06-27-2008, 09:22 AM
hildfree and happy ...no kidding
An increasing number of couples are deciding that parenthood is not for them, reports Aine Nugent
Just the two of us: Childfree couple Kevin and Nadia Ryan at their
Friday June 27 2008
With the long summer break from school just a stone's throw away, many parents will be getting their heads, and their pockets, around how to keep children busy over the long summer months, particularly if the weather is anything like last year. Whether it's summer camps, paying for childcare, or day trips to museums and the park, keeping them from being bored is hard work, and expensive, especially for working parents who won't have as much time off as they might like to spend with their kids.
There might even be a tinge of envy for colleagues who have no children -- how easy it is for them to while away the long summer days while you have to pay over the odds to pack your lot off on holiday during the school break. Then again, you wouldn't change it for the world ... or would you?
There are an increasing number of people choosing not to have children. Not because of an inability to become pregnant, or because they haven't met the right partner, but simply because it's not a road they want to go down. They can be maligned, misunderstood and downright hated because of their choice, in this child-centric world of ours. But a professor of psychology at Harvard, Daniel Gilbert, told a 'Happiness and its Causes' conference in Sydney recently that, while married couples are happier generally than unmarried people, those happiness levels plummet when children arrive.
"People are extremely happy before they have children and then their happiness goes down, and it takes another big hit when kids reach adolescence."
He claims psychological studies have proven that paying for any commodity increases our happiness with it and that money is a key reason people believe children bring happiness -- parents spend so much on kids, we subconsiously assume kids will make us happy.
Remaining childless -- or to use the PC term 'childfree' -- has become a lifestyle choice for some. As for the terminology, according to childfree.net, one of the many organisations set up to support non-parenting adults, "We choose to call ourselves childfree rather than childless, because we feel the term childless implies that we're missing something we want -- and we aren't. We consider ourselves childfree -- free of the loss of personal freedom, money, time and energy that having children requires."
According to a 2006 study carried out by the Childless By Choice Project in the US, the top three motives for remaining childfree are the freedom generated by the status, the belief that a couple's relationship won't be enhanced by a child and that the couple don't want the responsibility of offspring.
Kevin and Nadia Ryan realised when they reached "that age" of late twenties and their friends were beginning to settle, get married and have children, that their social outlets began to shrink.
"We were no longer seeing them anymore because of their family commitments. In Ireland today, I feel it's still not socially acceptable to not have kids -- there's a bit of the old Catholic about it all, this requirement to procreate," says Kevin (30), who lives in Galway with his French wife Nadia (32). The Ryans realised 'very early' they would not have children.
"Within a couple of months of meeting we both knew," says Kevin. They have been married two years and still get questioned by friends. "We're often told we'll change our mind and it's sometimes assumed we don't like kids, which is not true. We both have nephews we adore."
Finding like-minded people to socialise with proved difficult, so Nadia and Kevin set up a website, BigKidsNoKids as a social networking facility.
"Grown-ups without kids can be a bit kid-like themselves, they don't ever really feel grown-up, so that's where the name came from. If you don't have children you can get involved in loads of things, have lots of interests. People without children have time on their hands. They travel, do volunteer work and become good contributors to society. But it can be hard finding people to holiday with, for instance, who are couples, but without children.
'There's a particular lack of understanding that you might want to be married without children," adds Kevin.
"It's a kind of 'come out of the closet' mentality. The general belief seems to be that you only get married to build a family. That's not true. We love each other, that's why."
The site features a 'statement of rights' for childfree couples like themselves. They include:
n The right to choose not to have kids;
n Being as equal as the person who does have kids;
n Not being considered selfish or guilty for choosing not to have kids;
n The belief that Big Kids without kids can and do help society in other ways than just breeding;
n Believing that having kids does not make people better human beings -- it just makes them parents, good or bad.
The group has members from many countries; the age range tends to be early thirties.
"It's not a movement as such," says Kevin, "it's just a method of meeting people who don't have kids but might want to go on holiday together, for instance."
And presumably, avoid all those endless conversations about nappies, bottles and babysitting.
http://www.bigkidsnokids.com
'I can write children, but not rear them'
Novelist Sheila O'Flanagan decided in her twenties that she would never want to have children.
"A company interviewing me for a job asked me what my circumstances were and I told them I had no intention of having children. It was the first time I had ever verbalised it, but I was always sure.
"I suppose it's a lack of a maternal instinct. I'm just not sure everyone has it. Some people are forced into having it, though."
The pressure Sheila is alluding to from other people can be strong.
"I was in a relationship once and his mother said how much he was looking forward to having children -- I just felt a chill wind. People always try to tie marriage and kids together without understanding you can be happy without them."
Sheila's current partner has children from a previous relationship and she's fine with that.
"I didn't have to make the decision," she says.
Sheila wasn't immune from pressure from other people, despite the firmness of her decision.
"I was told I'd feel different when I did have a child, but what if I didn't! I have four nephews I get on great with but I simply don't have that nurturing nature."
The author has no problem with writing parenting roles in her books, though. "I've been told that I can 'write good children'," she adds, "but it's just the rearing of them I didn't fancy."
Sheila O'Flanagan's latest novel, Bad Behaviour, is in bookshops now
http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/chil...21760.html
An increasing number of couples are deciding that parenthood is not for them, reports Aine Nugent
Just the two of us: Childfree couple Kevin and Nadia Ryan at their
Friday June 27 2008
With the long summer break from school just a stone's throw away, many parents will be getting their heads, and their pockets, around how to keep children busy over the long summer months, particularly if the weather is anything like last year. Whether it's summer camps, paying for childcare, or day trips to museums and the park, keeping them from being bored is hard work, and expensive, especially for working parents who won't have as much time off as they might like to spend with their kids.
There might even be a tinge of envy for colleagues who have no children -- how easy it is for them to while away the long summer days while you have to pay over the odds to pack your lot off on holiday during the school break. Then again, you wouldn't change it for the world ... or would you?
There are an increasing number of people choosing not to have children. Not because of an inability to become pregnant, or because they haven't met the right partner, but simply because it's not a road they want to go down. They can be maligned, misunderstood and downright hated because of their choice, in this child-centric world of ours. But a professor of psychology at Harvard, Daniel Gilbert, told a 'Happiness and its Causes' conference in Sydney recently that, while married couples are happier generally than unmarried people, those happiness levels plummet when children arrive.
"People are extremely happy before they have children and then their happiness goes down, and it takes another big hit when kids reach adolescence."
He claims psychological studies have proven that paying for any commodity increases our happiness with it and that money is a key reason people believe children bring happiness -- parents spend so much on kids, we subconsiously assume kids will make us happy.
Remaining childless -- or to use the PC term 'childfree' -- has become a lifestyle choice for some. As for the terminology, according to childfree.net, one of the many organisations set up to support non-parenting adults, "We choose to call ourselves childfree rather than childless, because we feel the term childless implies that we're missing something we want -- and we aren't. We consider ourselves childfree -- free of the loss of personal freedom, money, time and energy that having children requires."
According to a 2006 study carried out by the Childless By Choice Project in the US, the top three motives for remaining childfree are the freedom generated by the status, the belief that a couple's relationship won't be enhanced by a child and that the couple don't want the responsibility of offspring.
Kevin and Nadia Ryan realised when they reached "that age" of late twenties and their friends were beginning to settle, get married and have children, that their social outlets began to shrink.
"We were no longer seeing them anymore because of their family commitments. In Ireland today, I feel it's still not socially acceptable to not have kids -- there's a bit of the old Catholic about it all, this requirement to procreate," says Kevin (30), who lives in Galway with his French wife Nadia (32). The Ryans realised 'very early' they would not have children.
"Within a couple of months of meeting we both knew," says Kevin. They have been married two years and still get questioned by friends. "We're often told we'll change our mind and it's sometimes assumed we don't like kids, which is not true. We both have nephews we adore."
Finding like-minded people to socialise with proved difficult, so Nadia and Kevin set up a website, BigKidsNoKids as a social networking facility.
"Grown-ups without kids can be a bit kid-like themselves, they don't ever really feel grown-up, so that's where the name came from. If you don't have children you can get involved in loads of things, have lots of interests. People without children have time on their hands. They travel, do volunteer work and become good contributors to society. But it can be hard finding people to holiday with, for instance, who are couples, but without children.
'There's a particular lack of understanding that you might want to be married without children," adds Kevin.
"It's a kind of 'come out of the closet' mentality. The general belief seems to be that you only get married to build a family. That's not true. We love each other, that's why."
The site features a 'statement of rights' for childfree couples like themselves. They include:
n The right to choose not to have kids;
n Being as equal as the person who does have kids;
n Not being considered selfish or guilty for choosing not to have kids;
n The belief that Big Kids without kids can and do help society in other ways than just breeding;
n Believing that having kids does not make people better human beings -- it just makes them parents, good or bad.
The group has members from many countries; the age range tends to be early thirties.
"It's not a movement as such," says Kevin, "it's just a method of meeting people who don't have kids but might want to go on holiday together, for instance."
And presumably, avoid all those endless conversations about nappies, bottles and babysitting.
http://www.bigkidsnokids.com
'I can write children, but not rear them'
Novelist Sheila O'Flanagan decided in her twenties that she would never want to have children.
"A company interviewing me for a job asked me what my circumstances were and I told them I had no intention of having children. It was the first time I had ever verbalised it, but I was always sure.
"I suppose it's a lack of a maternal instinct. I'm just not sure everyone has it. Some people are forced into having it, though."
The pressure Sheila is alluding to from other people can be strong.
"I was in a relationship once and his mother said how much he was looking forward to having children -- I just felt a chill wind. People always try to tie marriage and kids together without understanding you can be happy without them."
Sheila's current partner has children from a previous relationship and she's fine with that.
"I didn't have to make the decision," she says.
Sheila wasn't immune from pressure from other people, despite the firmness of her decision.
"I was told I'd feel different when I did have a child, but what if I didn't! I have four nephews I get on great with but I simply don't have that nurturing nature."
The author has no problem with writing parenting roles in her books, though. "I've been told that I can 'write good children'," she adds, "but it's just the rearing of them I didn't fancy."
Sheila O'Flanagan's latest novel, Bad Behaviour, is in bookshops now
http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/chil...21760.html