The Simple Reason Why We’ve Decided NOT To Have Children

Will i regret not having children? Weirdly, this seems like such a taboo subject, especially coming from a married woman. Sadly, it’s drilled in to us that once you’re married (or even before), as a woman, should want to start a family. Not having children, even these days, still seems to be a bit of a strange subject. I can’t tell you the amount of times i’ve had people ask me when we’ll be starting a family now we’re married. Then when we tell them we aren’t going to, it’s as though they look at us like we’re aliens! As though they might melt if we touch them, desperately wanting the ground to swallow them whole to get away as fast as possible.

Yes, i do understand that many people do want to have a family of their own. However, not everyone is like that, and that’s what people need to understand better. We don’t judge those who do want kids, so why shouldn’t we get the same respect in return?

Many people have even asked why we bothered to get married if we don’t want to start a family! Some thing i don’t get at all. Surely you don’t have to just want to get married to start a family? I wanted to get married to my best friend. To show our love in front of our friends and family. To become a family ourselves. Plus, when you live together, being married makes the whole finances thing so much easier in the long run! But who cares what our reasons were. We wanted to get married and NOT have kids – end of story! Even now writing this i feel i need to defend our reasons for doing so.

Growing Up

Growing up, i was never in to any of the ‘girly’ things. I didn’t have dolls, or fake babies to take care of. I was out with my brothers, climbing trees, building forts, getting as muddy as we possibly could. There wasn’t ever a time i even remember thinking about wanting to become a mother, EVER!

As i got a bit older i thought maybe the whole maternal thing would kick in – still waiting for it at 38! Children just didn’t interest me in that way, and still don’t.

I always felt that I was missing the gene that makes you feel female, or feminine. I guess the best term of me would be a ‘tom boy’. Even things like wearing make-up, or dresses, skirts, heeled shoes, jewellery…etc, were never even on my radar, and they still aren’t.

But what does this have anything to do with not wanting to have children you ask? To be honest, i don’t really know. I guess i’ve just never felt like a ‘typical’ female in any sense at any point throughout my life. I thought all of this might change as i got older, but if anything i feel even more as though i don’t fit that ‘role’ in society. I’m just ME i guess!

Will I Regret Not Having Children?

I even get people asking if i think i’ll regret not having children when i’m older. Well, i’m 38 now and still don’t want to have kids. I don’t think being a mother was ever intended for me. So, how can you miss something you never wanted or had to begin with?

I honestly think that if we had gone down the route of having children, we would have regretted that! It would’ve been for the wrong reasons. Doing it because society says we should. Or because we felt pressured by our parents, wanting to become grand-parents. We feel complete not having children in our lives so it would be selfish to bring something like that into our lives when we don’t really want it.

The only thing i feel guilty about is that i know our parents would have loved to become grand-parents. Taking that away from them isn’t a nice feeling, but to do it for them would have been so wrong!

Especially these last few years during the pandemic, we have been so thankful not to have had children to look after. We’ve seen friends and family really struggle with having their children at home with them 24-7. Trying to juggle life, working and at home schooling.

What Were The Reasons Not To Have Kids?

I’m sure there are different reasons not to have kids, depending on the people and their situations. However, for us, there were many reasons not to have kids, which is ultimately why we didn’t. As i mentioned above, we feel complete without children. Kids aren’t something we wanted to add to our lives, so we didn’t. We love our lives as they are now. We both get to do what we want, when we want. Some might say that’s a selfish way of thinking. However, wouldn’t it be more selfish to do something just because society says that’s the more ‘normal’ thing to do?

Do You Hate Children?

No not at all! We have an amazing nephew who we get to see and spend time with often. Also, many of our friends have children who we adore. We just didn’t want that for ourselves. I’m such a kid at heart and even at 38, i love going to the park with my nephew, going down slides WAY too small for me. Swinging as high as we can on the swings. Playing hide and seek…etc. Just because we don’t want children ourselves, doesn’t mean we hate children – at all.

I love that we don’t have to worry about anyone else in that way. When we get home from work, we can relax and do whatever we like. No homework to try and figure out. No putting the kids to bed, or worrying about their futures.

I hope this article has maybe answered many questions some of you have when it comes to people deciding they don’t want to become parents. What are you reasons not to have kids?