Why you shouldn’t pretend to be “happily childfree”
Recently, a close friend announced that she’s pregnant. I’m really happy for her, but I was also surprised. She’d talked quite a bit about how she and her husband absolutely didn’t want kids.
When I casually mentioned this, she was silent for a moment. Then, awkwardly, she told me that they’d actually been trying for years. The “we don’t want children” stance had been a front, so they could avoid painful questions and appear as though they’d actively chosen to be childfree all along.
She’s not the only friend who has talked to me in depth about choosing — and loving — the childfree life, only to relievedly announce a longed-for pregnancy further down the line. When this happens I always feel excited and glad for them, but there’s also a nagging feeling that something isn’t right.
When I was younger, I assumed that feeling came from fear and worry. My friend is about to throw a grenade into her life (because I can’t help but see parenthood this way) and we won’t be quite as close as we once were.
This time, I felt just a tiny bit betrayed.
I’d rather friends said nothing at all, than lie and suffer the pain that comes from hiding their true feelings. I won’t ask — I never ask if other people want children or not, because it’s none of my business — but I feel bad that just by talking to them about my not wanting children, I will have caused them some of that pain.
And I sort-of resent that I trusted them with my own feelings. As friends we’d bonded, at least in part, over a ‘controversial’ life choice I thought we had in common. If a close friend tells you they feel the same way as you about not having kids, you’ll naturally open up and share things with them that you might not with someone who doesn’t.
(I imagine parents are the same with other parents: when you’re part of the same ‘club’ it’s just easier, because there’s no need to set context or apologise in advance. Everybody gets it).
It’s hard enough for people — especially women — who don’t want children to talk about that choice freely, without fear of judgement (whenever I talk or read about this actual fact, some empty-headed people will always scoff: “No-one cares whether you have kids or not! Stop making it all about you.”)
Telling people you chose not to have kids, especially when you’re over 45 and there’s no chance you will, tends to elicit awkwardness, pity, confusion, or huffiness. There’s a good chance you’ll be spoken down to — unconsciously or not — by people who think you haven’t really grown up. To them, you just haven’t developed the deeper meaning that having kids brought into their lives (or so they claim, anyway).
So those people who feel the same way as you are your allies. Your kindreds. Precious people you don’t have to censor yourself around.
Pretending to your friends that you don’t want kids, like the childfree life is a coat to be put on and taken off at will, isn’t a nice thing to do. It’ll hurt you, and it’ll also make your friends who chose childfree-ness feel a bit guilty and weird.
Those friends might think twice about who they choose to share the details of their lives with in future, which means the childfree will retreat even further into the murky backwaters of society.
So please, don’t do it.
