The choice not to have kids is a highly personal one that is impacted by several of factors. I’ve never once in my life ever had the feeling or even inkling of wanting to have kids. Especially at my age where a lot of people around me are starting to settle down and are having their first child people always ask me when I’m going to have mine. And I always say I’m not having kids but they always respond with “oh you’ll change your mind one day, your still young. I said that when I was your age too”. And it’s mostly other women that make these comments. As I’ve gotten older I’ve just found more reasons and am disinclined to not have kids. My mom has an at home daycare and I’ve been working there for as long as I can remember, if I’m being honest working in a daycare is like free birth control lol because children are just a lot. When I first brought up to my mom that I didn’t want to have kids she wanted to have this long debate about how I would change my mind and be a great mother, how I need to give her grandchildren but she has 2 other children if she wants grandchildren that bad that’s if they even decided to have kids. The most she’s going to get from me being a grandpawrent (aka a grandparent to a pet)
Thinking about this why is that a person’s decision to not have kids is questioned and ridiculed so much but when someone just openly says that they are trying for kids it’s met with cheers and congratulations. They really just openly said that they are having sex all the time just to have a kid and no one questions it but me saying I don’t want to have kids at all is like the end of the world.
Unruly Bodies 
I heavily empathize with your struggle. I feel like the decision should always be extremely personal because, as a woman, being pregnant can change your body in unimaginable ways. And as a black woman, pregnancy can kill, and that’s all before raising a child. Yet, I too, feel pressure from the outside world to want to have kids, which is really weird to me. No one ever questions why a man wouldn’t want kids, but because I have ovaries and a uterus, it is in my DNA to long for motherhood. Like, have y’all been around a 3-year-old lately? They are disgusting. I also feel the pressure to “carry on the bloodline” or something like that. That too, is disproportionately placed on women. I guess it comes down to the assumption that women’s only desire in life is to have a child when, in reality, many parents were pressured/forced into parenthood and really should not be parents. I really respect your decision not to have kids.
PS I come on Insecure reference!
Hi there, I am also child free by choice and plan to get my tubes tied in the next couple years. This is a decision that I have made based on many factors including mental illnesses, climate change, the economy, and the lifestyle I want to live. I find it ridiculous that so many people think that if a woman has the ability to reproduce, she has the responsibility to do so. There is also the idea that child free women will die alone and unhappy, when a happiness expert actually showed that single child free women are among the most happy groups of people. It puts a lot of pressure on women in general but most importantly, it reduces us down to our body, objectifying us in the mot influential way. I have also heard that not having children is selfish, while I could see that perspective, I argue the opposite. People have children for selfish reasons all the time; they want someone to love them unconditionally, to “continue their legacy/bloodline,” or to heal their inner child through another child (like that makes any sense). It’s all so stupid and just ridiculous. We have this expectation placed on us by society to benefit the economy but it is often to the detriment of most people. And I don’t think a lot of people really understand what raising a child entails, so when they have children they regret it and usually inflict trauma on those children because of that resentment (whether directly or indirectly). I also get the “you’ll change your mind” and it makes me so mad because no, I wont. This decision is based in morality for myself, the potential child, and the world at large. Plus I will NEVER give birth ever, that is not for me at all, and THAT IS OK. It doesn’t make me any less valuable as a woman and as a human, I personally think it’s very respectable to be able to know yourself well enough to make an informed decision about bringing in another LIFE into an already fucked up world.
I can relate to your position of choosing to not have children; I feel as though the generations before us don’t see the change in culture, climate, and economics that the U.S. has succumbed to since 2000. Like, do they not see how many kids still live at home in their 20s because they can’t afford to live by themselves even with a degree and a career? And then parents tell you to have kids, so they get grandkids. There becomes an unhealthy, selfish dynamic in the inquiry and debate aspect of it all, to the point where it seems the parents want nothing but what would make them happy. I haven’t even had a full relationship yet as a junior in college and my parents talk to me about children…
For people like that, it’s so obvious that all they care about is a woman giving birth to a child, and not necessarily about raising a child. Let me explain what I mean by that:
My mother never cared whether or not me or my sister had kids. Growing up, she made it very clear that she would not care if we didn’t have kids (the fact she felt the need to reiterate that speaks volumes about society’s view on giving birth), and would actually prefer to be a grandpawrent (and I do want to be childfree and own a few dogs). But my mother is also over 50 and has seen a LOT more than me and my sister.
So she’s seen how over the course of my 2 decades on this earth, things have gotten WORSE for women who have and raise children; she’s seen the education system decline and become more expensive, she’s seen inflation on housing and groceries, and she is well aware of how much healthcare costs. Especially over the past few years, women’s reproductive rights have been restricted, which ABSOLUTELY extends to even pregnant people who want children.
She’s one of the few people I know who is well aware of how difficult it is for people to raise kids and, by extension, for those parents and kids to have decent lives. And all of this does not even touch on the fact that it is ultimately up to the person to decide whether or not they want to use their body to birth children.
All these people care about is a woman giving birth, but they clearly don’t care how it affects the women or even the children they allegedly care so much about.