Being Childfree

Bash away!

2011-07-04T07:31:00.004+08:00

Ok, no, I don't condone hitting kids, but when one kid takes on another kid who was trying to rip off his stuff, I'm all for it.

I am certainly NOT for parents who say "Ok, he's no angel, but he didn't deserve punishment for trying to break into someone's house."

Yes, yes he does. He deserves to be punished, as do the parents for raising such a socially retarded child. When are we going to start holding people accountable for what they do? Why is this not standard practice?

Kids out wandering the streets at 930pm at night? Where are the parents?

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/son-cops-rough-justice-to-the-head/story-e6freoof-1226086683599

Airline bans babies in First Class

2011-06-30T09:23:00.003+08:00

http://www.couriermail.com.au/business/malaysian-airlines-announces-they-will-ban-babies-from-flying-sirst-class-after-complaints-from-passengers/story-e6freqmx-1226084221125

Thank. God. Finally, some sense.

Of course, my sister is the only one of my Facebook who disagrees. Shame. Before she had kids, she used to think with her head, not her womb.

If ONLY I could afford to fly first class. *sigh*

There is nothing worse than children on a plane. If I had the money (and excellent lawyers) I would start a No-Kids Airline. Kids are the WORST on planes - ignoring of course durnken pissing Kiwis. (http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10735146)

I was fortunate once to get a Business Class upgrade and had to endure a screaming baby who was in the first row of Cattle Class. I hated it. I hate flying but it is a necessary evil. I do use ear plugs but most baby screams pierce through those like a hot knife through butter.

Planes need a parents section so that those who choose to burden their life with children are not a burden to those who choose not to.

2011-06-27T14:14:00.000+08:00

Vanity, thy name is MOI.

A while ago, I bought a Keratin straightening treatment off of a Groupon website for $55. Why not? I won't pay the $500 Australia wants to charge, but I will try it for $55.

I have had curly hair all my life. I like it, but at the same time, it's annoying.

Exhibits A and B (me with curly, long hair) - ps these pics are old, sorry:

Those are both pretty natural, not a lot of product in it, left to air dry etc etc. I am laaaaazy when it comes to my hair. LAAAAZY.

The last time I got a trim, they straightened it Exhibit C:

That's straight. WOW.

I do own a straitening iron and I have tried to do it myself. I can't find that pic at the moment. Suffice to say, it was not well done. FOUND IT!!

Exhibit D :

If this hair straightening fails, I can always shave my head again! Exhibit E:

Failing that, there is my wig collection, Exhibit F:

GODDAMMIT! All these pics make me miss Hong Kong. Bastards.

I got a B! No, Ralph, that's an F. I must've spilled some kahlua.

2011-06-27T05:11:00.001+08:00

As we established in my last and many of my recent posts, I do love love love my new(ish) job. LOVE IT. It's like my own little corner of Hong Kong in Brisbane. LOVE IT.

Why do I love it?
1. The parents are overseas. NO PHONE CALLS! No parental interference. AWESOME.
2. They are paying HUGE money to be there.
3. They are adults. (I know I call them kids but since they are HALF my age, they are kids)
4. It's a prep year for uni so it's srs bzns.
5. I have great support people and a really cool English staff.
6. It's close to home.
7. The pay is good.
8. The hours are flexible.
9. My students are AMAZING and I love all my classes.
10. Very little discipline problems means I get to TEACH in the time allotted to teach. *shocking*

However, like any job, there are drawbacks.

My complaints are not with the job/workplace itself, although there are issues, but with teaching in general.

#1: "Teacher, why did you GIVE me that mark?" Oh my sweet child o mine...I gave you nothing. I merely wrote down a numerical representation of the work you gave me to review. If anything, you should look at it as you gained those marks, as you started with 0 prior to submission.

While I admit my marking suffers at times (too tried, too bored, too drunk), on the whole, I think I am consistent. I have almost 20 years of practice doing it. Well, 17. Not quite 20. Let's not make me older than I am, shall we? Thanks.

If you follow the guidlines given, trust me, you WILL pass. The school lays it out pretty damn well for you all. If you have questions, ASK. I don't bite (hard). I can be nice. If you don't ask, I assume you know. I assume you are ok. I have heaps of students. I can't chase you down because I *think* you might have issues.

#2: "But but but....the OTHER kids got...." This might be the #1 reason for me not to have kids. If the other kids jumped off a bridge, would you? You would? Cool. Let's go find that bridge. Leeming. Don't let me stop you.

I had a girl the other day say to me "But, teacher, all the other Korean students I know got 6s and 7s." That's.....great. And? Maybe their teachers like them more than I like you. Maybe their teachers were more drunk than me when they marked their papers. Maybe they bribed their teachers better than you bribed me. Or, maybe, JUST MAYBE, they did better work than you did. Maybe they have better attendance than you do and therefore, are more aware of the requirements of the assessment pieces. Just. Maybe.

#3: "How can I get you to give me 90%" My standard answer is $100 per grade. You want a 90? 90 X $100 is the going rate. "Oh but miss, I have a 70 now. I should only pay for the 20%." No, my darling dumpling face. If you are bribing me and I may lose my job, I need a bigger cushion than $2k. Now, fearing that some of my students now COULD bribe me, I need to be more careful. Or up my rates. Or remind them that the easiest way to get a 90 is to follow the well-laid out criteria and DO THE WORK.

#4: "Yes, I know the deadline is XX date but for me, you can change it, right?" Yanno what, my little pudding cup? Due dates, like road rules in China, are merely a suggestion. I can't FORCE you to hand in your assessments on that date. In fact, if you don't, there is precious little I can do....other than remove 5% per day it is late, which is what EVERY SINGLE TEACHER at the school will do. You're sick? Sorry. I hope you have friends you can trust to get the paper in on time. Also, this due date was stated pretty damn clearly at the START of the year. Yeah. You've known for over 3 months. Do you hear that? No? World's smallest violin playing for you, sugar lump.

#5: Mobiles in the classroom. I am not blind or stupid. When your head is bent over the desk, I KNOW what you are doing. Stop it. When you ask me for help a week later, I remember this and I wonder why you missed the oh so important information I pass on to everyone the day you decided it was more important to watch the NBA playoffs on your iPhone. You're 18. WHY DO YOU NEED AN iPHONE?

#6: Being late. This is not just in the classroom. This is in life. If you have an appointment time, MEET IT. My classes start at a certain time for a reason. Look, I am the FIRST one to bitch that Brisbane transport is BEYOND shit but *I* know this. You've been here 4 months and you know. When it's a problem, as you know it is, LEAVE YOUR HOUSE EARLIER. All the empathy in the world from me over BNE transport won't change your sagging attendance figures.

#7: "Other teachers gave their students XX and YY." Again, that's nice. And what do you want from me? It's not like they gave them the test in advance. I agree that for the most part, we should be all on the same page with what we tell the students but at the same time, I can't speak for teachers who have been here longer than me and therefore have a better clue. Also, I am not doing your review for you. I won't spoon feed you. Here's a shocking truth, sugar plum, you need to learn these things for yourself. SHOCKER. By me not telling you exactly what you need to know may make me "mean" but at the same time, it prepares you for the real world. You're not going to be in bubble wrap forever.

All in all, I loooooove my job and my chosen profession but sometimes, just sometimes, I would like to smack some kids with a Clue By Four.

Kids are great, Apu. You can teach them to hate the things you hate and they practically raise themselves

2011-06-26T06:48:00.000+08:00

Normally, I am not one of *those* CFers. I don't want kids. Yours are fine. I enjoy reading Booj. I am a teacher FFS. If you want to be knocked up and are, I am truly happy for you. If you don't want to be and are not, awesome! Let's have a drink. I don't GET the desire, never having felt that bio clock once. Did I hit snooze or throw it through a window?? I dunno. However, certain things make me want to SCREAM at breeders to STFU. If you think this might offend you, you might want to stop reading.

G showed me THIS ARTICLE last night. This morning, I am still fuming. Not about the article, mind you, but about the mindless fucking comments but mindless fucking breeders that followed.

One comment, I want to cut and paste and plaster all over parenting forums.

"Steve & Liesel have said what I was going to say: this would be about the 10th article I've read in The Age over the past few years on this "issue". It is BORING, BORING, BORING. Clem, if that's really your name, just get on with your life and stop whingeing about this sort of thing. You don't want kids - good luck to you. Couldn't care less & don't want to read articles about it. And Age editors: stop printing articles on this really tedious subject.
Peter | Northcote - June 21, 2011, 11:14AM"

Now, if I can edit this to read "This would be about the 1000000000th article I've read in The Age over the past few DAYS on this "issue". It is BORING, BORING, BORING. Parents, just get on with your life and stop whingeing about this sort of thing. You wanted kids - good luck to you. Couldn't care less & don't want to read articles about it. And Age editors: stop printing articles on this really tedious subject." and then paste this on every single fucking article about parenting or in comments when someone bemoans "Won't someone think of the children" or feels that bringing up the fact that they are a parent means they should get special treatment, I'd feel better. The majority of people have or want kids. This does not make it special when EVERYONE is doing it.

What I wish would happen is that Clem or whomever managed to get This Section peppered with those comments and removed. Does the paper (online or print) NEED a baby section? I think not. You can't read the paper today without being bombarded with ads and baby info. Even my Facebook is trying to convince me to shit one out, with IVF and "Why aren't you a mother" ads on the side.

Have em, have 19 (bit excessive), don't have em, can't have em... why does everyone think that they get a say in what a woman does with her uterus? If you have em, people want you to have more. Can't have one. Oh no. That's selfish. Have more than 3? OMG You're insane having so many? Don't you know about birth control?? Can't have em? Awww...you poor thing, have you considered adoption (bc that's EASY!) or IVF (which is SO cheap!)? Don't want em? What's WRONG with you? Clearly, you are not a real woman. Have you no heart?

While parents may think that their kids are the reincarnation of jeebus and the sun shines out their babies bottoms (last I checked, that is the LAST thing that came out of a baby's bottom!!!), having a baby is NOT a big deal. It's what 'should' happen. As someone said in the comments :"Sure, "congratulations" are in order, but getting pregnant doesn't usually involve a special skill. We've being doing it for a good million years and it takes as much work on average from a PhD as it does a drunk 16 year old." Christ, if Bristol Palin can do it....

*sigh*

720am and my blood is boiling. Maybe a good thing, since it's f'n cold here this AM.

Oh, and a bonus article: Whining is the worst sound. Later today, the papers will report that water is wet and that the sky is blue. THANK YOU CAPTAIN OBVIOUS! You're welcome, No-Shit Boy!

Since I have most likely offended people, unfriending line to the left please.

WHAT THE HELL!!!!!!??????

2007-12-20T00:12:00.001+08:00

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/foreign/richardspencer/dec07/failed-adoption-press.htm

http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?t=33911094

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=501281&in_page_id=1811

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071216103352AAG7v7K

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/china/2007/12/12/134586/Dutch-diplomat.htm

http://dutchjackalgirl.net/expatlair/index.php?topic=1288.0

Girl had bonding fear, says envoy
Barclay Crawford
Updated on Dec 14, 2007
The senior Dutch diplomat who gave up his adopted Korean child says she was suffering from a severe fear of bonding when the family handed her over to the Social Welfare Department last year.

The statement came as a woman who babysat for the family in Indonesia in 2001-02 said the girl, now 8, was treated differently to the couple's natural offspring.

Social welfare lawmaker Fernando Cheung Chiu-hung said he had been told by the Social Welfare Department that the girl's condition had improved remarkably since she left the Poeteray family. She was now happy and healthy with no mental problems. Mr Cheung, who will meet the girl, said she would remain in Hong Kong.

Raymond Poeteray and his wife, Meta, said in the statement last night that the girl's condition became so serious in the middle of last year that, on the advice of medical specialists and staff from adoption agency Mother's Choice and the Social Welfare Department, a decision was made to place her in temporary care.

"After our daughter became part of our family, it proved very difficult to get through to her," they said.

"In Jakarta, where we were transferred in 2000, it was not possible to identify the cause of the problem. Only after we moved from Jakarta to Hong Kong did medical specialists make the diagnosis that our daughter suffers from fear of bonding in a severe form. We tried to cure her through intensive family therapy, but to our great disappointment she did not get better. On the contrary, the situation got worse and the family began to suffer greatly from it."

The statement also confirmed the family has since not had any contact with her. "That was a terribly painful and sad moment for us, but we saw no other option."

The couple said they had followed Korean law for the adoption.

"The reason [she] does not have a Dutch nationality is simply a result of the fact that all her medical problems have prevented us from completing the naturalisation process. We hope this explanation will evoke some sympathy for our situation."

The family's former babysitter said she believed the treatment of the girl while she was with the family was not right. "They did not treat her the same way as their son. There was not the love there," said the babysitter, who asked not to be named.

The Sunday Morning Post revealed this week the couple adopted the girl when she was four months old. They have two sons, one older and one younger than the girl.

Mr Poeteray has returned to the Netherlands.

SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.....lemme get this straight...you adopt a nice, infant girl. You have 2 of your own and then decide that the adopted one if DEFECTIVE somehow and RETURN HER????? She's not a fucking TV, you racist cocksucking assholes!!!!!!!!!!

And you wonder why adoption gets a bad rap. People want to return the kids, 4, 7, 36 years later....What the god fucking HELL??????

It's getting worse

2007-12-11T19:44:00.001+08:00

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,22896354-662,00.html

The comments are where it is at. Truly.

Stupid Aussies.

Legacy

2007-11-19T07:50:00.000+08:00

Do the childless by choice think, or do, more about about leaving a legacy because they don’t have kids? What about you? Do you think about your legacy? Does it matter?

This question was posed on the Purple Woman Blog.

Fair question to ask as well. Parents always seem to think that their children will be the future curers of cancer and find intelligent life on other planets. For those who are CF, what does this mean? Will our pets grow up to cure AIDS? Doubtful...and some of us do not have pets.

What is my legacy? I'd like to think that my job as a teacher is a good start. Since starting teaching in 1995, I am met a fair number of young people. I've taught in city schools and country towns. I've taught adults, teens and kindy kids. I've taught in Canada, Japan and Hong Kong. I've taught English, Maths, Social Studies, Home Ec, French and Art. I've taught foreign students about how to ask questions when they travel or move to a new country. I have introduced my foreign students to the customs and culture of the western world.

With the invention of the internet, I have had former students contact me through Facebook and emails. It's interesting when they contact me because I have to ask myself why someone who is at least 15 years my junior would want to talk to me. I have had students email me and exclaim how much they missed me.

I'm not their parent. I don't want to be. I am, however, an adult that they can talk to without fear of judgment. I had a student come out to me as a homosexual when I taught in one small town. He waited til almost the end of the year and when he did, I asked why he chose me. He said that I was the one adult he knew would not judge him and would support and help him.

I also have a great nephew and we get along great. He is really bright and fun to be with. His mother is a single mother and unfortunately, she's a overly strict with him and I don't see that they have a really close relationship. I hope to cultivate a better relationship with him as well.

I'd say I have met well over 5,000 young people and adults in my teaching career and I would like to think that at some point, they will remember me fondly and this will be part of my legacy.

In a non-child centric way, I hope that my photography will live on as well in some small way. I'm no professional by any stretch of the imagination, but I would like to think that it is something that will carry on after I am gone.

Katherine Hepburn said: "I was ambitious and knew I would not have children. I wanted total freedom." She left one of the most amazing legacies in the world.

Having children does not guarantee that you will leave a worthwhile legacy. Not having them does not mean you won't, either.

"The world might, perhaps, be considerably poorer if the great writers had exchanged their books for children of flesh and blood."

--Virginia Woolf

Because it's different when you're a mother

2007-11-16T17:49:00.000+08:00

http://stcharlesjournal.stltoday.com/news/sj2tn20071110-1111stc_pokin_1.ii1.txt

A MOTHER creates a Myspace page to bait a young girl. Girl is depressed and overweight. Girl starts to believe that fake Myspace boy is falling for her. "Boy" pulls the plug, calling her all sorts of names. Girl hangs herself.

The press protects THE MOTHER who did this.

What is WRONG with this world???

Invisible and Childfree

2007-11-16T15:38:00.000+08:00

This summer, my husband and I went home to my parent’s place. It was the first time he would meet them and the first time I had been home in 3 years. We’d been planning this holiday for a long time. He was very thrilled to be going to Canada and I was anxious for him to meet my family and friends, as well as seeing them myself.

My mother is one of those mothers who only wanted to be a grandmother. My husband and I are blessedly childfree, one of the many things that brought us together. My sister thankfully gave my mother her first grandbaby this year. However, timing could not have been worse, really. Baby arrived 3 weeks before we arrived. My mother informed me that she would NOT be present at our home when we arrived in town and that she was really unsure of when she would be back.

I was gutted. I had been planning this trip for so long and my husband was looking forward to meeting my family. We did not plan to sit around and wait for my mother to come home, as we had friends we wanted to see as well. I made it known to my mother that this arrangement, such as it was, was unacceptable to me, that she needed to sort it out and to be home when we arrived.

It did not happen. It feel completely on deaf ears because of the new baby and we are 2 self-sufficient adults. To this day, my mother and I are at odds because she can not understand why this hurt me as much as it did and why I can not accept that babies come first. How could she have been expected to leave my sister alone with an almost month old baby when her husband was out of town? Erm, right. Ok. Because a new mother has NEVER BEEN LEFT ALONE?!

4 months after leaving my parent’s home, I am still upset and angered by all of this. My wishes, being the childfree adult were ignored, tossed aside because of my sister and her newborn. Even now, in trying to sort out other various issue with my mother via email, she does not have the time to devote to speaking with me because she is busy doting on her new grandbaby.

I am being ignored, my wishes being ignored because my mother is grandbaby crazy and I am childfree. There is no category in her mind for myself and my husband as we’re not toeing the line and doing what is the done thing.

Do I feel invisible? Of course I do. I feel more invisible in the last 4 months since returning to my home as my mother has made sure to tell all my relatives how horrible I am because I can not fathom how important a baby is. Of course I get it. I’m not a monster. Why does she not understand how important it is for me to have my needs and wants recognized and met in the same fashion as those of the breeders in my family.

I realize this is a fairly personal rant about the selfishness I endured this summer and will continue to endure in my family. I will remain invisible as well for a long while if I refuse to cow tow to my mother and accept all the blame.

I am doing something that she does not understand or can accept, so if she does not see it, it does not exist. If I told her we were sterile, well, that different. Making a conscious choice? Why would you do that? I feel that my husband and I are not being counted as family as we are only 2 people. It’s not ‘T’s family’ she talks about, it’s ‘T and her husband’.

When it comes to family activities, I know that us being the couple will not play into any advanced planning. Why, of course we can drop our plans at a moments notice as we do not have children! It’s not like we have jobs that require notice of holiday leave or plans with friends to change. No, that would not play into family activities. You have no children, therefore, you are required to be the most flexible people around. If we do venture back to the land of maple syrup and hockey, I know that whatever plans we have will be pushed aside to make way for those of the childed ones. Never mind that we would have traveled over 36 hours and 3-4 planes to get there. We’re childfree and therefore, do not count.

My feelings of being invisible have magnified since my summer at ‘home’, as have my feelings that ‘home’ is no longer where my parents reside, but firmly and safely ensconced with my fabulous childfree husband and our big rambling house filled with the 2 of us.

Summer Dramalama

2007-09-24T17:45:00.000+08:00

More rellies came over yesterday. Dad's brother and his wife. Had a nice dinner. Spent the afternoon with the ever lovely and amazing crawfooty and her oh-so-perfectly-cute little boy.

After dinner, the phone rings. It's mum. She's talking to me like there is nothing to be wrong, that this is NOT a problem. I'm fuming and thisclose to crying, again. She carries on a bit, asking about various things and asks if she will see us on the Sunday when she gets in. I say I don't know, possibly. I *want* her to meet G. I want to see her. I also want to punish her and make her feel as butthurt as I do right now...but I can't make her feel butthurt without hurting my father and my husband...two men who do not deserve this.

After I hang up with her, I hear Dad and his SIL talking about WHY my mother is still in BC. Apparently, Jana can not handle the 2, 4 and 6 am feedings AND nap during the day, so my mother is the one taking care of the baby AND my sister's husband is not there this weekend. Excuse me??? When is she going to learn to take care of this thing by herself?? Then again, when has my sister EVER learned to do anything by herself?? She's NEVER been alone, lived alone, dealt with life alone...so why start now!!

I came downstairs and just bawled. My chest hurt I cried so much. This is not how this was meant to go. All my planning...shot...or so it feels. I am so hurt I can't be hurt, I am just mad.

G comes down eventually and says that K and T want us upstairs for pictures. Riiiight. Me and my red, crying eyes. I try to make it look good but in that time, G's told them I am not feeling well and that maybe some other time. Dad comes down and asks me what's wrong and I light into him, telling him I am sick and tired of this, that I have never been this hurt, insulted, disappointed and generally sad over anything in my life. Dad defends her, as he would. He asks G if he is insulted. G says he wants to meet mum and he is a bit confused, but so long as she shows up, it's all good. Dad says to me that it appears G is not insulted. I remind him that I never said G was insulted, *I* was insulted.

I explain to Dad how it seems that it's always up to ME to understand when things change or go wrong, how I am meant to understand what is important to everyone else but when *I* explain how *I* am hurt/sad/dissappointed, well, fuck it. It's brushed aside because as long as *I* understand, it's ok. How much shit am I expected to swallow with a spoon and still keep smiling??

Then, in a lovely chain of events, Dad asks me if I will see my birthmother. WTF ON A CRACKER??? Fuck no!! Jeebus crickey!! He asks why and I briefly explain the events of many xmases ago and how it's just not a part of my life. He asks me if I am ok with being adopted, if I feel *different* because of it or if it bothers me and if I am happy with my family. Again...WTF ON A CRACKER??? Happy? Usually, yes. Glad I was adopted? FUCK YEAH! Bothered by birthmum's apparent insanity? Nope.

This is followed by dad asking me if I am jealous of my sister. Oh how I KNEW this was coming... No. Am I jealous that she has a baby? Nope. Am I jealous of the fact that her life has changed forever and she will never have free time again? Nope. I am perhaps a little jealous that she seems to be able to command any attention she wants and GET IT without anyone calling her selfish whereas when I point out how unfair things are, I am selfish. But this has NOTHING to do with this kid. NOTHING. Dad asks me why I do not want kids. I remind him I see 1100 of the little buggers daily and I do not wish to have one in my home. G points out to Dad at this time that HE is very opposed to kids and that this is something WE have agreed on.

I remind Dad as well that it is NOT like this kid came 3-4 days ago. It's been almost a MONTH, FFS! This trip, we've been planning for over 2 years. I've not been home for 3 years. Oh, but, Tanya, your mother looks at your pics lots, talks to you lots (wrong!) and emails often (wrong again!) so it's not like you are GONE gone, but merely slightly less accessible. *sigh* Not out of mind, just out of sight.

Dad and G wash their hands of it, with G telling Dad he is not hurt by this. Well, thanks, that just negates all my feelings, doesn't it??

Explain to me why I am NOT allowed to feel hurt by all this, why it seems OK to once again, dismiss me and my feelings and once again, have everyone else have everything THEIR way which makes them happy and I am miserable. This has been a theme all year, hasn't it? Sure, I am not the one who *needs* my parents perhaps as much as my sis does and the like, but FFS, this is not the normal visit, is it?? Things have changed a little. Dad asked me what I would be doing with mum if she were here. I DON'T KNOW, but I would feel better about then leaving to bugger off to Regina/S'Toon later this week and NOT having enough time to catch up with her. But I guess, as I said to Dad last night, that does not matter. He asked me how I felt about her not being here and I flat out said "like it doesn't matter to her at all" to which he tried to defend her. Geez...I wish my husband defended me half as much as my father tried to defend my mother. My feelings? Pointless, it seems. Thanks again.

She arrives tomorrow and will be expecting me to greet her openly and happily and all I want to do is punch her in the face.

Joke

2007-09-24T17:44:00.000+08:00

A Woman, A Bus And A Baby ~

A woman gets onto a bus with her baby.

The bus driver looks at the baby and says, "That's the ugliest baby I've ever seen!"

Totally insulted the woman goes to the rear of the bus and sits down fuming. She says to the man sitting next to her, "That driver is SO rude! He just insulted me!"

The man says, "There's no call for that. You go right up there and tell him off. Go ahead! Here ... I'll hold your pet monkey for you."

FED UP!!!!!!

2007-08-31T14:54:00.000+08:00

Kids. Babies. People who breed without thinking. I'm getting to the point of just being fed up with it all.

My sister had a kid recently. My mother decided it was more important to spend the first month with my sis and her infant than to be home for my return home (new husband in tow) in 3 years. She'd never even met my husband and yet, it was not important enough for her to be there when we arrived home. This was a MONTH after the baby arrived, so it's not like it was a new little loaf. Why was she not there? Apparently, my sister can not be alone with her child for more than an hour. Her husband was away at the same time we arrived home, so mum stayed there....because my sister can not manage to nap AND nurse AND care for her child at the same time.

My aunt sends an email to all relatives saying that baby and sis spent the weekend with them, after my mother left, finally deigning to meet my husband, and my aunt was SO IMPRESSED that my sister was comfy enough to whip her boob out and nurse when/where ever she felt it necessary. Dear dog! Gross.

When my mother does finally make it home, all we hear about is baby baby baby and my sister is calling every 10 minutes. Not only that, pics of this child are plastered all over the fridge at home. Sorry, but there is something wrong with my niece. When she has her eyes open, she looks like an alien more so than any other baby I have ever seen.

I know that some might read that as sibling rivalry and the like and dog knows, I have been beaten with the 'you're jealous' stick enough lately. It is not that, trust me. I am glad my sister went through the agony of childbirth to give my mother her much wanted first grand baby. She wasn't getting it from me. I'm furious that for the first time in my life, I made a specific request of my mother and not only did she ignore me, but she snubbed my husband because my sister is not capable of handling her own child.

*sigh*

Sadly, hubby and I spent WAY TOO MUCH TIME on airplanes this summer as well. All I can say is if your child is screaming for an ENTIRE 10 HOUR FLIGHT, you deserve to be shot when you disembark. I'd also like to bitch slap the mother who allowed her child to run up and down the aisles with it's trousers down around it's ankles. I did not need that shit rubbed up against me, nor did I need to SEE some 2 year olds arse. And no, it is NOT cute when they stare and babble at me and stop at my seat as you let them tear around the airplane. It's an AIRPLANE, not your personal playground.

/rant

Furious Red

2007-07-10T11:23:00.000+08:00

There really are no words.

Hubby and I arrive home in 9 days.

Mum is still with sprogged sister.

Mum has NOT YET BOOKED a return flight.

Dad says mum will still not be able to make it back before we arrive home.

This email will get sent....

I've talked with Hubby. The concert is the night of the 18th and we're leaving before lunch on the 19th. We'll be home than night for sure.

I am assuming that given that everyone is happy and healthy and there were no problems, Mum will be home for our arrival, yes?

Since there is no return ticket booked that would require a huge change fee and sis/baby are healthy, there is really no reason for this to be a 'long story'.

Basically, given the time we have, the effort we have put into this trip home, the amount of time since the last first and the fact that this is Hubby's first visit, quite frankly, if she is not there, we're not sticking around to see her. I'm beyond insulted and hurt and if this is the time for me to put my foot down, so be it. I'm tired of being the one to 'understand' when no one else seems to ever understand why I am upset.

If you both want to see both of us, you'll be there. If not, you won't. This it how it is. End of long story, as there is none.

Harsh?? Sister gave birth on the 27th June. We're back on the 19th. I've not been home in 3 years. Is it WRONG to expect my mother to be home when we get there???

Pluses and Minuses

2007-07-03T21:23:00.000+08:00

Things are starting to look up in CFT land.

I got a job. This is a good thing.

My hubby arrives soon. Double, super good thing.

I had a good long weekend. I got burnt, but hey, life happens.

What do these seemingly uninteresting things have to do with being CF?

My job is at a catholic school. You know how THEY can be, right? The priest asked me if hubby and I had kids. I was honest and I said that no, we did not want to have children. He gave me that *oh so sorry* look and I said: (I don't know WHERE I got this from...)

"If I had kids, someone would suffer, either my own children or my students. I have chosen to make my students the #1 priority in my life as far as children go. I don't feel I can be a truly effective teacher with my own children at home."

GO ME!! Did I ace that interview or what??!!!

This weekend, with friends, one of our friends was talking about her upcoming wedding and how as soon as she is married, she's stopping the pill. She obviously wants kids. She turns to me, married for just under a year, and says, "OH! I just KNOW you will be pregnant by the end of next year!!"

*sigh*

I say "OH no, I won't. I can guaran-fucking-tee it!"

She says again that she thinks I will. I just shook my head.

I give her credit in that she never pushed it beyond that and then started talking about her own baby plans.

I also met Bob this weekend. Bob is the cutie pet dog of my friends. I got all gushy and cutesy with Bob and did the whole "You're such a good boy, Bob. Sooo cute!!" My friends asked why I can't do that to babies. I said babies are NOT cute, hense, not possible to do that. :P

All in all, a good CF weekend.

How's you all doing?

She's heeeeerrreee!!!!

2007-07-02T14:12:00.000+08:00

The golden sprog has arrived!! All hail mighty golden sprog.

This cutesy email from my sister, written from the baby. Someone shoot me.

Hello Everyone!!
Sorry I have taken so long to email but it was a quite the journey out of the birth canal and Mom, dad and I have not slept much! I sleep all day and then party all night...not too sure if mommy and daddy like this, but they will get used to me. I put mommy through 33 hours of labour, only 7 off that was intense and then mommy said, "give me some pain killers" she got the epidural at 8 cm dilated and then when I was ready to be pushed out the dr. got called to emergency c-section and mommy was told not to push, easier said than done because I was coming! The dr. was then called in and at that time the epidural wore off mommy and she could feel everything!! My daddy was the best labour partner for mommy and kept her calm and cool and she only had to push for 30 mins to get me out. I am completely healthy and weigh 9lbs and 21 inches. I have the best daddy in the world and he taught mommy how to change me, swaddle me and he stays up with mommy all night too. Mommy likes to play dress up with me but realized just how hard it is to put on "trendy clothes" I am real wiggle and I have a bobble head!!

Gma and Gpa are here to help look after me and they are cooking good meals for us. I think I am getting spoiled with LOVE, but I enjoy it. I pull some funny faces and sometimes I feel like I am just entertaining mom, dad, gma and gpa! I am sending you some pictures so who will recognize me when we meet.
Until then I will be eating, farting and sleeping and pooing only when daddy changes me!
Love to you all,
Baby Golden Sprog

Babies

2007-06-29T22:20:00.000+08:00

I don't get babies. I don't. What's the fuss? They cry, they eat, they sleep, they cry more, they make a bis mess in their nappies, they eat, they 'smile' (ie. have gas), they sleep.

Oh please. Gimme one of those! *eye roll*

I like some kids. Heck, I even love some of them. My nephew is cool. He's almost in middle school. I like him. Ok, he's got some odd behaviours, but he's a nice, polite kid. I can talk to him. He has opinions. He thinks. He does things.

My niece? She's a baby. An infant. Teeny tiny infant. My WHOLE FAMILY, even my sensible brother is goo-goo-gah-gah over this squealing pooh machine.

This pooh machine, who I call Princess the Sequel, as my sister is a prima-donna princess, quite honestly, I don't CARE if I ever meet before it goes to kindy. (See, I called her *it*. To me, its and it. It has no personality, it has no spark.) This child (better?) has effectively ruined my summer visit home. And yes, I *am* pissed off about it.

Do I think sis planned to have said baby just to fuck my travel plans up? No, but it's mighty convenient. Do I think it is right that my mother won't be home when I get there with my husband because she'll be caring for Princess and PS2? Hell no. Do I feel selfish and horrible and childish? Yes, but I also feel I have the right to.

Someone I spoke to about all this agreed with me. She said when her siblings had babies, she thought :""how will this change our family dynamic?" "What will happen at Christmas?" "Will my parents start to neglect me because they've got a baby to fawn over?" "Will DH and I become second class children because we haven't produced the golden sprog?"" I admit, I am in the SAME SINKING BOAT!

What shits me most? This is my first trip home in 3 years. Hubby and I have been planning this trip for 2 years, even before he was hubby. This is his FIRST TIME to meet my family and my mother can't be bothered to be there when we get home because OMG!GRANDBABY!

Fine. I get it. I'm not the favourite kid. Never have been. I won't give you precious grandbabies and be a homebody. I moved. I live a 20 hour FLIGHT from home and it will be longer than that in a few years. Fine. Ok. Ya know? I am HAPPY with my life. I have a great husband, great friends, a good job, my own place, my own investments, a passport loaded with tons of stamps and I'm healthy. I SHOULD be a child you are proud of. Instead, I will be shunned because *I* don't get the baby fuss, because *I* won't give you grandbabies and because *I* make you accountable for your actions to ALL your children.

Family. I love mine, but at the moment, I do not like them.

Is it wrong if I make a point of NOT seeing my family(mum and dad) this summer?

Purple Women & Friends: Childfree Book Reviews

2007-06-25T10:57:00.000+08:00

Purple Women & Friends: Childfree Book Reviews

No Kidding!!

2007-06-25T10:30:00.000+08:00

What I loved most about the article below:

"He said he didn't want a wife or kids."

"She got one out of two," says Peter.

"I got the one that mattered."

The more I think about it, the more it becomes apparent to me that my relationship with my husband is more important than the relationship I *could* have with children.

No kidding
The ecstasy and agony of living childfree
by Naomi Zeveloff - from the website http://www.csindy.com/csindy/2007-06-21/cover.html

Though many ascribe selfishness to couples that decide to go childfree, Andrea and Peter Wenker cite environmental concerns as a big motivation.

There was a time after Andrea Wenker decided not to have kids that she still hung out with parents — playmates from her youth, children who grew up to have children of their own.

Those three friends, Andrea and two new mothers, scheduled scrapbooking dates, evenings the two mothers thought of as a respite from their toddlers. But more often than not, recalls Andrea, things turned toward the babies anyway, especially when they began screaming in an adjacent room.

One night, this time in Andrea's quiet east-side home, her two friends began talking about labour. Andrea silently pasted photos of her Rhodesian ridgeback into her album as the other two recalled giving birth. The conversation stretched on for more than an hour.

"I don't have anything to contribute," Andrea thought, watching the two women assemble family snapshots in their own scrapbooks. "I don't have that."

It was only the beginning.

Andrea, 36, and her husband Peter, 39 — who underwent a vasectomy years ago — faced more than just a disconnect with their child-laden counterparts. Disbelieving fathers at dinner parties goaded Andrea into saying that maybe, someday, she might change her mind. Long-term friends wondered aloud if the couple regretted their decision. Co-workers and acquaintances — people who know Andrea and Peter well enough to broach the topic, but aren't close enough to understand why they won't reproduce — constantly needled them. Peter's mother, saying they were "thwarting the will of God," stopped speaking with her son and daughter-in-law.

"People think you're not right as a woman if you're not procreating," says Andrea.

It wasn't long before the pair decided it was time to find some new friends. An Internet search led Andrea to No Kidding!, a social group for adults who have never parented. The club was initiated 23 years ago by a childfree man in British Columbia, who noticed his friends had all but disappeared from his life once they began breeding. After he created a Web page, similar alliances began popping up throughout North America. Today, the group boasts 10,000 members in 44 groups all over the globe.

Andrea and Peter drove north to the Denver-based club, where they would go out to dinner or concerts with a loose assemblage of non-parents. Eventually, when the Colorado coordinator stepped down, Andrea took his place. Denver Metro No Kidding! now has 347 online members, with a handful of newcomers joining each month.

Andrea and Peter live in Colorado Springs, and host some of the best-attended events. At a recent costume party, Andrea asked guests to dress up as superheroes. Many came in costumes based on their strengths. She went as Grammar Girl, a takeoff on her English instruction master's program. Peter, who always dresses for the weather, wore layers. Another person was "Esposo Fabuloso," the fabulous spouse. Nobody, of course, dressed as Best Mom or Dad.

"No Kidding! gives me a relevant social life," says Peter. "When you're a minority, it's easy to feel that you are isolated and the people around you don't share your experience. Especially in Colorado Springs."

The kidless choice

Colorado Springs is unabashedly kid-centric. Up north, Focus on the Family and New Life Church glorify parenthood, while suburban sprawl accommodates ever-growing families and their litany of plastic slides, basketball hoops, sandboxes and kiddie pools. Downtown, the Uncle Wilber Fountain serves as the city's literal and figurative core, with hundreds of children splashing in the summer months. Bars and clubs might open their doors in the evenings, but so do the ice cream shops and the pizzerias.

Families in Colorado Springs pull major political weight. New U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn ran on a pro-child platform, touting his "reputation of being a strong family man," as his Web site reads. When he won last November's election, Republican supporters gathered in Mr. Biggs Family Fun Center to celebrate. The adults washed down rum and colas while their children played on plastic inflatable slides in the adjacent room.

Colorado Springs' kid fever has people like Andrea and Peter feeling like uninvited party guests.

"Many of them have to be in the closet," says Vincent Ciaccio, a spokesperson for No Kidding!'s national chapter, speaking of childfree couples in conservative cities. "They can't tell people — otherwise, they have a huge backlash against them."

Still, Andrea and Peter grew up in Colorado Springs and lay claim to their community. As a teenager at Doherty High School, Andrea didn't think about having kids. But she also didn't think about not having them.

She was 18 when her mother gave birth to her youngest sister, and she watched the baby while her mother was at work. When the family opened a daycare in their home, Andrea helped tend to the toddlers.

"I grew up assuming I would have babies," she says, standing behind the counter in her kitchen. Peter, just back from work at the Air Force Academy, sits at the table with a glass of milk. "You assume. It seems weird, because it's such an important decision. To grow up assuming seems backwards."

Andrea met Peter when she was in high school. A friend who was dating Peter's roommate invited her to the boys' apartment. Andrea remembers standing on the balcony with Peter, then a religious Christian, when he told her he wanted to be a monk.

"He said he didn't want a wife or kids."

"She got one out of two," says Peter.

"I got the one that mattered."

After they were married, Andrea took nearly four years to re-evaluate her thoughts on children. By that time, Peter was hardly religiously observant, but he still didn't want children. (Today he cites environmental issues and his personal need for quiet time.) While he waited to make a vasectomy appointment, Andrea contemplated a life without kids. It was a National Public Radio piece on overpopulation that convinced her.

Even while people like Andrea and Peter battle the sense that they're the only ones without kids, the childfree choice is becoming increasingly common. The advent of birth control, coupled with an increase in women entering the workforce, has made going childfree an easier, and sometimes necessary, decision. In 1976, 16 years after the first birth-control pill became available in the United States, 10 percent of women ages 40-44 had never had a child. By 2002, that number had risen to 18 percent. According to a 2004 census, 44.6 percent of women ages 15 to 44 are childless.

The reasons cited for not having children are as multifarious as the people who make that choice. No desire. Lack of money. Environmentalism. Career advancement. Going back to school. Having found the right spouse. Having found the wrong spouse. Not having a spouse. Infertility. Travel. No time. No room. Too old. Too young.

Costs and benefits

Among all the boons to childfree living — long, uninterrupted conversation, carefully constructed dinners and dates with like-minded friends that last late into the evening — Andrea and Peter decided together that Andrea could and should go back to school.

Last year, she lived in Fort Collins while working on her master's program in English Instruction at Colorado State University. That choice came after long discussions about finances. A few years back, Peter had lost his job in the tech industry, and Andrea — who had been a "homemaker without kids" — went to work answering phones for $10 an hour.

The graduate program, and all the commuting and renting it entailed, nearly wound up more than they could afford. But it would have been out of the question if they had children.

According to an MSN Money tabulation, it costs $124,800 to raise a single child on a salary below $39,000. (Generally, the more a couple makes, the more they spend on their kid.) That doesn't include college or other costs if the child stays home after the age of 18.

Peter and Andrea aside, some childless couples surely resemble the DINK stereotype — that is, Double Income, No Kids — of a wealthy couple with money to burn. According to a study commissioned by American Demographics magazine, childless couples heavily outspend their parenting counterparts. They shell out 60 percent more on entertainment, 79 percent more on food and 101 percent more on dining out, not to mention alcohol, clothing and pet expenditures.

Though childless couples might have more financial liberty, they still subsidize the lives of their neighbors with kids. They pay for public schools, libraries and immunizations, to name a few. And they don't receive the same tax benefits that couples with kids do. The federal earned-income tax credit rewards families with two or more children with $4,536, while a pair without kids can make $412. In recent years, President Bush expanded family tax credits to better cover dependent care and adoptions.

"Speaking for myself ... I would much rather see that money going toward a more centralized pot to helping schools or children's hospitals, rather than what amounts to simply paying people to have children," says Ciaccio.

In addition, childfree individuals say they are routinely passed up for raises on the job, though they often fill in for colleagues with kid-related commitments during the workday. Ciaccio says he hears stories of employees who get last pick for vacation days around the holidays. It's assumed, he says, that they have no family with whom to share their time.

Andrea doesn't anticipate coming up against those problems when she finishes graduate school. She concedes that her all-but-promised job as a writing instructor at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs won't pay much. But she feels she belongs in that position. Besides, the university serves as a kind of oasis in a child-centric culture.

"Since I've gone back to school, several things have changed," she says. "In academia, children are not present. If their parents are there, they talk about academia. They rarely talk about their personal lives."

Still, certain thorny realities of living childfree are simply inescapable. Like the fact that women without children aren't exactly honored.

"We celebrate women's rites of passage with a wedding shower or a baby shower," says Andrea. "Life is more than giving people stuff. But it's symbolic, a showing of support. It's not that I resent that. I notice that women that don't have kids don't have a rite of passage. If you graduate with a Ph.D. or an M.A., if you have a great accomplishment, there is no way that we recognize that rite of passage."

When Andrea made a similar statement in a 2005 Rocky Mountain News article, she was met with derision in the online comments section of the story.

"Now these people think they should be celebrated for doing NOTHING? No wonder they didn't have kids. They're too damned self-centered!" wrote one poster.

"Honey, you're a whiny liberal tweedle, and I'm delighted you've decided not to reproduce. Please consider not voting, either!" said another.

Deciding for good

Andrea and Peter, like many childfree couples, have heard the "selfish" line. But they say their desire not to have kids has less to do with their own egos than what they feel they're able to give back to the Earth.

"Given the fact that there is no biological or economic justification or impetus or imperative, you have to do some ethical and moral thinking about whether having kids is the right thing to do," says Peter. "If you are not the kind of person who wants to do it, it's not going to be fair, given the fact that the planet doesn't need your kids. It's important to make sure that if you do have kids, that it will be good for you and the planet."

Yet it's that type of analysis, the couple says, that gets their friends and relatives telling them what good parents they would be. They often hear the world needs more people like them, people who think things through, who don't accept the "scripting" they're born with, as Peter says. But Andrea and Peter can only wonder at that logic. For them, having kids would have inhibited that sort of thoughtfulness.

Andrea and Peter represent the conciliatory end of the childfree spectrum: disgruntled couples who seek to promote understanding, rather than divisiveness, between themselves and their parenting counterparts. But just as there are people who think everyone should procreate, there are also the anti-parents — individuals and couples who simply dislike kids and resent that the world seems to cater to them.

In this arena, encapsulated on Web sites like ChildFree Hardcore, children are referred to as "crotch droppings" and "brats," and their parents are "housemoos" and "breeders."

One site, badbuttons.com, features lapel pins for the anti-parent with phrases like, "Babies creep me out," "I'm not pre-pregnant, I'm pre-abortion" and "Ask me about my vasectomy."

As the buttons and a litany of Web postings on those sites suggest, remaining childfree necessitates access to permanent and nonpermanent birth control. In the childfree sphere, stories abound describing the tribulations of finding a doctor who will perform sterilization. Women who want a tubal ligation, but have not yet had children, report meeting with uncompromising doctors.

"It is a part of our societal bias against women," says Ciaccio. "Despite all the advances they have made, they are still expected to be mothers. Doctors, especially the more conservative ones, don't want to take that chance."

Dr. Deborah Lasley, a Colorado Springs obstetrician and gynecologist, says she will do a tubal, but not until after talking about less-permanent options with her patients, like the removable IUD.

"I try to steer them toward some reversible birth control," she says. "If I have established a relationship and I feel they are making their own decision, I don't ban them from it. It is their body."

Yet, she adds, there is a lot of "tubal regret" among women, and she urges couples to choose a vasectomy instead.

While childless men often have an easier time finding doctors who will perform a vasectomy, they still face questions. Peter had to go through a half-hour interview, in which the doctor grilled him about his choice to go childfree.

Much skepticism around the childfree lifestyle centers on the notion that the couple might change their minds later on. Andrea contends her choice is somehow threatening to people who have had children. What some people saw as an imperative in their own narratives, she saw as optional.

The biological clock, she says, is simply a myth.

Yet one psychologist in Colorado Springs maintains that it's real.

"When a woman gets to a certain age, it's a fact," says Alison Walls, director of clinical training at Colorado School of Professional Psychology. "When a woman wants to have kids, she is older and wiser. She is not as fertile as she was, but at a young age she wouldn't make the kind of parent she would later on. I think the prime fertility years are between 15 and 25. People don't want to have kids at that time. The biological clock and lifestyle and maturity rate don't go together."

Walls admits that childfree couples might simply not want to parent, but she also repeats some oft-heard stereotypes that make the kidless community bristle. Childfree adults may have been abused when they were young, she says. Or they're too self-centered to have kids. Or their parents were narcissistic.

Gender division

For another childfree couple in Colorado Springs, that societal expectation of "you'll change your mind" has crept into the marriage. Though Allison Swickard, 30, and Joe Gorman, 34, decided long ago not to have kids, Joe still questions his wife.

"I ask her, "Are you sure?'" he says. "This would be a big deal in our marriage. I am kind of brainwashed by society. I expect her to change her mind."

For Allison's part, the periodic questioning agitates her. But she admits she can't be completely certain.

"I am 99.9999 — a lot of nines — sure that I don't want children," she says. "But a scientist hasn't said I'm not going to. You can't prove to me that I won't. If you are aware, either you know or you don't know. You're either a kid person or not. But what we've been schooled masks what we know. We buy into things."

Allison and Joe grew up thinking they wouldn't marry or have children. Early in their relationship — what they call "Round 1" of their dating life — they sat on the couch in Allison's living room and talked about kids. Allison felt that she'd be an overbearing and too-involved mother. She rarely babysat as a child and enjoyed her time spent alone. Joe never thought about children. His older sister, now in her 50s, never procreated, and though his family was very Catholic, he thought they'd accept his choice as well.

"I very clearly remember talking about it," says Allison, sitting at the kitchen table with Joe in their downtown home after a Sunday afternoon hike. "I was excited that he was on the same page. You meet someone and there's some energy there, and the values are there and the decisions from the values are there."

But, like Andrea, she faced a certain exclusion when the women around her began having children.

"Once, we were with some friends. Everyone there had just had a baby, and I was the only person in the room without one," Allison says. "I can talk about everything. But it felt like hours, and I had nothing to contribute. That was the first time there was something in my mind, to make me think, "There will always be this difference.' One coworker of mine had a baby, and she described entering into this club of moms.

"I like to be involved. It made me feel sad for a second, but it didn't make me want to have kids."

Allison and Joe have few childfree friends, and occasionally babysit for parents they are close with. When they host parties at their home, they don't allow kids, but they also put their two large dogs in a kennel. The couple also has several cats — Allison says the animals fulfill the nurturer in her.

"She won't want kids as long as I keep her in warm, fuzzy things," says Joe.

The notion of woman as nurturer, as keeper of home and hearth, is a traditional concept that doesn't typically align with the choice not to have children. Some kidless women take umbrage at the idea that they must fill their days with a child substitute, like a pet or a garden. Still, it's myopic to deny that a childfree woman might still feel the need to mother in some sense of the word.

"People define [the childfree] as people who have never parented," says Andrea's mother Alice Vincent, speaking by telephone from Boulder. "To me, that doesn't seem accurate. Andrea has done some good parenting, taking care of her little sister and other children. Those are parenting kind of things. She is an aunt, so maybe one would say that doesn't count."

In spite of the equality in their marriages — there are no distinct home-makers or breadwinners in either pair — Joe and Allison and Peter and Andrea evoke some very gendered traditions when it comes to who does what inside the home.

Until recently, Andrea did nearly all of the cooking and cleaning — including laundry — within her home. Peter wasn't as good at it, they both say. But when Andrea lived in Fort Collins during part of the week, Peter found he didn't know how to scrub the toilet, and he hired someone to do it for him. Today, they're working toward a more balanced way of dividing the labour. It's something, they say, that they'd be unable to focus on if they had children.

"If I believe Andrea has an equal value to mine, having her do all of the housework — if I'm at work doing creative problem-solving and she is doing housework — it's not walking the walk," says Peter. "Andrea has to perceive herself as an enriching member of society."

Life goes on

At a recent No Kidding! event, Andrea and Peter walked to Josh and John's with a gaggle of other childfree couples after a mariachi performance at Colorado College. The couples held hands for a time, and then separated, the women apart from the men.

Though kids were all around them — kindergartners at the mariachi show, pre-teens on summer break at the ice cream shop — nobody talked about children. Nobody paid them any mind. It was a stark contrast to that evening, just a few years ago, when Andrea sat scrapbooking with the two mothers.

Nor did anyone talk about his or her choice not to have children. In that context, it didn't really matter. There were no justifications to be made.

Later in the evening, when most of the ice cream cups were empty, Andrea divulged that her new neighbours were opening a daycare next door. She and Peter were looking to move to a new house in any case, she said. That would speed their search.

The rest of the group looked at each other, nodding. They got it.

Raising little Hellions

2007-06-19T14:49:00.000+08:00

Hands Off Parenting?
Talker Parents?

What is this? What's this doing to the children and to the adults of the future?

I just read this article, which was kindly linked off of BritGirl's blog. She wrote an excellent post about this type of parenting style as well.

Since she did such a good job with her post, I won't expound on it much except that as I commented on her post, I found myself with more to say.

We have a friend, C, who has an almost 5 year old, M. C is the talker parent. She thinks she can talk her son out of anything, that by REASONING with him, he will do what he is told and understand WHY it is happening. Uh-huh. Sure. C, as a woman and a friend, is bright, clever, insightful, brilliant, on-the-ball and funny. As a parent, she fails both herself and her son.

The other weekend, at a friend's home, C and M had to leave early to go to the circus. M was playing with the other kids who were there. At any given time, there are probably 5 kids in this home, 3 belonging to my friends and 2 to another couple. M, being an only child, loves the kid interaction. On this day, C packed up M's things and reminded him to get ready to go to the circus. He fussed. He tantrumed. He yelled. He thrashed about. In the lift on the way downstairs, TO THE CIRCUS, I might add, M proceeded to hit his mother about the legs, screaming that he wanted to stay and play with the other kids. She kept saying "Oh, I know you are upset because we are leaving. It is ok to be upset. I'm sorry you feel this way, but this is what we had to do."

Excuse me???

It's not like she removed him from the playgroup to go to the dentist. They were going TO THE CIRCUS!!! She allowed him to hit her repeatedly in the lift to the ground floor and pit a fit the entire way into a cab to take them to the circus.

I don't know about anyone here, but if that were me when I was a child, I would NOT have been going to the circus after that display of insanity.

I can understand him being upset as well. The kids he was playing with are good kids. In all honesty, they tolerate him because he is a whiny, pretentious, spoiled little twat.

What's wrong with the word NO? I heard it MANY times as a child and I turned out just fine. A small spanking could also help in cases like this.

If that were me, I would have smacked my kid back. This is part of the reason I will not have kids. I know I have no patience for this kind of psycho-babble crap that parents use with their kids. I felt like hitting my friend C as well. She might have said something to me, but not to a 5 year old who NEEDS boundaries.

I should send her this link.

Quote

2007-06-15T11:06:00.000+08:00

The real mothers and fathers of the human race are not the fathers and mothers of the flesh. For every one of my 18,000 children, I have expended more motherly feeling and action in a week than my mother has expended on me in 37 years.

Florence Nightingale, 1820-1910

Childless Revolution - Review

2007-06-08T12:25:00.000+08:00

The Childless Revolution – by Madelyn Cain

I finished this book inside of 3 days. Easy read and not very thick at 173 pages.

Basically, Ms Cain divides the childfree into 3 categories: Choice, Chance and Happenstance. In those categories, she also looks at various issues within each one.

Under the heading of CHOICE, she talks about the positively, religiously and environmentally childfree. These are women who, for whatever reason, have chosen to remain childfree and not breed. Some did it for personal reasons, others because they devoted their life to a religion and others for protection of the environment.

I found this chapter to be too short, really. Only 43 pages about women who have made the conscious choice to not breed. Surely, there has to be more women like that out there, I would think. Not only that, there has to be more reasons and better ones than only those 3 mentioned. The author seems to focus a bit too much on the idea that many childfree women are selfish in their lives and their choices. Are parents not selfish in wanting to have a little them? How is protecting the environment selfish? If we don’t have kids for environmental reasons (or at least TELL people that is our reason) does that make us better CF people than someone who says “I just don’t want kids”?

In the second part, the author looks at women who are childfree/childless by chance, often due to medical reasons. She touches briefly on gay couples who wish to have kids but can’t/don’t due to red tape and the obvious conception problems.

Many of the women in the chapter, in my opinion, are not childfree. Childfree, to me, indicates a choice, a lifestyle that you not only want but embrace and welcome. Many of the women who are childless by chance WANTED to have babies and have resigned themselves to a life without them due to failed fertility treatments. She even labels one of these categories “Tragically Childless”. Tragically? I find this to be a bit of an over inflation of being childless, but then I am one of the ones who chose this lifestyle. The tragically CL women had memorial services and buried their hope and dreams (literally) for their unborn children.

In my opinion, anyone wanting to be a parent in this day and age can be if they are willing to forego the idea that children are only your children if they come from you and adopt a child. True, adopting a lily-white newborn in a western country is tough. So why not look abroad? Why not look into fostering children? The adoption/foster-care system in most places needs a major overhaul and if someone won’t start it, it will never change. Maybe that’s a bit simplistic in my thinking, but there are ways to be a parent without giving birth.

One good thing to come out of this chapter was one women’s comment about how her fertility treatments made her sit back and REALLY look at what was driving her to have a baby. She said, “I think many people do not think about having children, they just do it… In fact in the last 15 months, I have stepped back and looked at why I wanted children. I wanted children for selfish reasons and that is not right. I wanted a child to complete my life and make it perfect. That would not have happened. So, am I selfish? The answer is, not anymore.”

FINALLY!!! Someone who gets it. We, the childfree, are not the selfish ones usually. More often than not, parents are the selfish ones.

The final chapter deals with those childfree by happenstance, which in many cases, seemed to be by choice as well…or neglect. It’s like some of these women woke up one day and said “Oh SHIT! I forgot to have a baby! Ah well….”

We find women in this chapter who did not have babies because of their moral beliefs, their horrific and scaring childhoods, due to their careers or due to their marriage. Many of these women expressed no regret at their childfree status as much as the women who had medical problems. Many of the women in this chapter are older, in their 60’s and expressed little to no regret about not having a child. One women said, “Being childless is not an aberration; being a mother who hates her child, now THAT’S an aberration.”

Women who felt that they had to be married in order to have a child and then never married fall in to this chapter as well. Due to their strong convictions, they have chosen to live without children rather than have one out of wedlock. More power to them in this day and age of women having babies to ‘complete them’, without a husband or partner in the picture.

As women get married at later and later ages, we find ourselves marrying men who have been married before or who already have a family and don’t wish to do it again. Some women find themselves with partners who are more CF than they are and refuse to be fathers. I’m in that boat, in a way. I know that if it came down to it, I’d have to choose between my husband and a baby. I’ve made my choice. I’m quite happy with it as well. Many of these women report happier, more fulfilling marriages and more intimacy with their partners. They can focus on their adult relationships and this makes them happier than changing diapers. One woman said, “But I just met him and, you know, everybody comes with their beliefs, their package, and that was him and that’s what I was choosing. It was easy for me. I didn’t have to decide. I chose. I chose my husband.” Sounds fair to me and that is the situation I find myself in, a situation that I am more than happy to be in as well.

In this chapter, the author briefly addresses the idea that if you do not have kids, you are not a ‘real woman’. This is one argument that shits me more than anything. How does crapping something out of you make you a real woman? By proving that the interior works work? So if you are in fertile, you’re not real either? Such bullshit!! Being a real woman means making real choices that work for you. Why do we think that the path to someone else’s house will lead us to our home? Everyone on this planet is wonderfully different. What makes the general public think that just because I am female I have to want what most other females want and if I do not, well, then I am clearly not female...despite all the signs to the contrary. Sheesh!!

In a way, I did not feel that this book put enough of a positive spin on being CF. Lots of the negative points were dragged out and left floundering in the wind and not really disputed. Why is it ok for retired couples to travel and enjoy life but not so much for a young, CF couple to do the same? Should we not enjoy life when we are young? Life’s short and very unpredictable. If you wait for your retirement, it might be too late.

The other thing that this book should focus on more, in my opinion, the sense of entitlement that mothers seem to have. Why should I be expected to do more work because someone in my school choose to do too much? Mothers work less hours, get out of extra work due their children and still make the same as I do. How fair is that? Also, what gives childed women the right to harass us for the decisions we have made? Why can’t we start asking them why they felt the need to reproduce in an already over-crowded world.

This book, while good, was lacking in depth. More insight is needed into many things and given that some CF people are afraid to speak out about it, it might take awhile before a book is incredible comprehensive in it’s dealings with CFness.

Guilty?

2007-05-31T08:29:00.000+08:00

I just started reading The Childless Revolution.

This book divides the childfree/childless woman into 3 categories - chosen, chance and happenstance. I'm a bit dismayed already that the childfree (chosen) ones are a mere 30 pages at the start of the book. These women are then divided into another 3 categories - positively, religiously and environmentally childfree.

The women that they spoke to have all expressed great joy and happiness with their choices and do not regret them.

The one bit of the book that made me go AH-HA so far is the letter that was written to Dear Abby in 1975 by a couple asking parents to tell them if having kids was as rewarding as everyone told them it was. An astounding 70% of parents said, if they had to do it again, they WOULD NOT! Oh..dear...

Being childfree is a choice that I have made and I'm happy with it. Beyond happy, really. Despite that, I admit, at times, I feel guilty. I am probably one of those 'lucky' women who would fall pregnant at the drop of a hat and have cute, healthy cherub babies...and I don't want it. It does make me feel a little guilty at times that I have this ability and I don't want it...at all. If my doc was to tell me I was infertile, it would be the best news I could ever get. I know a few people who desperately want babies, would be great parents-not-breeders and have all the patience/love for a child and they can not have one.

In TQC the other day, the question was asked if god existed and we met him and could have ONE thing changed for all humanity in the future, what would it be. My response was:

People are infertile until they CHOOSE to have children and prove that they will be decent, upstanding parents to said children.

This would, if you ask me, solve a few problems. But ideals worlds never happen, so, yeah.

I look forward to finishing this book. It seems fairly well laid out so far, but we shall see.

One in 3 women will be Childfree

2007-05-29T13:09:00.000+08:00

I came across this article below the other day. It was also discussed on the CF_Hardcore in LiveJournal.

I was born in 1971. I am not having kids. I resent that these women interviewed gave such crap reasons, such as:

The four women they interviewed gave the following reasons for being 'childfree':

1) "I'm trying it just hasn't happened"
2)"I'm having too much fun"
3) "I haven't met the right man yet"
4) "I'm too vain"

This to me sounds like a cop out. Admit that you do NOT want kids and let the rest of the world accept it. For me, those 4 excuses are easily refuted.

1. I am enjoying a very healthy sex life with a/many partner(s) but unlike 1/2 the population, I have mastered the art of birth control. The only thing I am *trying* to do is to have more of it.

2. See #1. Sex IS fun and I'm having it more than those who have kids are. Also, I am going on holidays, eating out, wearing nicer clothes and I like my childless, cluttered home.

3. I have met the right man and he is MORE CF than me. If I hadn't met him, I'd have waited til I met another CF man who was on the same baby free page as me.

4. Perhaps I am. I like home clean, free from jam handprints and snot on every pillow. I like to wear nice clothes and not have to cover up with a burpy rag. I like to be able to get a mani-pedi when I want, as well as have a GOOD haircut and colour that is not from a place that offers lollipops to it's customers. I like that my stretch marks are from having eaten great food and having drunk great drinks.

5. I don't like kids. Babies make my skin crawl. I don't understand why everyone thinks that the world STOPS for them just because they had a kid.

Childfree, as I know it and live it, is to NEVER want one. EVER.

http://www.independentngonline.com/

One In Three Female Graduates Won’t Be Mothers

April 29th, 2007

Sometimes one finds it difficult to believe some of the findings of modern day researchers, but hard as they are, it is obvious that some people are indeed doing more than others. Researchers in developed countries are committed to knowing why certain social phenomenon turn out the way they are in order to understand the human race better.

Recently, in the Daily Mail of London some researchers at the Centre for Longitudinal Studies, Institute of Education in London, reportedly came out with findings that indicate the likelihood of a third of female university graduates never becoming a mother.

The researchers polled a total of 35, 000 people born in 1970 in parts of Europe and tracked throughout their lives.

Though the researchers did not indicate if the women were blacks or mixture of white and black but one thing they did state is that the poll was done in London.

The study found out that 40 per cent of highly-educated women are still childless by the age of 35 which is an increase of 20 per cent in just over a decade.

The researchers then made a forecast that by the time the women reach the likely end of their child-bearing years of 45, about 30 per cent of them will still be childless.

They noted that while some are making a conscious decision not to have a family, others are simply leaving it too late after taking years to build their careers, buy a home and find the right partner. And graduates who do become mothers are having fewer children and leaving it later.

If the trend continues, the eventual rate of childlessness among graduates now in their 20s is likely to be even higher than a third.

Professor Heather Joshi, head of the research team said: "They waited to establish their housing, careers and sometimes to find the right man."

Out of a group of graduate women born in 1958, 32.7 per cent were childless at 35.

The result has assisted in helping to explain the low birth rate which is leading to an ageing population in Britain and much of Western Europe.

The study has also led to calls for employers to be more flexible so that women do not feel their career would be over if they have children.

(What do you think about Nigeria’s situation? Is education and career affecting marriage and child bearing of female graduates? Send comments to yinks_shok@yahoo.com or simply text 08033338634)

Forget you, there is a baby on the way!

2007-05-28T19:42:00.000+08:00

Can you REALLY ever keep everyone happy??

My husband seems to think you can...which usually means *I* get the short end of that stick, so as to avoid conflict on his home ground. Sure, piss T off! She's not here. No fucking problem. Promises made to her can be broken at will as, well, she'll just have to learn to suck it up.

My mother seems to think you can. Oh, T's coming home for the first time in 3 years and bringing her husband home with her. Oh...really, I don't need to be there for that. Not like they have been planning this for the last 2 years. Nah. No biggie. Not at all.

On paper this plan works, so here is hoping it works in real life. I am talking about the fact that I just may not be home when you arrive in July. No surprise when I say that the way things stand at the moment, I will be in victoria. Now, according to your travel plans you plan on staying in Calgary recovering from jetlag for a couple of days. This, on top of the fact you & G plan on making a day or two trip to Saskatoon, it could give me the day or two I am going to need to make things work. It is a long story, and I won't get into it all right now, but did want to get this out to you and hopefully you can understand that I am between a rock and a hard place at the moment, and trying my best to keep everyone happy.

Fuck this shit.

Seriously.

Keep everyone happy. My fat white arse.

I've had this fight with my mother. "I hope you understand" seems to be her catch phrase. Sure, I get it. Yup. Does that mean I have to agree with it or accept it or think it's right? Nope.

And further more, me expressing MY opinion on matters DOES NOT make me a manipulative bitch, so for those of you who continue to fan that flame, FUCK OFF!! I'm damned if I do, damned if I don't. If I DON'T state my opinion or how I feel, I get walked on. If I do, even if I state clearly that it is MY opinion and it does not mean I expect people to cowtow to it, I get called controlling and manipulative. Can not fucking win, can I?

Mum emails back and says "Don't get all excited." Trust me...my first trip home in 3 years...why the godgivenfuckinghell would I POSSIBLY be excited? I want to email her back and say exactly that to her as well. "Why, dear mother, would *I* be excited to be coming home for the first time in 3 years AND bringing G with me? How utterly silly of me to think I should be excited about that when there are clearly bigger and infinitely better things going on. Excited? Nope. Not in the least. Why bother?"

Am I being irrational? Maybe. Am I fed up with this? Fucking right I am.

I'm at odds with she-I-call-Mother. If you ask her, I should NOT be the LEAST bit upset, as everything will work out. (Read: We'll do what we want and you'll have to suck it up.)

As we know, G and I are going home. Have had this trip planned since after I came home from Europe. Have had tickets since just after I came back from Aus this past summer. Mum/Dad and all and sundry KNEW that we arrived on the 16th July.

Sister's due date is June 27th. First oh so precious gurgling grandbaby. Whoopeee, says she who is not a baby person. I admit it, the birth of the impending niece is not making me do cartwheels. It's a baby. Meh. Sorry. Talk to me when it's talking and maybe it will be interesting. Sure, it'll be cute and mum/sis will be ga-ga over this little pink screaming creature. Me? I won't be.

Do I think sis planned the timing of the first golden grandbaby to fuck with our arrival? No...and the timing IS for shit. Has my mother known about our arrival longer than that of this infant who will be around for a good 40-50 years? Yup. Should that take priority? If you ask me, yes. Should they be home when I get there for the first time in 3 years, with my new husband? Fucking rights they should. Then you can go back to your precious baby daughter and her precious baby daughter. To not be there when we arrive, to me, is a MASSIVE slap in the face to both me and G. Is it better if one parent is there and the other gone? Honestly, it's insulting no matter what. It's not like we're flying in unannounced for fuck's sake.

But you don't understand....your sister needs HELP! It's her first baby!! It's our first grandchild!!!

Ya know what? They LIVE in Canada. WE do not.We, since choosing to go to Montreal for our honeymoon kinda trip, have shortened our time in MJ considerably. Apparently, it's not enough time to really put the fear of dog into her...so maybe I should just remove MJ from the list altogether. Would THAT get her attention? "Oh, well, since you'd rather be in Victoria, you can stay there. We'll catch you some other DECADE when/if we come back."

You also know what? You can go BACK after we leave. Yes, you can. I am sure that unless there is some massive medical emergency for which J and baby need to be hospitalized, all will be fine for a week. You can be where you should bloody well be when we arrive and then go back to babyville.

Basically, at this point, I do not give a rats arse if I see my mother. She's made her stance well known. Trying to please everyone? HAHAHA! Bullshit. She is trying to please herself and my sister. Forget me, I'll just deal with it. Well, this time, I won't. This is the biggest of the insults she's handed out to me in terms of me coming home and the like. Enough is enough.

I get to live there some day. Joy.

2007-05-02T18:00:00.000+08:00

http://abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200705/s1912649.htm

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200501/s1289827.htm

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200705/s1912683.htm

Julia Gillard, a politician in Australia, is slammed by the opposition, saying that she is "is not fit to lead the country because she is "deliberately barren"."

Holy. Wow.

Defending his earlier description of Ms Gillard as "deliberately barren", Senator Heffernan argued that having a family helped political leaders understand their community.

So, being unmarried and childfree makes you a bad example to the country's women, does it? Would it be better if she were mother to 4 different children from 3 different husbands? Would you like her to adopt a child to make her 'whole'?

If she were male and in politics, childfree and unmarried, would she be under such fire from her opponents? Probably not.

Women today have choices. Ms Gillard is a shining example to Australian women on how to exercise your choices. Marriage, kids, career, lifestyle, hobbies....these are all choices we make. It's hard enough in this day and age to make good choices. To see someone who can be a good example to future women, someone who is in politics and can do something good for the country AND is also childfree is great.

The current Aussie government and the man who made this comment:
"Mr Heffernan, like the Howard Government, overall is a man who's stuck in the past," she said.

If she had kids, would she then be unfit because the kids will take too much of her time?
If she were male, would it matter?
If she were UNABLE to have kids, how have they just rubbed it in her face?

Welcome!

2007-05-02T12:50:00.000+08:00

Ah....the joys of being Childfree.

Come along for the experience. Share your stories. Support those just like us.