no boys allowed in the room!!!!

reproducing biologically? that was a dumb way to say that. having a baby come out of my body is what i am talking about. i AM capable of doing this (afaik), just to be clear. but i have often been tempted to snap "i can't have kids actually, thanks for constantly bringing it up," jsut to confer the proper amount of shame on them for their behavior. however, they should be ashamed for not respecting people's autonomy and personal choices, not for imaginary reasons.

I several friends who don't want children and they get this shit all the time and it's awful and I hate hearing about it.

Oh the other hand I do want children and I get a lot of "what are you waiting for?" "time is running out, you better get started" comments which are super infuriating too for similar reasons. How do they know why I haven't yet? What if I was having fertility issues or something? Last year when my co-woker told me my ovaries were shriveling up I later thought that I should have said, "Actually, I've been trying for 5 years so thanks for that" but at the time I was too shocked to say much of anything.

Whooey roxy you are talking about my situation (only minus the siblings).

The idiots who are making things uncomfortable for roxy, LL and ENBB are idiots. But I've maybe also been that idiot. I never said anything, but I've been annoyed at the withholding of info that's none of my business.

There's this couple who were once close friends of mine, but have a tendency to get outraged very easily. They're in their early 40s now. They talked vehemently in their early 30s about how horrified they were that people ever asked them about their plans for having kids, and how it was none of anyone's business. That's fundamentally true. But at some point, not discussing the situation even with their very closest friends just got weird, because they themselves made such a fuss about being asked by less-close friends. The guy clearly adored, and still adores, children in general. The woman is more equivocal, though she gets on with kids just fine. They moved into an enormous house a few years ago, just the two of them, and said they wanted 'more room'. Either they've decided not to have kids, in which case their closest friends would have shrugged and moved on, or they can't, which would be sad if they wanted them but something they could have trusted their close friends not to make a big deal of. Or they haven't decided yet, in which case what on earth was all the fuss about? Instead, there was this 'how dare they ask!!!!' drama that just drew attention to the whole issue.

Not your situation, though, since none of you are into drama as far as I can tell! And I felt bad wanting to know, because even behaving as they did, of course they still had a perfect right to keep shtum.

mr veg and I have chosen not to have kids...i am thankful no-one has given us a hard time. i think mum is kinda confused like 'oh they will eventually just not now' sort of thing, but if I was still living in my hometown i know it would TOTALLY be a thing.

my best friend back home told her sister she wasnt having kids & her sister legit started bawling right there in front of her, as if my friend's vagina had just committed suicide or some shit. wtf.
ppl are so insensitive about it, it pisses me off. why should HER CHOICE reduce her sister to tears. you should say oh ok cool. fin.

Oh man I used to get so IA about the child-free thing (the term "childless" still irks), but I guess I have mellowed out. Also once you get old enough/have been coupled (especially married) long enough without breeding, ppl stop asking. By far, far, far the majority of women in the world have been pregnant/have borne children. Some of us haven't. It is a special little club. Welcome :)

UnBabby Club

i think i've been exceptionally lucky to have never really dealt with this - for all my parents' faults, asking me about when/if i'm having kids, let alone expecting me to have them, is just never a thing they would think to do. and jordan's parents... well, his mum basically told me that having children is overrated!!! and like i said, none of my close friends have children. in fact, the only person i can recently remember asking me about kids was one of the women i work with - but she's middle-aged and from the philippines and catholic so it's different.

the sibling thread is an interesting tie-in with this subject; to be harshly honest, i worry about what will happen to us when we're old and don't have kids bc we don't have close family out here, AND if we did have a kid i'd want to stick with one bc that's all i could handle BUT then i don't want that one kid stuck looking after us. so.

i think some ppl are just ignorant. they think it's 'normal' to have a family so they don't see it as inappropriate to ask about yours. but it's easy for me to not feel that bothered by it bc i don't have to deal with it, and also bc there isn't anything going on behind the scenes like fertility issues or anything.

Sibling thread?

I dunno. This stuff is just complicated. People ask inappropriate questions they don't realise are inappropriate because it's just ~the next step~ on the presumed ~couple ladder~ and easy default conversation when you don't know what else to talk about. I know I've done it myself, when younger, even as I've grown into a situation which is, well, complicated. I feel like people have the right to Not Talk About It, but also, people have the right to ask - but having the right to ask means having the right to ask, politely and respectfully, once, and then shut the fuck up and be satisfied with whatever answer is given.

I was thinking about this, because I was thinking about friends who have fallen off the Parenting Cliff.

I got very irritated at a former friend I was once very close to, who had always been kind of entitled and selfish, and that was just part of the deal of hanging out with her, because she had a million other good qualities that made up for it. Now, I know that this is the equivalent of saying that I eat babies and worship Hitler or whatever, but: I do not like small children. I am extremely uncomfortable with babies and small children. Part of this is the fact that I did not grow up around babies, didn't have an extended family with babies. And part of this is complicated stuff I will get into later. Suffice it to say, I do not like babies. I do not want to hold anyone's baby, or be made responsible for anyone's baby. And this friend turned up at an event where I was DJ-ing, demanded that I look after her baby (not even because she wanted to spend time with me, but because she wanted to spend time with another friend!) and laid heavy guilt on me until she literally dropped the child in my lap, against my will. I don't know how to look after a baby, I was given no guidance as to what to do, even how to hold it, the child sensed my discomfort because children are not stupid, and immediately rolled off my lap and onto the floor, with a wail and accusations of "you dropped my baby!" No, you thrust your child onto an unwilling party who warned you in advance they were uncomfortable with the task. Next time someone says "I'd rather not hold your baby" just don't stick your baby on them.

And there's a part of me that wants to say: if you are a parent, please just *accept* that there are some people who do not like babies, or are uncomfortable with babies, and as much as you adore your little diddums, it is not your duty to get that person *over* their fear, or expect your child to be somehow magically excepted from that person's discomfort, because hey, your child is so adorable, who won't like your child? Hitler, that's who. That's like going up to the person who has told you that they have a severe phobia of dogs and telling them "oh, but my dog is ~friendly~!!!" and letting that dog run up to them, jump up on their lap and lick their face. You will never see that person again if you disrespect their boundaries so thoroughly. DON'T BE THAT PARENT.

But, you know "not liking children" is complicated. Yes, it's because I'm a shrivelled up old prune who hates fun and hates life and really really hates noise and disorder and bad smells and rock'n'roll and apple pie. Or something. But it's also because my child-free status is complicated. I desperately wanted children when I was younger. I was forced to terminate an unplanned but wanted pregnancy at 30 because of health issues, and I gave up for adoption the child I fathered (in every sense of the word except providing the sperm) when I was 17. This stuff is shitty and painful to even just type on a messageboard thread, where I don't have to show anyone that I'm wiping away tears as I type it. It's easier to just say "I don't want to be around children because I fucking hate babies and yes, I do worship Satan, too" than to talk about how painful and complicated my feelings about ~babies~ are.

I do realise that friends who have children are not making their lifestyle choices *at* me. But it's also the sense, when people say "oh, you just have to make more effort" with friends who have had children. Yes, I have to make a huge amount of effort (when I don't *have* a lot of emotional wherewithal to start with) to place myself in a situation that I may find painful and emotionally raw. Oh, let me think about that. You know what, it's probably better for both of us if we let this friendship quietly slip away.

Family stuff got easier after my brother had a child, that took the pressure off me. But now my brother is divorced, and he and my Mum are estranged, and even the One Golden Grandchild has become a complicated situation, and guess who my Mum always wants to talk to about how *complicated* that situation is? I am a bad daughter. I give her about 5 minutes of Talking About The Grandchild while I go "uh-huh" vaguely because clearly she needs to talk about it, and then I change the subject because oh hey this is an unhappy and fraught subject on so many levels.

I thought I'd feel better after typing all that shit out, but really, I don't. It doesn't ever get any easier talking about this stuff.

People don't have children for all kinds of reasons, some through choice and some not through choice, and all of those reasons should be respected, and people who don't respect those reasons are the *real* baby-eating Satan-Hitlers. I feel bad for leaving this emotional vomit all over the thread now. My apologies to anyone I've made uncomfortable with this post.

tl;dr - sometimes it's even *more* complicated than "fertility issues" and people are still assholes about it

I should really learn to stay the fuck out of these conversations. :(

I don't see why you would have made anyone uncomfortable with that post! It was very interesting and honest which is very admirable and you are right, sometimes it is about more than fertility issues which was what I was trying to get at earlier. I would have loved to have a baby any time in last 3-4 years but it did not happen for a number of incredibly valid and good reasons (none of which have anything to do with fertility) and overall it's a very good thing that it did not. However, that doesn't mean it's not incredibly hurtful to me when people make those kinds of comments. I guess it's because I know how hard some people struggle with infertility that it seems like it should be more hurtful to them and that my hurt isn't justified but your post made me realize that that's not true at all. Anyway, people are insensitive jerks is how I break it down to an extent and I'm sorry that you've had to experience that.

Also, to all the child free by choice folks, I once worked with a woman who was probably nearing 60 at the time and who had never had kids. I very clearly remember her telling me that not having children was the best choice she had ever made and that she didn't regret anything about it. This lady was awesome and had led one of the coolest most interesting lives I've ever heard about. I think about her every time one of my friends tells me about getting the whole "Oh, you'll regret that choice when you're older" spiel.

Also BB, you don't have any reason to be worried about posting about your dislike for small babies. I freaking love babies but because I've never been around them, I have no idea what to do with them and they make me incredibly nervous! I was once cooing over someone's six week old at a rehearsal dinner when the mother suddenly put her arms out and tried to give me the baby and I was like "No, no, please it's OK I don't need to hold her!". I will never forget this lady's face when I declined to hold that baby. She looked so offended but I'd had wine and I'd never held a baby that small and I was terrified I'd drop her. I've still only held a newborn exactly once. If I do ever have a kid I'm going to have to start hanging out at a daycare or something so that I get used to very small people.

I do not feel uncomfortable with that post! You make a good point about not everybody wanting to be around babies. I don't think I am that parent? But it's something to be mindful of because I am a big sappy dope about my kid and might forget not everybody is flooded with baby-oxytocin.

great post branwell.

if you are a parent, please just *accept* that there are some people who do not like babies, or are uncomfortable with babies, and as much as you adore your little diddums, it is not your duty to get that person *over* their fear, or expect your child to be somehow magically excepted from that person's discomfort

YES

Also kindly try not to treat that person like a fragile freak, or a person who lacks maturity. If I'm going stay in a buoyant mood, I need to not type out my abundant feelings about this but I'm happy to discuss irl (or on the lol phone!)

ll, we ate some of the pine resin jam that you gave us the other night on Club crackers, it was soooo good. also i didn't notice that on the container it says "effective against flu and bronchitis" - with no caveat, asterisk, etc

Oh that's great!! I love the language on the jar. Everything about that product really delights me and I'm so glad you liked it!!

The health benefits have no caveat because you need to believe that the Rhodopy Mountain people know what they're doing. I haven't been gobbling spoonfuls of it daily or anything, but I haven't been sick either!!

Also if it's just pine sap + sugar syrup, doesn't that mean we can make our own? Wanted to ask you that!!

I guess I was worried about making people uncomfortable with that post, because I realise that there are many parents here. And parents can be kinda ~precious~ (sarcastic "precious") about their children, because children are actually *precious* (genuine, real precious, not sarcastic "precious").

And I guess it's just one of those things that I struggle with. I hate babies! But... how can anyone hate babies? Babies are wonderful and amazing and great! Especially a person who reads as "female", like how can a *female* person with a womb and everything ~hate babies~? It's just another way I feel like I've failed as a "woman". Saying you hate babies is like saying you hate flowers and unicorns and fun.

Except... just... there are more reasons to feel uncomfortable and unhappy around babies than just being an Evil Failed Woman and worshipping Satan.

Thanks for understanding, ladies. This thread is the best.

I have spent the afternoon in the community garden planting pansies and spreading woodchips and hoeing so I'm feeling really full of life and positivity again now! I wish I could give you all rhubarb.

Gardening is awesome therapy. I can't wait to get back to my garden. Rhubarb is a favorite! I don't have any planted, but may stick some in in the fall.

Sorry, I was using fertility issues just as an example of complicated private stuff related to the kid-choice - I def didnt mean to imply thats the -only- complication out there.

i did my first gardening of the year today too <3 feeling really alive and hopeful and full of vit D

Lol me too, yesterday - first time ever! I bought easy veggies to grow too.

Stewed rhubarb is the best, maybe I should grow some too.

LL - i think it would be easy to make, pine sap is really easy to collect!

It's so weird, like, every Sunday, I feel so lazy and sluggish and "ugh, do not want to go up to the community garden, I'd rather lie in bed and mope" - like that, is crazy! Every time I go to the garden and muck around digging and planting things, I come home feeling amazingly great. It's partly gardening, and partly this gang of awesome middle aged ladies who insist we take a tea break every 45 minutes and sit around talking about Japanese Knotweed and slugs and Serious Apple Tree Business. And every time I go, I come back thinking "Why did I not want to go?!" And yet it's like I have this demon sitting on my chest who does not want me to go up there and get happy. I need to tell that demon to STFU on Sunday mornings and go garden every week.

I have even sowed rocket and beans in my tiny planter at home, I am so inspired. We have been discussing trellis vs wig-wam bean cultivation styles up at the garden so I'm excited to see what I can do in the little concrete courtyard.

What is everyone else growing?

Right now I am trying to keep alive, in pots, for two more weeks:
_* heirloom tomato seedlings
_* jalapeno, serrano, and habenero pepper seedlings
_* bunch o' herbs (parsley, sage, rosemary, French and lemon thyme, basil, spearmint, tarragon, dill, maybe something else that I am forgetting?)
_* three unusual ferns
_* two hostas
_* several hellebores

Mom's gonna dig some stuff out of her garden--more hostas, maybe some other perennials.

that sounds fantastic. Good mix of edible and decorative. (Love "unusual ferns")

You've also reminded me I need to buy herbs, but I tend to get starter pots at Sainsburys, plant it out and keep it going.

I never really decided whether I wanted kids or not and now I guess I'm not having them, seeing as I'm in my mid-30s and single, way too fucked up to consider being not-single soon (not v likely even if I wanted to), and way too risk-averse to try for kids with anyone I hadn't been with for at least a few years; also, PCOS prob means fertility issues, and one more unconfirmed medical suspicion re breeding too.

This makes me kinda sad even though I don't really like being around kids; at least, I always feel so nervous around them bcz kids are fragile and kids speak their minds and I can't deal with either, and a kid shouldn't have to deal with a perma-nervous depresso mother who will fuck them up by being so neurotic, even if I didn't flip out with my horrible temper and do actively bad stuff, which, you know, I hope I could manage not to but it scares me. Hi I'm weird.

I work in a library tho and sooo many of my coworkers are female, older than me and childless, so I have a kind of skewed idea of how normal it is I guess. It's weird though, all the guys are married with kids and so few of the women are.

OK, back to gardening talk. I don't have a garden either! I do have a balcony that I have a few pot plants on except I've had mad slug infestations recently. How do they even get up to my second floor (3rd floor US) balcony?

As someone once pointed out to me (roxy??), they can get anywhere, because their whole body is a foot! The way to curtail slugs is to clear away all growth, vines, etc from the base of the wall they're climbing up. If there's foliage climbing up the wall, it will bring bugs.

there was a lifehacker article last week about the easiest veggies to grow, which inspired me - so i got:
- cucumber
- red and green peppers
- zucchini
- radishes
- lettuce
- tomatoes
- parsley
- thai basil

i got a pretty fern as well, and still want to get some bouganvillea to cover the fence, maybe some beans and regular basil too. we already have a ton of potted succulents (i should post pics for crabbits). we have a small front yard that is just bark chip with some huge camellia bushes and landlord has just been like 'you can do whatever you want or nothing at all', which is nice. so yeah, i think i might really get into gardening this summer!!!

Oh I'm glad you mentioned bouganvillea! I want to get two mandevilla (sp?) to climb up these trellis thingies left by previous owners; those things did an awesome job two years ago, but I failed to bring them in over the winter so I will have to start from scratch.

Radishes are one of my favorite things to grow! They sprout practically overnight, which makes one feel quite accomplished. Lettuce is also a really great "beginner" veggie, as long as you're not trying to grow it when it is too hot.

Eating perfectly ripe tomatoes you grew your self is one of the best summer experiences imo.

Consider trying strawberries! Easy and so tasty.

Spacecadet, you can set out beer traps (just some beer in a couple of shallow bowls) to catch slugs.

We use this strange grease/glue stuff which you spread around the base of trees or the rims of pots, over which slugs apparently cannot climb. So far, it appears to be working, at least our figs are untouched.

This makes me kinda sad even though I don't really like being around kids; at least, I always feel so nervous around them bcz kids are fragile and kids speak their minds and I can't deal with either, and a kid shouldn't have to deal with a perma-nervous depresso mother who will fuck them up by being so neurotic, even if I didn't flip out with my horrible temper and do actively bad stuff, which, you know, I hope I could manage not to but it scares me. Hi I'm weird.

This is the kind of double bind crap that really fucks up my head. Like, the constant hysteria (sexist word chosen somewhat deliberately) and mother-shaming all the time of "OMG IF YOU ARE NOT PERFECT MOTHER YOU ARE CRAP AND WILL DESTROY CHILDREN'S LIVES FOREVER" backed with the equal and opposite shaming of well, if you decide not to have children, for whatever reason, even if it's something reasonable like "I don't feel prepared to take on the responsibility of children" it's "OMG CHILDLESS WOMEN ARE USELESS AND SELFISH AND WEIRD AND UNFULFILLED." Why should anyone feel any obligation to bring another human being into the world, in order to conform to anyone's expectation of What Women Are Supposed To be. Yet another case of: Women! Whatever you do, it's wrong.

The good news is, once you hit 40, most people stop asking, because they assume your ovaries and your mind have already shrivelled up like tomato plants you forgot to water during a heat wave.

Speaking of which, I should go and water my beans.

Sorry! God I should not have read that "children in pubs" thread first thing in the morning. That brought on the stabby rrrrrage.

ok tbrr, the story that follows is why i feel heartbroken about my close female friendships:

* you guys reminded me that even if it's a repetitive task, i need to reach out to ppl who have just had babies, so i extra reached out to a friend a few other friends had asked about (and i had to report back "i don't know how she is") . so i called and left a message (casual, not demanding) and a funny text with a silly question. this was yesterday.

* this morning i got a text that read "so sorry, looking for time to call you back but i just don't have it. so consumed these next few weeks. soon!"
* my heart broke for real because i realized that i had been demoted

The good news is, once you hit 40, most people stop asking, because they assume your ovaries and your mind have already shrivelled up

I don't think they assume that about your 40 year old mind, or at least everyone I interact with doesn't. Maybe I have a knack for avoiding awful people? My parents have already accepted that the family line will end with me, and there is something glamorous about being viewed as a childless Satan-Hitler by intrusive acquaintances.

* this morning i got a text that read "so sorry, looking for time to call you back but i just don't have it. so consumed these next few weeks. soon!"
* my heart broke for real because i realized that i had been demoted

:(

I...dislike cold, hard reality so I try not to think about what priority level I am to my friends at any given moment. I also have enough of them in different stages of their lives that I can sort of afford to be less important to a lot of them if I can find a couple who have time for me in the near future or whatever. If they all left me, or I felt like they were leaving me, at the same time and I ran out of community to splash around in when I needed it, I would have no way of recharging or rebuilding my resources. I'm sorry. :(

yeah there's nothing i can do to make her want to talk to me more so i just have to accept it but it stings

A few weeks ago I was supposed to do something w a friend I don't see enough, and we both had the night "free" but also both had a bunch of *lyfe* obligations like studying, laundry, getting our shit together. After a few queries, we agreed to give each other the gift of time to put our lives in order because that pressure and those needs are real. Because we talked it over and were both agreed, it felt like an expression of our caring for each other.

This is not The Answer to anything, it was just a solution we found on that one occasion.

ach i'm sorry LL, that would bum me out too!!

plus the extra level of mental havoc that reaching out and being backburnered adds, I'm not very good at handling stuff like that personally

kinda long tl;dr sobstory here, boo hoo friendships sorry but I need to get this out of my head

i am grappling with the possiblity that I may have officially lost a friendship with a girl I've been friends with since 7th Grade. top of the list, my favorite person in the world. she was a bit harder to reach after she had kids, but nothing I couldn't handle. she went through a divorce about 3 years ago, and since then seems to have pulled away from both me and our other mutual friend. she's not an email person, is kinda hard to stay in touch with from a distance generally anyway.

2 years ago when I was home I called & left a bunch of voicemails, Hi I'm in town for 2 weeks I'd love to see you etc...dropped by her house but no-one was home...ended up dropping a letter in her mailbox the day I left saying I was sad to see her. never heard anything. and this last time, I was only home for such a short time I didn't even make plans to catch up with her. and then I felt horrible so I wrote her a long snailmail letter about a month ago telling her how much I want to stay friends, in whatever form that takes etc.

but I don't know if I'll ever hear back. I don't want to think about the likelihood that I won't. i just wish I knew what was in her heart, if she's going through some shit or if we're just moving to the deep-freeze phase of the long distance friendship

the thing is we stayed tight through SO much shit. SO much. that I just can't get down with the idea that this is, possibly, it. I dunno if I can give up yet.

idk.

*sad to see her = *sad not to see her

jeez

all that makes me sound like a 'she's just not that into you' thing and that I'm crazystalking someone who doesnt' want to be friends

it's not exactly that way

there's more to it but yeah just :/

I hear you. I lost my first "best friend" by moving to NYC. We were inseparable, roommates and confidantes who needed no one else, for years. We thought no matter how much time passed, our connection would stay the same; that we'd be aunties to each other's kids. For about a year we talked on the phone on and off. Then stuff happened, and we stopped. In later years I left her a couple of messages, tried to get in touch when I was in town, but no response.

Finally I found her on fb and swung a visit to her two holidays ago. It was brief, coffee and an hour at her house. She was amiable but distracted, friendly but missing some emotional engagement. I thought catching up was important, but it was more important to her to take a nap before her night shift as a nurse. She has a husband and two kids and owns a house in our college town, and that life is more real than being friends with me (since I'm just going to leave again anyway?). It's probably healthier for her to have boundaries and a clear view of her daily needs but I def felt put in my place low on the list.

tl;dr, just...I feel that feeling too. It's weird-sad. I stopped trying, we're both still alive and part of the universe and maybe our stories will intersect again, maybe not. At the very least we changed each other. The fact of our history isn't erased by it not lasting forever....

:/

I wanted her to do more with her life than marry some Midwestern dweeb (he's a dweeb) and never leave our ultra-conservative town and not have any friends who weren't religious. I know it's hateful and patronizing of me to indulge these thoughts but she could have developed so much more interestingly.

yep

That reads horribly--I should say that she was beautiful and iconoclastic and coquettish and confident and all the boys I liked liked her instead of me. She was a shining thing. Maybe she burned herself out, I don't know.

i totally get what you mean

getting old/adulthood kinda blows in that regard

the stuff you want for each other as teenagers seems so much more exciting than what irl usually doles out

Like marrying Leonard Cohen.