NovemberStar]

@Echo - I'm not sure about the OP, but for me, it isn't just about not abusing my children or repeating the cycle of abuse - it is in a small way I suppose, but its mainly that being in the depths of my illness, and struggling so much, there is no way I could be fully emotionally available to a child. Even when I was well (12 years without PTSD) and living a fully functional life, I knew it took all my emotional energy to stay well, and having a child, even back then, would have left me having to fight so hard to stay 'stable'. I guess I find life challenging enough without having the challenge of being responsible for a child.

 

[Echo]

@NovemberStar - for me these things can be interlinked. My mother was certainly not dealing with her mental illness when she was so emotionally neglectful of me. She didn't try and actively enjoys even now taking her stuff out on me. Her abuse of me and her tolerating of my father's abuse of me were, I think, choices. Many people put up with appalling circumstances and are still brilliant parents. I do though, of course, realise it wouldn't be easy at the height of PTSD, but that strikes at different people at different ages, and if it can be healed or well managed when one is young, it should not mean that one might not later have children. Part of the key to good parenting is being conscious of your choices isn't it and not being locked in the old psychdramas.

None of this may be relevant to @mytai's decisions now and later, but I just wanted to counter the pernicious myths surrounding people who've been abused in case she was fearing they may be true.

 

[mytai]

@Echo, my concerns and decision isn't based on the fact that I think that because I was abused I will become an abuser (although I know that is a fear for some). My decision is based on the fact that I know I am not emotionally available, and I wouldn't want to make a child suffer through my inability to provide the love and constant care they need just because getting married and having kids is what women are "supposed to do" in the eyes of society (and my family). My family will undoubtably see my decision as selfish but I know it isn't. I'm only in the very beginning of my healing process and I don't see this being "fixed" in the next 5 to 10 years (enough for me to revisit being in a relationship and having kids). I say this because I'm still dealing with active abuse and I can't even really touch a whole lot on the 18 to 20 years of abuse prior to this current garbage.

 

[Echo]

Yes, families and society tell you you are selfish when you don't have children. I find it infuriating and it was very hurtful to be told that I was a career girl, that it was the reason relationships failed, when none of that was true and I had lost babies. People didn't know or dismissed the real causes. But it really doesn't matter what they think in the end (about anything!); it is up to you. You know what you need to do, and even if you don't entirely, going with your gut feelings is the best way forward, isn't it?

 

[Hashi]

@Echo, I'm afraid I can't agree with your sentiments. Giving care to an animal or friend is nothing like bringing up a child. However well meaning any of us are, that doesn't necessarily anticipate how we would be during eighteen years of non-stop parenting.

As @NovemberStar says, the absence of acting out abuse (if we can) doesn't mean we can provide the emotional environment that's good for a child.

Maybe someone can and maybe someone can't. Who knows? - not me. I'd just suggest that none of us can be so certain that good intentions and resolutions mean everything will be OK. My highly abusive mother thought she was bringing me up as - quote - "a free spirit", because she was comparing that to her own abusive upbringing. I'm really uncomfortable with your seeming certainty about things that I don't think you can be so certain of.

 

[Echo]

@Hashi - I speak from my own 53 years' experience. I am perfectly certain that I have never abused anyone. I am sorry this makes you uncomfortable, but then you have no knowledge of my life, beyond what I have written on this forum.