Parenting: Are Child-Free People Misunderstood Or Missing Out?

When it comes to children, many believe they’re a blessing and even more believe they’re a duty. There’s an unspoken fundamentalist belief that the most important thing a human could do is create another human. Unfortunately, it’s gotten so entrenched in our culture that it’s led to harmful beliefs—like forcing women who don’t want children to have them and shaming people who can’t have children. The modern age has given people more choices than ever on how to live. So why are people so reactionary when their peers remain child-free?

Child-free by choice

Like every facet of adult human life, such choices lie on a spectrum. In the parental continuum, some people find themselves completely unable to like children. They have no patience for them and avoid them the way ophidiophobes avoid snakes. For such people, children are like an alien species that they can’t relate to and they even wonder how they were ever children. Some would like to think that they were born fully grown because a lot of the accompaniments of childhood—bright colours, loud toys, unabashed screaming, messiness—are things they’d rather avoid even on their best days. When they go to family events and people line up to hold a baby, they’re more likely to hold the door open for the baby’s admirers.

Another group is people who love children but choose not to have any of their own. This also comes with a range of reasons. For some, children are a blessing but they’re also an expense they’re not equipped for. They have carefully considered how much it would cost to raise a child and see it’s not practical for their futures to do this. However, this doesn’t prevent them from doting on any young person who bestows them with attention. In other instances, this can be because of chronic illness, being a caregiver to someone else, or environmental reasons. A report by the BBC found that many young people don’t want to have children, even when they love them, because of climate anxiety. According to them, it feels unethical to bring a child into the world in its current state.

Others simply don’t want children because they want a lifestyle without parenthood. They’re loving aunties, uncles, godparents, or mentors but they don’t want to be mum or dad. Lifestyle choices can also impact the decision to be a parent. If you have a job that requires travelling, you may not want to be a parent. Adults can also choose not to have children because they have careers that require too much effort and they don’t want to sacrifice that for children.

Childless not by choice

Becoming a parent is difficult on the body and personal finances. Very few countries in the world offer subsidized childcare. Some people also have conditions that don’t allow them to have children. According to the World Health Organisation, at least one in six people of reproductive age experience infertility. This can happen as primary and secondary infertility. Primary infertility is when a woman can’t achieve pregnancy while secondary infertility is when pregnancy has been completed before. Doctors can diagnose infertility if an adult has been having regular unprotected sex for at least a year without getting pregnant. Sometimes when people experience this, they wrestle with the decision to become parents. Others opt for adoption or surrogacy but these processes are reserved for wealthier people. They are forced to remain without children because they don’t have other options.

Some illnesses prevent pregnancy or make carrying a pregnancy to full term impossible or difficult. They include endometriosis, mental health conditions, polycystic ovarian syndrome, thyroid disease, pelvic inflammatory disease, diabetes, cancer, and sickle cell anaemia. The costs of managing these conditions can also be high and make parenthood a choice that patients and their carers must forego. Sometimes, adults who would love to be parents make the difficult choice not to have children because they have a genetic condition they don’t want to risk passing down.

In other instances, adults haven’t found the right partner they’d want to raise children with. It’s certainly possible to raise a child as a single parent, there’s less stigma for them. People also get in nonconformist arrangements where they become parents without traditional relationships. However, some people would still rather have a nuclear family and when they can’t find a partner, they forego parenthood.

Another common reason is childhood trauma. Although this straddles the line over choice. Some people choose not to have children because of what they went through while others can’t because they’re not recovered from trauma. Negative experiences with family can colour parenthood and unless they get extensive mental health treatment and management for the rest of their lives, they can’t even consider becoming a parent. Other times, mothers can struggle to start a family again if they lose their child due to a miscarriage or the death of a child.

When society is threatened by the childless

There’s nothing more suspicious to some than an adult past a certain age without children. If you’re a woman, there has to be something fundamentally wrong with you. Iif you’re a man, surely, you’re waiting for the right woman to come along. Many people who have a problem with the child-free don’t seem to grasp the complexities behind such a decision. To them, being child-free is an anathema.

A divide of opinions is simple to navigate, you just agree to disagree. But when you choose not to be a parent, this is a lifelong choice not just an opinion. For child-free by-choice people, having no children is liberating. For those who can’t have kids, it’s agonising. But those who herald parenthood as the most important thing you can do, it’s something they can’t comprehend. Sometimes they even view child-free adults as insulting.

When you ask most child-free adult women why they chose not to have kids, they often insist on how happy they are. Others don’t see it that way. They think you’re irresponsible, immoral, or even someone who can’t hold down a relationship. They believe there has to be something wrong with you, even if you love children but don’t want kids.

Some child-free people believe this is reactionary because these parents regret having kids, at least at the time they did. Children bring with them joy, memories, and someone who can inherit your legacy but they’re also complicated and expensive. Other child-free people believe that parents nurse their resentment towards child-free people because a child is a lifetime commitment and they wish they hadn’t made it. But because they can’t undo such a commitment, they’d rather have other people join them, misery loves company. However, this is an uncharitable look at the situation. While there may be a percentage of parents that resent child-free people, it’s more of a lack of understanding between the two camps.

Child-free married couples vs married parents

There is an even bigger divide among married people who are child-free and those who are parents. Child-free married couples have their own mapped joy and get their fulfilment from other things outside of children: travel, careers, and pets. To parents, this seems—incomplete. Many parents also argue that if you don’t have kids, you won’t have anyone to take care of you when you’re old. Child-free people then rebut that you can’t have children for the sole purpose of having a caretaker when you’re old. Having kids isn’t even a guarantee that they’ll take care of you when you’re old.

Parents also confess that they have children because it’s what is expected of them. They couldn’t envision a world where they exist not as parents. When child-free people rebel against that, it feels like refusing to be human. But it’s not. Child-free people remain valid and according to some studies, happier. According to The Conversation, women who are child-free by choice have a better sense of individuality, and identity, are freed from their role within the family, have more financial stability, are less stressed, and have better marriage stability. Child-free by choice men were also happier and satisfied with their decisions. Why is it such a bad thing when people prioritise their happiness?

The real conversation we should be having

In countries like South Korea, birth rates are reducing drastically. Women have expressed multiple reasons for this. In South Korea, this is because of unaffordable housing, long working hours, increased cost of living, focusing on careers, the motherhood penalty, high cost of education, and changing attitudes towards family. Instead of focusing on child-free by-choice people, society should care more about people who want to become parents and how to make it easier for them.

Countries should make childcare affordable and homes should divest from forcing women to bear the brunt of it. There should be more accommodation for mothers in workplaces, and schools. Housing, education, and healthcare should also be more accessible and affordable for families. Reducing the stress around parenthood makes life easier for parents and this will be more beneficial for society as a whole. Norway has many family-focused policies and this means women don’t lose a high quality of life after becoming parents.

For child-free people, living without children becomes less about making sacrifices and more about realising you just don’t want to be a parent. People shouldn’t have to give up their dreams to become parents. For others, their dreams come true simply because they aren’t parents.