When I was about ten, I announced that I intended to have eight children. I assume that my intent was to shock or impress someone but, having said this, I stuck with this idea for the next several years. Until I neared adulthood and a time when I could have actually had children. Then I realized I wanted no children. None.
This shouldn't have surprised anyone. When my sister wanted to play with baby-dolls, I had her line them up on the bed and we played 'adoption'; I had her fill out paperwork and take 'home' a 'baby'. I never touched the dolls. I'm pretty sure I never had a doll that cried or 'wet' or took a bottle. I'd have certainly been given one if I'd asked, but I don't think they ever appealed to me. The dolls I enjoyed were 'adult' dolls - Barbie and her ilk - and I had them go to college and embark on careers and take fabulous vacations.
When my mother's friends would come to visit and bring their children, I resented being sent out to play with those kids. I wanted to stay indoors and listen to the adults talk. They had interesting conversations, didn't find it necessary to run around outside, and they rarely got dirty. So somewhere along the way, I realized that not only did I not want children, I didn't like children. I still don't. I don't like anything about them, the cries/smells and needs of an infant, the way toddlers always seem to have sticky hands and make annoying sounds, the interrupting adult conversations ... until a child is at least able to participate intelligently in conversation and wait to take a turn to speak, I don't want to meet it.
From about the age of 20, on, I made it very clear to anyone and everyone that I Would Never Have Children. The way this blog would be expected to go is that I'd, somehow, wind up having a child and realize that being a mother is The Greatest Thing in the World. That's not what happened.
I never did have a child. I consider deciding not to have children the best decision I ever made. There is nothing about it I regret.
Society disapproves less now than it did when I was 20, but the expectation is still that women want to be mothers. People still shake their heads sadly, assume that you must be infertile, or fret about the fact that you will "come to regret" this decision. I've even had a boyfriend's parents (whom I'd not yet met) point out to my boyfriend that I'd probably want to get married soon because I wouldn't want to wait (at my age) to have children.
This paternalistic belief that a woman who chooses to be childless can't possibly really know what she wants is more than annoying; it's dangerous. Every ob/gyn I had refused to tie my tubes because I "might change my mind" down the road. No matter that if I had, I'd have been the one to have to live with that choice, no matter that I'd shown no signs of ever changing my mind, no matter that it is MY body, they were convinced they knew best. And female ob/gyns were often the most self-assured on this point! So I took birth control pills for decades and, had I ever gotten pregnant, I'd have had to undergo an abortion, because the medical profession felt that I wasn't capable of knowing what I wanted.
It was with real relief that I passed my child-bearing years. No more birth control pills and no more disappointment from self-righteous physicians. I can say "I can't have children" and no one dares judge me for that.
This choice has had effects on my life. More than once, I dated lovely, desirable men and knew the relationship was doomed because they wanted children. More than once I've walked away from friendships with women I've loved because they had children and I couldn't pretend to want to be around their offspring. But overall, it remains the best decision I ever made.
Yes, I have some friends who've reared truly lovely children, people whom I now enjoy. But to get them to that point, they had to endure things that strike terror into my heart: teething, two a.m. feedings, teen-age years. And I have other friends who, knowing what they now know, would have likely decided to remain childless. In fact, I don't think I have a single friend who, whether they remained child-free by choice or not, now wishes for motherhood.
I am truly thrilled for all those who want to do - and do - become mothers. The world has to keep procreating if it is to survive and I appreciate the willingness of many to do this job. I am grateful.
But society owes to those of us who've chosen not to have children, gratitude, also. It's unlikely anyone who really doesn't want/like children would be a good parent, so isn't it wonderful that some of us realized that and have volunteered not to add another dysfunctional family to the world?
