To have or not to have, that is the question! A century ago, it was assumed in most cultures that if you were married, the next step was to start afamily. But nowadays, that expectation is starting to fade in many places, and some people have realized that they don’t actually have the desire to beparents.Redditors in their thirties and forties who never had kids have recently beenopening upabout the realities of beingchildfree, so we’ve gathered some of their most insightful replies below. Whether you knew from a young age that you always wanted to be a mother or you’re on the fence about whether or not to start a family, we hope you enjoy hearing these people’s perspectives. And keep reading to find a conversation with the person who started this thread!This post may includeaffiliate links.
To have or not to have, that is the question! A century ago, it was assumed in most cultures that if you were married, the next step was to start afamily. But nowadays, that expectation is starting to fade in many places, and some people have realized that they don’t actually have the desire to beparents.
Redditors in their thirties and forties who never had kids have recently beenopening upabout the realities of beingchildfree, so we’ve gathered some of their most insightful replies below. Whether you knew from a young age that you always wanted to be a mother or you’re on the fence about whether or not to start a family, we hope you enjoy hearing these people’s perspectives. And keep reading to find a conversation with the person who started this thread!
This post may includeaffiliate links.
My life is terrible, I am just glad I am not subjecting a helpless child to it. Probably the most responsible thing I have done with my life.
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40, have never wanted children, and my life is great. I get to travel and have expensive hobbies and live in blissful silence. There has never been a single moment in my life I’ve regretted not having children.
I am 38 and quite happy that I don’t have kids, I can barely take care of myself.
To find out how this conversation started in the first place, we got in touch with the Reddit user who invited others to share their experiences in this thread,Meizcathooman. “I started this out of curiosity; I was just trying to see what the common perception is among Reddit users,” he shared.We also asked the author if he’s interested in starting a family of his own. “I personally don’t want tohave kids. Although I’m just 24 right now, I still don’t see my stance changing anytime soon,” he noted. “There’s already so many people, I don’t want to contribute to this chain.”
To find out how this conversation started in the first place, we got in touch with the Reddit user who invited others to share their experiences in this thread,Meizcathooman. “I started this out of curiosity; I was just trying to see what the common perception is among Reddit users,” he shared.
We also asked the author if he’s interested in starting a family of his own. “I personally don’t want tohave kids. Although I’m just 24 right now, I still don’t see my stance changing anytime soon,” he noted. “There’s already so many people, I don’t want to contribute to this chain.”
I’m 39, and an American with the American healthcare and childcare systems, American political system, and American society. I can’t even f*****g imagine having a child in this country.
There are fewer freedoms greater than being child-free as a man. No regrets.My life isn’t great. It’s a sh**show, actually. But, unlike literally all my predecessors, I wasn’t stupid enough to create another life to inherit my problems.Whatever happens ends with me.
Love it. Kids are so difficult and I don’t even like em.
But the author knows how it feels to be expected to become a parent some day. “My family members definitely want me to settle down have kids and everything,” he told Bored Panda. “Pressure is definitely there, and society still sees childless people with a slightly demeaning point of view.”
Wife and I travel every year, we’re both in our early 40s, don’t struggle with staying fit and healthy and we have a sizeable savings account that we expect will help cover our retirement when we get there.So yeah, we’re perfectly happy.
37, happily married, happily childfree. Not having kids was the best thing we ever did. Working full time it already feels like we barely get enough free time to ourselves, I can’t imagine spending it taking care of a kid.
- It’s like your 20’s but back pain and money to enjoy your hobbies.
“There were many surprises, all sorts of stories about how some people had this view from a young age, and some changed when they met their partner. So many heartwarming stories too!” the author added. “I thoroughly enjoyed each and every comment, [whether they shared a positive] experience or not.”
- My life is awesome. A couple years ago I picked up and moved across country.I saw one of my favorite bands on Friday night, then Saturday morning went mountain biking with some friends. Then Sunday I slept in, got stoned all day while watching dumb movies and spent a bunch of time with my dog.I have never been in a situation where I thought “this would be better with a child”.
Amazing of course, but to each their own. I personally cannot understand why anyone would want children. I don’t have a paternal bone in my body, except for my four legged friend. My fiancé and I can do what we want, when we want, I just cannot imagine bringing up children. I am very capable and would make a responsible dad, I just simply have NO interest, at least in this lifetime. People may say, ‘well who will look after you when you’re very old’ however there is no guarantee for those with kids. In fact it probably ensures I take much better care of myself with older age in mind, that there is a high chance I will be alone, but aren’t we all, at the end of the day.
I’m in my 30’s and childfree, honestly, I couldn’t be happier with the decision. My life feels so full. I’ve been able to travel, focus on my career and dive into hobbies that bring me joy. I love the freedom to plan my days exactly how I want, wether it’s spontaneous weekend getaway or just enjoying some quiet time with my partner or pets.. that’s not to say I don’t occasionally wonder about the future like who will take care of me when I’m older. But those thoughts are fleeting because I know I made this choice intentionally. I’ve built a life that feels meaningful and true to who I am and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Being a childfree has given me the space to grow, experience and live fully in my terms.
Married, no kids. It’s great.We’ve got two cats. They’re pretty cool when they’re not being tiny terrorists.
I work, hike, volunteer, do hobbies, maintain my house, and rest.I’m happy with it. I never wanted to be a mother and I still don’t. I couldn’t imagine my life with kids. I’m glad I don’t have to worry about a child when bad things have happened to me in the past and future, too.
Taking care of myself, pets and a husband is enough responsibility for me. So glad with my choice. I’d be miserable otherwise.
Honestly I cannot imagine having to plan every aspect of your life around a kid.Also, kids ruin practically everything (such as planes, restaurants, theatre shows, quiet public spaces etc).
I absolutely don’t regret it. It was the right call for me as well as any “potential children”.I’m someone who would have had a child to feel like I had a family. Someone that was my family and that thought did occur to me a few times over the years. But it would have been selfish and led to misery, for everyone.Then I look at the news see what’s happening to our civilization and I KNOW I made the right choice.
I’m torn. There’s a deep want in me to have a kid. However, I don’t know if I’d want to bring another soul into this world to suffer. It’d be very selfish on my part. Although everyone has always told me I’d be a good mother, I think, for now, that love will go to my dog, my nieces and nephew, my partner, and my friends.
Living the dream: sleep, travel, brunch, repeat. No regrets here!
40 y/o here.So so happy. all my friends come to me they are exhausted and do nothing but vent. I get to go to nice restaurants whenever I like - for them it’s a logistical nightmare.
37 here and absolutely loving my decision. I travel whenever I want, my home is a peaceful sanctuary, and I’ve built an amazing career in marketing without juggling mom duties. Sure, my parents still bug me about grandkids, but I just send them pictures of my succulents instead. Zero regrets!
I’m 48f and childfree; not really a conscious choice, just never happened and I’m okay with that. Honestly, I lack the energy and patience to handle parenting anyway. I’m a proud Auntie of 4 nieces & nephews, who I love dearly and have been fairly involved in their lives. I have my pets to keep me company, and the money (from not raising kids) to pay for elder care if/when the time comes.I love my freedom! I can do what I want when I want, for the most part, and enjoy traveling on my own. In fact, I’m going on a solo cruise + trip to Europe next spring. Can’t wait. :-).
31 year old.Here are things I wouldn’t have been able to do had I decided to have children:1) Managed to move into other country on my own.2) Found a great workplace.3) Educated myself and been upgrading my professional knowledge through many courses (which would have been impossible with kids).4) Healed my past wounds through therapy.5) Visited exotic countries.6) Spent many peaceful and lovely afternoon naps with my partner7) Saved money so I can have a car of my own.I basically left my toxic circumstances, educated myself, earned money, did meaningful investments, met the love of my life…And I will continue to do courses and be exceptionally professional.I will continue to be there for people.I will do whatever pleases my heart… Without children.Because being a mother wouldn’t please me.My partner, friends, my grandmother, my colleagues, animals fill my heart with joy and happiness.I am actually very proud of myself that I managed to buy my first car ever. It’s such a relief and it made me realise that I would have probably been a struggling mom who would have to go back to work when the child is 1 year old.And I don’t think I can do that to a child.
My life is awesome. I have a kick a*s partner, weekends to myself and I’m picking up new skills and trying to break into new careers.Currently hand sculpting my own little range of fantasy miniatures as well as writing a graphic novel, even have an artist for it who’s done a few pages.My life is amazing.
Overall, yes - I am at peace with this decision. I am infertile so, options for having children that aren’t the “natural” way are extremely expensive. As a result of this infertility and the associated costs of adoption, IVF, etc - I lost the woman I loved because she wanted children. That was difficult to bear for a long time. However, when I consider the cost of everything associated with raising children and the reality that I would likely be working myself to death or living in or close to poverty, it puts my mind at ease.I ran into a friend at the grocery store this weekend. He as three children ages 8 months, 5 and 7 - they spend $1200/month just on childcare. That’s the equivalent of a second mortgage payment every single month. I asked him how they do it and he said they’re barely hanging on. I couldn’t live with that sort of financial anxiety all the time.Add in emergencies, medical issues, extracurriculars, climate change, the risk of gun violence, etc. Wages overall remain stagnant, inflation continues to rise… Then consider the cost of sending a child to college without setting them up for a lifetime of financial hardship due to student loans, the possibility that they will be living with you long term due to the job market, et al. It just seems totally unfeasible to me to raise children with a quality of life they deserve without working yourself to death.
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I’m 39, female, and married with a cat. Never wanted kids and I’m so immensely happy with my decision. I can do whatever I want whenever I want and never have to think about someone besides my wife. We have more money to do things like travel, and we don’t have to only go places that are kid-friendly - like Disneyland. I am happy to say I will go my entire life without changing a kid’s diaper. The idea of kids just makes me feel sad. I like my freedom and peace and quiet, and I hate how this is seen as “selfish” in society. Such BS.
Extremely. Wife and I are living our best lives. We get to just…do whatever the fk we want, whenever the fk we want. We don’t have to consider anybody but us, expensive hobbies aren’t a bad thing. Zero regrets at all. Every time a friend says “no, I can’t go to because of the kids” I am even happier.
I’m a 40 yr old woman and honestly I’m starting to have some regrets. Not life changing woe is me I ruined my life regrets, just dang wouldn’t it be cute if I had some art to put on the fridge. My husband is younger than me so it’s still feasible to have one soonish so I’m not an ancient parent, but the chips aren’t falling that way at the moment.
I legitimately don’t understand how people have children and remain dedicated to their work. I’m glad I don’t have to juggle more than work already is.
Honestly, no. I hate to admit it but life feels very empty.
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39M. Single, no pets. California based.Digital nomad who works in Client Services. I travel the world for about 3-4 months a year (Europe, Latin America) while renting my place out in California to a friend who’s also a nomad. Essentially we’re splitting my apartment.The freedom is amazing - I do anything I want when I want. When I’m traveling in South America I wake up at 10am usually, start work at noon and end at 8pm (depending on where I’m at), mostly just joining client or internal calls, making sure the team is hitting deliverables.I love seeing new cultures and places and exercising my brain with new languages.But it’s very lonely. Sometime I fly out an old flame from home to come stay with me for a week or two somewhere fun if I get really lonely or homesick (that’s expensive).But the harder part is when see adorable little kids walking down the street with their parents and start to wonder if I made the right decision. I see the amazing young adults coming into their own that my friends created years ago (they made people! How crazy is that!) and I again wonder if I’m living the life I should and could enjoy the most.I worry that I’ll look back in 30 years and regret it all. I’ll guess time will tell.
In my 40’s. Happy with the decision because I generally don’t like kids. Spending a couple of hours with my nieces and nephews is more than enough to remind me I made the right decision.Aside from that, I get to do whatever I want, whenever I want. Me and my wife love going to restaurants, I see my friends when I can, we go to a lot of concerts, I go see a decent amount of live sports, I play video games when I want, I drive a sports car instead of an SUV, I travel (but still not enough), my house isn’t destroyed, and my stuff isn’t sticky.
I’m definitely happy with no kids but I’ve seen children empower people who were complete messes and turn them into full blown adults. Meanwhile, I’m just a kid who never grew up. That is fundamentally the tradeoff - parents are (usually) forced to grow up whereas I’ve spent my life trying to do it.
I am very happy with my life. I have a partner, I have money, I travel.This week we are visiting family for Thanksgiving. We just now decided instead of going back home we are going to spend a week on vacation after this. Things like that are not possible with kids.
42, no kids, married 12 years. We never wanted children. I had my tubes tied so it would never happen.We’re gonna pay off our house we custom built to retire in in 2 years if not before. I have a pool. I have awesome friends and a dang full social calendar.I will admit most of our friends we see very often are much younger because they don’t have the child obligations. But they’re amazing friends!I tell my husband ALL THE TIME that I’m so glad we don’t have kids. I mean this economy is C**P. How can anyone afford it? And we love all our free time. We just like to spend our evenings hanging out doing our own thing. And Lord help all the sicknesses going around!He’s a big gamer. I’m a big crafter/maker. We collect board games.So happy to be child free.ETA: I do have a cat. Also, don’t tell my MIL about the tubes being tied. Not her business.I have been called selfish as I would be an amazing mom, but I don’t want to be. If God wants me to raise a kid, he’ll shove one in my life and I’ll take them home like a found kitten and tell my husband they live upstairs now.
31F here. I’d rather saw my arm off than take care of kids. My nieces are enough for me if I need my fix of being around kids. I went as far as to get a Salpingectomy done at age 25. Nooooo regrets. I hardly even want to take care of myself and I want to sleep in and be absolutely undisturbed on my weekends off lol.
100% do not regret being childless. (late 30s male)Everytime I see my friends with kids, I cannot understand how they do it, why they put up with it and where do they find the energy. I can never wishthat to me. I never once sat there and thought “I wish that was me”.As Marc Maron said, yeah I get lonely. But I never thought a kids would make that better.
36, no kids, getting a vasectomy soon to make sure of that.Kids are nice and at one point I wanted them. But for a lot of reasons, it just doesn’t make sense to me to create life. My parents had me when they were too old and as a result, my childhood was a little robbed. I buried my parents in my mid 20s. I don’t want to do that to my potential child. I believe there’s a point in like where you go from being your parents child, to their friend. You just hang out and talk casually, grill up, have a drink, whatever your thing is. I never got that opportunity and I feel robbed.Other reasons.. they’re costly, it’s a thankless job, the world kinda sucks and keeps getting worse. You sign them up for a life of work, taxes, illness, war, disease and an eventual death. My genes suck and I wouldn’t want to pass a ticking time bomb on to my potential kids.I have selfish reasons not to, but mainly selfless.If I ever really want to, I’ll adopt and save a kid from being forgotten in a system people claim to care about in theory, but don’t really in practice. There’s nothing magical about a kid that has my genes, to me.(Forgot the main question) But my life is pretty good. I travel when and where I want to. Maintain friendships and hang out with people (other childless people are easier to hang out with). I’m enjoying life, don’t really feel like I’m missing out on anything. I’ll probably be in the same nursing home as the parents who expect their kids to take care of them someday.
Wife and I are in our late 30’s and every few months we’re reminded how different things would be if we had kids. The current example is that we need to move for her job for the second time in two years and I couldn’t imagine pulling that off with kids. The expenses, logistics and emotional labor involved would be much more difficult with kids involved.We have to travel three hours to go see houses near my wife’s new office. We can pack up and drive down now and again over the next few weeks without trouble largely because we don’t have to worry about kid stuff. Our next week consists of driving to see family for Thanksgiving and then doing an extended weekend in NYC for a concert and some other shows/sightseeing. That’s just not really viable with school aged or younger kids to deal with.
Someone once told me: even though I don’t regret my decision not to have kids, I still grieve not having that life sometimes. That quote opened up so much headspace for me. I always worried that fantasising about having a life with loads of kids would make me regret my choice and that made me scared of my own thoughts. Now I can ponder freely once in a while without questioning my life choices!Happily childfree btw, I knew this when I was 15 and am 33 now.
Im 43, no kids. This is the best. Everyone i know who has kids never has time for anything. Im sure they love them but you rarely hear them talk about the positives the kids have had in their life. Its always complaining and the things they talk about make me even more glad i havent.
Tail end of 41, married, very happy. I have a dog, a house, 2 jobs, we travel a lot, I play a lot of video games, I teach martial arts, and have a very full life. I honestly just never felt a paternal instinct. I never wanted children. I remember my brother who is 5 years older telling me he wanted kids back when I was 13 or so, and I didn’t want kids just because I was so young and it would kick in when I got older and it just…. Never did. I stayed open to the idea but I never felt that want. Having kids was something I always saw as something I should only do if I 100% wanted it and wanted to be fully invested in, not because of anything societal or otherwise, and it just never clicked that way for me.
I will say that I’d be immensely unhappier with children. I have issues. Those issues wouldn’t get any better with the added stress and financial burdens that children bring. It’s the best passive decision I’ve ever made.
36f, married to 43m. 3 dogs. 3 houses. $ in the bank. Do whatever we want whenever we want. Travel often. Relax when we want.Hard to be happier.
40’s. Never wanted kids. I’ve always had the freedom to do whatever I want. I sleep to completion every night. I moved across the country on a whim when I was 29. My 20’s were so fun. I went out every night and had fun with my friends for years and years.Wouldn’t change a thing.
Yes I am focus on my career and personal growth. without the distractions or limitations that come with parenting. This might mean advancing in a career, changing industries, or starting a business.
Amazing! I’m dogfree too! Which makes it even better. I go where I like. I have savings. My house is clean. Honestly its awesome. I don’t see the appeal at all in having kids. Everyone I know who has kids just seems to have issue after issue. I guess it keeps them from being bored tho. But I never get bored, I have enough hobbies and interests. Work keeps me busy. Infact I actually dont know how I’d even have time to have kids.
36 and chillin' on the couch enjoying my whole week off. Hell no I don’t regret it and am very happy with that decision.
As someone in my 30s/40s, being childfree has allowed me the freedom to focus on personal growth, travel, and career, and I’m happy with my decision.
Yep, 100%.Always dreaded the thought of eventually having to have kids, then i found out that I didn’t have to, and even found a wife that felt the same way. So all in all it worked out great 👍.
Heading to my 30s soon and was always the guy that was always 110% not having kids. But ever since my sister had a kid and seeing the joy that could come out of it has made me second guess it. Now it’s more like 70-30.
53, no regrets. Currently playing on my phone with my dog snoring next to me.I got the COVID vax on Saturday. I was able to sleep almost all day Sunday.I also travel a lot. I recently started to scuba dive, which I love!!
Ask me when I wake up from my nap taken whenever I wish.
I’m 36 … no regrets whatsoever. Being able to fly business class (occasionally) is far more fun than cleaning up after a tiny human all the time. Not to mention - pregnancy seems like it would be awful..
Ugh I’m so happyyy to sleep in and be high whenever I want. Too selfish to give that up.
I don’t like it. i feel like I’m wasting time.
I’m 34, I would like to meet someone and do the family thing. I don’t want them enough to be a single parent, I won’t be getting a doner or adopt alone.I also love my life, I do what I want when I want and never have to think about putting a child before me. Some of my friends with kids do sacrifice aspects of their life, but they knew they would need to do that when they had them.Sometimes I feel I’m ok either way having them or not but I don’t want to get to 40 and think am I missing out.
Apparently I’m in the minority. I wish I had a kid.
I just turned 35 and i’m child free immaturity and bad decisions ruined the few romantic relationships i had and worse decisions have made that state of being permanent. i wanted a wife and kids. im not happy.
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