The No-Baby Boom

This recent article from Details.com has people buzzing and tweeting. Not just because of the solid reporting and the cool charts but also because of the humor.

Brian Frazer, the writer of this piece, tongue-in-cheek, reports on the increasing costs of raising kids, particularly in a society that values conspicuous consumption. He writes “you can get a vasectomy at Planned Parenthood for less than the cost of a Bugaboo Cameleon stroller.” This shouldn’t be funny, but it is.

The Childfree trend not just an American trend as Frazer points out:

One Italian mayor has resorted to bribery to restock his town, offering couples $15,000 for each child they produce. Germany's baby shortage results in an annual population loss of 100,000. And the sheep-to-human ratio in New Zealand, which currently stands at 10 to 1, seems sure to increase, since a staggering 18 percent of adult men there have elected to get vasectomies.

In the past an article like this, heralding the trend of voluntary childlessness, would illicit dozens of comments predicting the end of civilization as we know it. Yet, the comments posted here seem to be much more thoughtful and less fearful. Could it be that we have turned a corner, to a place where we welcome the impact of lower birth rates?

Flickr Photo by FS999

Is coming out as childfree like coming out as gay?

This is the question posed by Lisa Hymas, senior editor at Grist.org in a recent article. I had to ponder this question for just a few seconds before nodding yes. There are some similarities because there is still stigma attached to being childless by choice, maybe not as much stigma as being gay in our society, but stigma all the same. It all has to do about the assumptions our society holds and the judgments we make about what is good or bad for society.

In a November 2010 TIME article titled Marriage: What's It Good For? results from a Pew Center Research survey showed that 29 percent of the U.S. persons polled felt that more women never having children was “bad for society.” Forty-three percent of those surveyed thought that more gay and lesbian couples raising children was bad for society. So gay and lesbian couples raising kids is obviously perceived by more folks as “bad for society” than women not having kids. However as Lisa Hymas has observed:

While LGBT people face more vehement and vicious prejudice than the childfree, they can, if they choose, ultimately lead more conventional lives. Their families won't look like the Cleavers, but they can have what many people would at least recognize as a family, following the traditional parent-with-child pattern. We childfree people, in contrast, are messing with the notion of family in a way that's perhaps even more fundamental.

Maybe that's why gays actually seem to be further along in gaining social acceptance than the childfree. In my urban milieu, no one skips a beat or lifts an eyebrow if you say you're gay, but people do often frown or avert their eyes or awkwardly change the subject if you say you've decided not to have kids -- if they don't tell you what you're missing and try to get you to change your mind.

Take, as a pop-cultural example, the Sex and the City 2 movie. Carrie Bradshaw and the gang are having a gay old time at Stanford and Anthony's big, fat, same-sex wedding when a woman starts interrogating Carrie and hubbie Mr. Big about when they're going to have kids. "It's just not for us," Carrie responds. "So it's just going to be the two of you?" she asks, voice dripping with pity and disdain. Flamboyant gay lifestyle: A-OK. Heterosexual couple deciding to forego parenting: deviant.

A stranger’s reaction to our status in one thing but the real acid test for testing the level of stigma or perceived deviance is how our immediate family reacts to our contently childfree status. As Hymas points out: “Coming out as gay or lesbian might hit your parents hard at first, but at least you can still give them grandkids!” Flickr photo by Sea Turtle

Marcia Drut-Davis—68 Years and No Regrets

Marcia emailed me to share her story and I knew I had to talk to her and learn more. Here’s an excerpt of her email to me:

I’m smiling seeing the direction of [your] project. In 1974, I was one of those interviewed on a “60 Minutes” segment. I was the President of the Long Island Chapter of NON. I announced my decision not to have children.

The next day, I lost my job as a passionate teacher.

My life was threatened, as was the life of my dog. I faced angry pickets at a high school where I was asked to speak. All this, because I dared to say I chose not to parent.

In 1974, you kept that to yourself. I’m now 68. I’ve just finished a memoir. I’m excited that I finally feel I’m being recognized as a woman who made a choice right for me and who has a message about this important choice.

When I followed up with Marcia by phone, she told me she used to wonder if indeed something was wrong with her, if she was a “genetic mutation.” But she set that thought aside and continued to follow her passions. She remarried and her name changed and she was able to re-apply for a teaching job and was later nominated by her peers as “Teacher of the Year.” She continued to be involved in the Long Island chapter of the renamed “National Alliance for Optional Parenting” and is now very active in a Humanist organization in her home state of Florida.

She admits she occasionally felt pangs of longing when she would witness what she calls “Kodak Moments”—those times when proud parents celebrate their children’s accomplishments or transitions at Bat or Bar Mitzvahs, but whenever she was asked “Do you wish you had kids?” her response is “No, thank you.”

Her plate is full: full of life, love, and the young women she has taught over the years whom she calls her “daughter-friends” who still call her up for advice. To Marcia, life remains “delicious.”

Is it Selfish Not to Have Kids? A Parent’s Perspective

Kudos to Trent Hamm, a parent who tacked the prickly question “Is it selfish not to have kids?” in a blog post on Christian Science Monitor.com.

It was so refreshing to read a post from a parent who was willing to acknowledge that although he knew going in that kids were going to be expensive and that being a parent would be a challenge he chose to have children because he “deeply want[ed]” the experience of being a parent.

I love this guy because he took ownership of his “want” and didn’t wear his parent role as a cloak of martyrdom or as a way to be holier than thou. For him parenthood was simply a personal goal, something he was drawn to and wanted to succeed at.

“For me, the price of being a parent is one I’m willing to pay, because being a parent is something I’m intrinsically driven to do.” He has also noticed that “other people don’t have that drive.”

I found myself nodding in agreement as Hamm summed up his beliefs:

My belief is that if you don’t wish to have children, don’t have children. If you think that children are more trouble than they’re worth, you probably should not have children.

I also believe that if you feel driven to have a child, you should do everything you can to prepare to be the best parent you can be. This means spending the time to really figure out who you are, how to control your emotions, how to teach, and most mportantly, how to be patient.

The world needs both parents and non-parents. There is a lot of societal value in a wide range of skills, abilities, and thoughts. I absolutely feel that being a parent is a noble choice, but that does not imply that DINKs are not making a noble choice. They’re making a different one in line with their values, goals, and talents.

Very Cool.

Flickr Photo by RealEstateZebra

Aimee’s Letter to Self

My friend and contributor Teri Tith received an email from Aimee from Australia. She had found the Purple Woman Blog (which Teri founded and I contributed to) and wanted Teri to know how she had been inspired by the posts.

Like many women and men who anticipate children in their lives but end up childless she was in the process of re-framing her perception of a childless life. She shared with us her “letter to herself” which was so touching and inspiring we knew we needed to share this letter with you. Here is an excerpt:

Today is the beginning of a new outlook on life. This weekend we made the decision to not continue on the IVF path. Not next year. Not ever. For me it is also a conscious decision not to continue on the ‘infertility’ path. That may sound strange, because technically we will remain, by definition, ‘infertile’. But today, and every day from now on, this is not how we define ourselves.

Spending our emotional energy, our time and our money trying to bring ‘something’ into our life implies that there is something missing. And that is what has kept us on the IVF rollercoaster and turned both of us – I guess me especially – into anxious and (if I’m being honest with myself) at times unhappy people. What I have come to realise this week is that there is nothing missing. We have a loving, fun, deeply committed relationship and we have a choice to make. So many of our choices have been made for us that I almost forgot the one we can still make – we can choose not to define ourselves by what we don’t have. We can choose to get off the emotional rollercoaster that is IVF. We can choose to embrace a different life. Not a lesser life, but a different one…maybe even a fuller one.

Yesterday I read that ‘There is only so much time in a day, a week, a lifetime, and if we don't raise children, perhaps we "raise" something else.’ Something about this blog excerpt resonated with me because, deep down, I know that I have something significant to contribute to this world. And I know that we both can make a mark, as individuals or as a couple. And that mark isn’t going to be children. But it will be something just as meaningful.

In the past, I was so sad that our beautiful love would never be reflected in a child. What I am focused on now is nurturing and protecting that love and having fun with it. There are other things that our love will be weaved into. We might volunteer overseas together… we might give something back in a way that others can’t. Importantly, we can move forward without resentment of other people’s fortune, because we are going to be fortunate in other ways. We are going to feel fulfilled and satisfied and free. We are going to make a difference. We are going to focus our energies on our marriage, on our own identities and passions, and on our friends – some that we have, some that we will meet. Most importantly, we will feel whole and happy because we have a deep love that we can spend every day investing our time and energy into and nothing will compromise that.

Flickr Photo by Donovan Beeson

Parenthood and Mental Health

As I was cleaning up my office I came across an article from 2006 I had printed out when I was doing the research for Two Is Enough: A Couple’s Guide to Living Childless by Choice. It’s titled “Parenthood Ups Mental Illness Risk” and was written by Jasmine Karalakulasingam, M.D. a medical reporter for ABC News.

As I read this article, which reported a higher risk of mental illness during the first three months after birth, I was thinking why don’t people talk about this?

In 2003 actress Brooke Shields went public with her crippling post-partum depression but when I attended birth classes with a young woman I was mentoring that same year I didn’t hear any warnings of the mental heath risks of parenthood. The nurse who was teaching the class warned about post-partum infection, breast-feeding challenges, and what to expect when you bring your newborn home but not a thing about being alert for signs of mental distress or illness.

Shortly after I had re-read this article I received an email from a woman who admitted that although she felt, even as a young child, that she didn’t want children when she got married she thought she might change her mind and discussed the possibility of having a child with her husband, who had a daughter from a previous relationship. But her mind did not change and after finding out she was pregnant she knew that she couldn’t handle the stress of birthing and raising a child.

“The thought of being a parent actually scared the hell out of me,” she admits. “I did not want to be pregnant or keep the child. It was in that moment I knew that I did not want to be a parent and I knew that my mental health would not survive having a child as I suffer from depression and general anxiety disorder.”

After discussing it with her husband they decided to terminate the pregnancy, and he arranged to have a vasectomy so they wouldn’t have to worry about birth control. They now have custody of his seventeen-year-old daughter “working through the challenges of teenage life.” She feels they made the right choice for them even though she still hears things like ‘You’re still young, it’s different when they are your own,’ but she knows that it won’t be different because she knows how the stressors of step-parenthood have impacted her mental well-being and her life: “To this day, I do not regret my choice and I believe my marriage is better off for it. I know my mental health is better for it.”

Whether you agree with this woman’s decision to terminate her pregnancy, or not, what are your thoughts on her consideration of her mental health in the process of her decision-making? Is this something you have considered in your fertility decision making?

Flickr Photo by Giarose

The Changing Roles of Women

Back in August of 2009, I posted a piece here on this blog about women who became the breadwinners for their family during this recent recession. Not so long ago, in the 50’s in many middle-class and affluent communities, it was considered shameful for a man to have a wife who was a working women. Even a woman who was working part time was tsk-tsked in bridge parlors and country clubs, “Did you hear about Betty? She is selling Avon. Can you imagine? I guess Bob’s business is not as successful as he makes it out to be…”

This attitude seems quaint now when women make up so much of the work force and contribute so much to our economic growth through their hard work and entrepreneurial spirit. Yet I don’t think we’ve fully grasped the implications of this dramatic shift on gender roles, women’s empowerment and financial security, family structure and dynamics, and reproductive decision making.

I suspect that a recent report issued by National Economic Council in the United States titled Jobs and Economic Security for Women will prompt some awareness and actions. In the executive summary of this report, issued by The White House Press Office, the following is highlighted:

• Women are a growing share of our workforce, our entrepreneurs, and our innovators. As the majority of college graduates and nearly 50 percent of the workforce, women are in a position to drive our 21st century economy.

• An increasing number of women are breadwinners for their families. In almost two-thirds of families led by single mothers or two parents, women are either the primary or co-breadwinner. In two-parent families, with the wage gap and the loss of jobs traditionally held by men in this economy, reliance on a woman’s income in their family budget is even greater.

• Since women are nearly 50 percent of the workforce, the recession’s economic impacts on women are even more consequential for the economy than they would have been in past recessions. As a result of the recession that started in December of 2007, women have lost jobs and seen their median annual earnings fall. Further, women have faced increased economic insecurity as housing prices declined and states and municipalities have cut back on the provision of social services.

• Women face a number of longer-term challenges such as the wage gap and female underrepresentation in higher levels of management. Further, specific groups of women like single mothers, older women and minorities face additional challenges.

When I am asked, as the author of Two Is Enough and producer of the Childless by Choice Project documentary, “Why are women choosing to delay or forgo children altogether?,” I respond with the list of most compelling motives I uncovered during my research and then I typically add my observation that increasingly women’s security in the world is tied to their ability to be breadwinners rather than bread bakers. The June Cleaver ideal of the apron-clad mom busying herself in the kitchen while Dad climbs the corporate ladder is just so…dated.


Photo Courtesy of Cornell University Library