Well, they where interesting before they had kids.

Probably just a coincidence.

Whereas the Fell Running bores weren’t. 🙂

😉

Ha ha, god they can be dull.

I was subjected to an inordinately long one way conversation about shoes a couple of days ago. No idea what he was going on about, I just blocked it out and carried on running.

I’m pretty boring in person and online, less boring in what I’m saying.

More in a Father Paul Stone fashion and not saying much.

The change that occurs is so fundamental that you can’t possibly know what it’s like until it happens

It’s easy to spot though. Previously sane individuals become irrational, vague, self-obsessed and retreat into an insular world revolving around an object that is treated like a demi-god. It’s a baby, not the second coming FFS.
Becoming a parent doesn’t have to automatically mean a change for the worse but for some people they can’t resist.

Becoming a parent doesn’t have to automatically mean a change for the worse but for some people they can’t resist.

I don’t know if your insights show whether you’re a parent or not, but my theory is that the ones that turn bad have usually just discovered, as the vicious onslaught of extreme noise terror, exhaustion and sleep deprivation is beginning to subside, that their choice of breeding partner was perhaps a tad hasty..
They have suddenly found themselves in an irreversible lifelong pact, more real than anything else on earth, signed in blood and shit and tears and witnessed by the heavenly host, and are wondering if perhaps someone else might have been a bit more compatible..

The yawning chasm of hopelessness and inescapable failure that has just opened up before them needs to be filled with something, and luckily there’s an utterly captivating brand new creation wriggling in their arms that seems to fit the bill..

Just a little spark of positivity there to help y’all on your way on this fine clear sunny morning..
I’m off to take the rugrats down the seaside.. 😀

It’s really not. The point the parents are trying to make is that having kids is on a different level to pretty much anything else you they may choose to do they have done.

FTFY. And this is a problem why? Generally, if the subject comes up, a parent might say something like this because for them it might happen to be true. Would you prefer them to be dishonest? I could understand your ire if someone just marched up to you and declared their new found insight but in my experience that just doesn’t happen. It never happened to me in the years I wasn’t a parent, and it’s never happened since. The way some of you talk about it you’d think there was some sort of conspiracy between parents to belittle the childless. There isn’t.

Would you prefer them to be dishonest

Yes

if someone just marched up to you and declared their new found insight but in my experience that just doesn’t happen

It’s happened to me on many occasions.

You don’t know exactly what your life would be like now if you hadn’t had kids is what I said.

It’d be pretty similar to how my life was 2 years ago. I think us parents do have a pretty good idea of what we’re missing – sleep, time and money, mostly.

Anyway, kids are horrid. Except mine. 😀

The way some of you talk about it you’d think there was some sort of conspiracy between parents to belittle the childless. There isn’t.

I think all we’re asking for is a teensy bit of perspective. Some kind of realisation that while it may feel like it should, the world doesn’t actually revolve around your offspring.

It seems to completely go out of the window for many people with kids.

My wife and I now tell people we are biologically unable to have children simply because them we get sympathy rather than the usual lack of comnprehension from friends or family who have kids.

Whatever our reasons not to have children and they aren’t going on a public forum it is true that many parents seem to become preachy condescending child obsessives who just can’t grasp why we don’t want children. I don’t care whether they have kids, why should they get so wound up that I don’t want to?

Childless mid 30’s person off for a nice impromptu walk with the wife then a pub lunch, before evening ride and a few beers.

It seems to completely go out of the window for many people with kids.

As does it for many without.

My wife and I now tell people we are biologically unable to have children simply because them we get sympathy rather than the usual lack of comnprehension from friends or family who have kids.

A bit disingenuous don’t you think? I imagine that telling folk you were unable to have children would imply that you’d tried. It can be pretty devastating for people who try and can’t so that’s why you’d have my sympathy if you told me that. Just be honest with people.

I think all we’re asking for

Are you serious grum..?

You’re asking for people to sensor what they talk about because they have made a different lifestyle choice to you and you don’t want to hear about it..?
‘Aaaah ok, you wish to converse with me, but as long as I don’t mention the one thing that inexorably effects my life in every aspect from the moment that I wake to the moment that I fall asleep..’

You seem to be looking for a cause to fill the void that childlessness has obviously left you with, and I hate to break it to you, but I think that you’re trying to invent perhaps one of the daftest sounding human rights movements ever..

many parents seem to become preachy condescending child obsessives who just can’t grasp why we don’t want children

I have honestly never witnessed this in 40 years on this fine planet.. A wee bit of pisstaking of my younger brother perhaps, but that’s cos he’s my kid brother, not because he has chosen to be a non breeder..

Are you certain that you’re not soliciting this behaviour somehow..?

Yunki I don’t even know where to start with that. 🙄 😐 😯 😆 😕

It seems to completely go out of the window for many people with kids.

And is the same not true for those without kids?

And this is a problem why?

It’s not. You won’t hear me banging on about it. All I’m trying to do is explain the situation and why people say stupid stuff like ‘oh you don’t understand until you have kids’. It’s not at all helpful, and doesn’t get your point across either.

However I stand by my original point. Having kids IS a unique experience, in that there’s nothing else like it. I’m not saying it’s the best thing in the world, or that you should all do it, or that your life is incomplete otherwise, but it’s definitely unique.

My wife and I now tell people we are biologically unable to have children simply because them we get sympathy rather than the usual lack of comnprehension from friends or family who have kids.

Try telling people you don’t drink, and never have.

Yunki I don’t even know where to start with that.

Sorry Grum.. it was a bit over the top perhaps..

your post just seemed a bit

what do we want..!?

Silence from breeders

when do we want it..?

NOW! 😆

My wife and I now tell people we are biologically unable to have children simply because them we get sympathy rather than the usual lack of comnprehension from friends or family who have kids.

You tell your friends this or just random strangers? If the former then that’s incredibly callous. If the latter, why bother? Why worry about what strangers think of you?

Try telling people you don’t drink, and never have.

No kids, no drinking and also not that keen on football. I am a social pariah.

This is the problem isn’t it? Some people just don’t seem to be able to grasp the idea that other people want to live their lives in different ways, or have had dofferent life experiences that have influenced the way they deal with stuff.
Why is is callous of me to tell someone that I fire blanks rather than that I don’t want kids because I consider the childhood I had to be so horrific and to have affected my mental state to the extent that I struggle emotionally engage with others and just don’t want to try and bring a child up? Why should I spare their feelings instead of mine?

Why is is callous of me to tell someone that I fire blanks rather than that I don’t want kids because I consider the childhood I had to be so horrific and to have affected my mental state to the extent that I struggle emotionally engage with others and just don’t want to try and bring a child up? Why should I spare their feelings instead of mine?

You’ve basically admitted lying to your friends and family to court sympathy from them and you ask why this is callous?

Tell them the truth. I suspect that sympathy might turn into something else completely and then you won’t have to worry about them not understanding why you don’t want kids.

Why should I spare their feelings instead of mine?

It’s called empathy. And it’s what people to whom you tell your story will be trying to display (whether misplaced or not). Sorry to hear your retrospectively introduced troubles. But it’s still lying isn’t it? And not exactly a “Yeah, that shirt looks great on you mate” type lie is it? Just say “I don’t want kids” and leave it at that.

My wife and I now tell people we are biologically unable to have children simply because them we get sympathy rather than the usual lack of comnprehension from friends or family who have kids.

I now tell people that my wife’s womb is a barren place where my seed can find no purchase.

That usually stalls any further inquiry.

And is the same not true for those without kids?

Not so much, no.

We got invited to friends for dinner last night. Their child was such a massive shit they had to ask us to leave prematurely so they could deal with it. As they were attending to a urination event in the hallway I reminded the wife that if we didn’t want kids beforehand, we definitely didn’t want them now 😆