Be honest: do you regret having children?

The ones who regret having children were simply not prepared to handle what comes with the territory and as a result caused harm to themselves, their relationship, and most tragic of all, their kids...who did not ask to be born into that situation.

Bottom line...it takes MONEY, time, sacrifice, and saint-like martyrdom at times to raise children in this world. Don't disembark carelessly.

I'm 28, single w/no children, and have been seriously questioning this for a few years now.

I probably should have chimed in with this sooner, but allow me to share my story. If it sounds familiar, it should. I've written about it here many times as it has been a large and never-ceasing issue in my life.

I'm one of three children. Both of my parents are fairly normal. Neither have any major issues. No mental illness, no addiction problems, no violent tendencies. Yet somehow, their first-born child has severe bipolar disorder, and a host of other problems that go along with it. Even though she is more than 30 years of age, she is like a five year-old in many ways. She can take care of herself most (certainly not all) of the time, but her life is VERY turbulent. She is in frequent contact with my parents and a constant worry to them (though we have all gotten better at dealing with her without getting too stressed out). My parents help her a lot, and so do her friends (what are left of them), but even with all the help, she has a lot of problems. She has had to live with my parents for extended periods, needed them to bail her out financially, needed them to take care of her during one of her quarterly episodes of severe mania, etc. I'm not sure people who haven't experienced mental illness can appreciate how burdensome it is to have a mentally ill family member to help and take care of.

That's my sister. My brother is on a whole 'nother level. He's a natural born psychopath who is no longer capable of functioning in society and belongs in a mental institution. Instead he is in and out of jail, so much so that he has spent roughly half of his adult life in jail, and the other half staying with my mom since he cannot support himself in any way and no one can stand to be around him for any significant period of time. He has destroyed his brain through long-term substance abuse (mostly alcohol and marijuana, but also a slew of other drugs). He's so messed up now that even a cup of coffee sends him over the edge. He'll start ranting and shouting in the middle of the night waking everyone up and can't be settled. He has been a huge problem his entire life, getting in fights and trouble with the law throughout childhood, constantly looking for ways to upset and harm others, even if it meant hurting himself more in the process, etc. It destroyed our family. My relatives want nothing to do with him, nor does my father, nor do I. My dad basically divorced my mom over it since she refused to break ties with him. He threatened to kill me on more than one occasion, which was pretty troubling given I was a teenager at the time and he is 5 years older than me. My parents allowed this to continue despite numerous please from me to kick him out so that I may have somewhat of a normal life, but they never did, and this created a lot of problems for my relationship with and feelings towards my parents. It basically lead to me nearly cutting them out of my life for several years and never really loving them the same as I did as a child, though I feel my relationship with both is good now.

Despite having two literally crazy siblings, I am normal, or at least not mentally ill to the point of needing treatment. My siblings, though both full grown adults, are more burden than joy, and since they are not my children, not mine to look after, I moved 1000 miles away to get away from the whole cloud of problems they produce. Because my brother has always been purely evil, I have no positive emotions towards him. I do not like him. I do not love him. I am sorry that he exists, both for the world and for himself. I want nothing to do with him. I want to hear nothing of him. My sister, though a huge burden, is still a wonderful person and has always been, so I still contact her and love her and try to help her, but to live with her or near her would be enough to pull me under. I would drown, and she would only be slightly better off. I cannot justify this, so I help her in small ways from afar.

I look at my parents and how life has turned out for them, and I feel very sorry for them. It's a tragedy. Nobody deserves this. I would not wish their situation on anyone. They will never know the satisfaction of raising successful children (outside of me) or see any promise in the future of their genes (through grandchildren). Being involved in all this but also observing everything has made me think long and hard about children... it is something I wrestle with nearly every day because I would deeply like to have children of my own, but I don't know if I could handle having a child like either of my siblings (who I share my genes with), and even if I am, I am certain my life would be better off with none than a crazy child who is a burden until the day I die. I still have about a decade to consider my options, but I really think my only hope is for technology to advance enough so that doctors/scientists can isolate "bad" genes and select against them when creating an embryo. Short of that (which likely will not happen any time soon), I really doubt I will reproduce. It just is not worth the risk. It is a real tragedy too, because I am a tremendous outlier in a lot of positive ways and feel like I have a lot to offer a child, but the tiny number of toxic traits buried in my DNA are enough to ruin all the positive ones.

I share this not really to justify not having kids but to provide an example to consider for those of you who cannot understand why some people think twice about the their own procreation. I hope you got something out of it.

I agree wholeheartedly with this post. My first of four was born while I was doing a postdoc. We were away from home, stressed out, and she had pretty bad colic for the first 6 months to the point that she was coughing up blood sometimes. Then we found a really good pediatrician who straightened things out for us and things got much better.

However, the experience of having small kids was generally sucky for me because I was in a crucial phase of my career and I was really focused on work.

Having come through the other side with four kids at 12. 9, 7, and 3 I'm much more able to appreciate the three year old now and how he is developing. The other kids are able to watch him and entertain him so that's a big help. They can do a lot of things like clean the house, feed the dogs etc so that takes a lot of stress away.

Going back, would there be some things that I would change? Probably, but the changes would have to do more with how I reacted to things or prioritized my life than in changing any event or course we took.

It's also incredibly important that I married the right person who allowed me to grow into being a father and was always very supportive. I had a pretty crappy childhood and I was concerned about repeating that with my kids.

Finally, the last part of runtherockies opost is absolutely true for what I've experienced. Lately, I watched Band of Brothers over a couple of weeks with my daughter and talked a lot about All quiet on the Western Front. I've been working on soccer with my oldest son and football with my middle son. Every night in my house sounds like a raucous cacophony with musical instruments. I love it because they're exploding with music and they're trying different instruments. It's really wonderful seeing what they're going to get into next.

Are you invested in the stock market? You should be taking appropriate financial management steps along with raising your family.

weighing in wrote:

honestly, so many of you on here are laying it on so thick that it makes me want to call b.s. on the majority of these posts.

a lot of delusion in here.

that's not bad, i guess, because obviously if you parade your "it's the best" thing over and over again it might help you to believe it and be better parents and that's all good, but it really speaks of how out of touch some of you are(judgmental, too) with other ways of life when you go on and on about the "joy" and whatnot and not wanting to have kids meaning you're not "suitable" for having kids. Ridiculous.

Funny, your post sounds judgmental to me. Having children is both great and stressful at the same time - like almost anything that is worthwhile. You worry they will get hurt, worry about paying for college, the heartbreak they will undoubtedly suffer at some point over a boy/girl, worry when they start driving, etc. However, at the same time, seeing those young children become their own person, succeed in school/sports/whatever activity, be a good friend to someone, become an adult and embark on their own journey is fantastic.

If you don't want to have children, then you aren't "suitable" to have kids. Not sure why that is offensive. Children deserved to be raised in an environment where they are wanted. Nothing wrong with not wanting children - it is not for everyone.

Rodent, I wasn't trolling you. I've used this name and another one (track chick) for a few years and I realise now that because a hamster is a rodent it might've looked a bit suspiscious! I genuinely wanted to know. Do you know what's wrong with your knee? Did you tear something? I can understand it fuelling your depression because I had an injury that stopped me from walking & running for years also. That's a long horrible story I won't get into. I went off the rails because of the pain.

To the person who gave the story about their sister and bipolar, I'm sorry. It's sad that someone who you describe as a 'wonderful person' struggles so much.

There are medical problems in my family and I'd be scared of having kids in case I passed things on. There are also a lot of good traits too so I don't know.

No regrets. My kids are one of the biggest joys of my life.

I'm not a parent, but I can honestly say I wish my parents did not have me. I hate myself, and my life. I have no future for now (I am 21). I have no idea what I want to do with my life. I will graduate university next year, but I don't know what I'm doing after that. I have no marketable skills, and I don't really enjoy doing anything.

Honestly, I don't want to exist. I wish I could take an assault rifle and blow 50million bullets into my useless skull. I wish I could go back to the day before I was born and give my mother a miscarriage.

even worse, my parents actually like me. They have no idea I am anything like this. I'm a chemistry major, with a 3.7 gpa. People want me to go to medical school or chem grad school. Honestly I hate chemistry and ony chose that as a major because I hate everything else even more. I want no job in science at all.

if my parents knew I had any of these thoughts, they would immediately send me to a counselor, like I'm crazy. but for now, all I have is lrc to vent my feelings to.

I've loved being a parent despite all the physical, emotional, and financial stress it entails. Now that my kids are almost fully grown, I can honestly say that I miss it and wish there were a way I could do it all again.

RE: Be honest: do you regret having children?

My kids are the world to me. I feel blessed to have them in my life. No regrets...