Any 'child-free by choice' people out there?

I have kids as well, but I honestly never wonder why someone *doesn't* have any. I hope I'm not being insensitive to the people who actually want to be asked, but I haven't encountered that yet. Maybe if other parents can get to the place where not having children is actually a normal and valid choice, it doesn't shock the system when someone comes along and doesn't have any.

I can say that my CFBC friends find it very rude when other people assume that selfishness causes them to not want to have children. So, any other parents out there might want to remember to refrain from making that assumption.

Something I admire about CFBCers is the fact that they thought it out first. Most of us don't question becoming a parent. It's just something you're "supposed" to do, or something that happens before you've given thought to the fact that there is the option to not do this. When someone takes the time to think it over or to understand the feeling culminating over the years, it's impressive to me.

I turned 40 this year, and just never got around to thinking about having kids, I love being able to sleep in, getting 8 hours sleep, I have travelled around the world, the only constraint i have is work and my mortgage, I have been with my husband 20 years, married 13 and we struggle looking after a cat, so image if we had to look after kids. I do have some great nephews though, that I see regularly, whom I love immensly, but I love the fact I can do what I like with my life.

Me! :happy:

My husband and I (We are just common-law, been together 13 years) have been saying since we were teenagers that kids are not for us. Everyone said, "You will change your mind". 29 years old right now, hubby is 30....we haven't changed our minds at all.

It's not that I dislike kids, I just don't want my own. I will be most likely working with kids when I become a Social Worker. My work placement in September is actually in Child Protection.

My husband and I have an amazing cat right now and we plan on getting a dog or two once we get our own home. But kids...not happening...ever!

I'm 27(28 in October) with 8 nieces and nephews. I've worked with kids since I was 16... my man friend, worked with those same children. We blame them for us not wanting children:) I love kids, I do. But I'm much happier knowing I can give them back. I'm far too selfish with my time and my money to have a child. And that's just blunt honest truth:) I want to be able to leave whenever I want to, spend whatever I want to etc. I don't like having restraints on myself, not even my JOB is as time constraining as a child.

I think it hurts my Mom a little bit that I won't give her grandchildren but alas, it's what I've chosen to do:)

I'm not child free by choice.. afterall I did try for over 7 years to conceive. It didn't happen and we've been on break for 3 years now. Not sure where to go from here.
I'm 32 and in my 20's all I wanted was to be a mother. I lost all my years being consumed on trying and going to the doctor. In the end, I didn't get my pay off. I lost all that time for nothing. When I turned 29, I vowed to NEVER spend another day, year, month whatever, of my time like that... and I haven't!!!

And I'm now here wondering.. do I really want children? I have become accustomed to our lifestyle now, which is going wherever we please, playing sports, taking fun classes, going to the grocery store at 12am if we please, etc. I wake up around 10am on Saturdays and we decide what we want to do. It's awesome. We got up and moved, left our hold home to a brand new city where we knew nobody, just because. I think that has been the favorite part of my life so far!!

So as I get older, I wonder, do I really want to change this NOW? I've pretty much accepted not having children so I turned that page. Should I return to that page?

In ending, I wish I knew one way or the other. I wish I had a decision made, although it sorta seems like my decision has been made for me but still, if I can't have kids then I want the desire to go away completely, not just 95%. We shall see what happens but I do envy you as you KNOW what you want. I don't.

26.5 years old and totally childfree. As a teenager, I told myself that I was going to gift myself with a hysterectomy for my 21st birthday. That's how badly I didn't want children. That didn't happen, but the feeling remains. Don't get me wrong, sometimes I'll see a cute baby and go "Awwww I want one" but then the thought is gone. I spent a week with my brother and sister-in-law with my newborn niece. It was neat and whatnot, but it got real old, real fast. It was such a hassle for us to just to bowling. I can't imagine how sucky life must be with kids. You can't just pick up and go.

With all that said, I accept the possibility that I MIGHT have a child. My boyfriend is just turning 22 this year. While nearly everyone in his graduating class has children, he's content to wait. I imagine that we may just end up pushing it back to the point where it's just not possible. That's okay with me. His sister has 7 (unruly) kids, so if we ever decide we want to be parents, we can always babysit and change our minds, haha Things might change down the road, but for right now, we are so so happy that we don't have children.

As far as people asking me about my kids, I just tell them that I can't have any. Sure, it's a lie. But they normally don't ask a bunch of questions like "Why?" or call me selfish or anything like that. When coworkers talk about their kids, I chime in with stuff about my cats. I'm just like "Yeah, I know you're talking about your kids, but my cats are my kids. So here's a story about my cats" haha

I would like to say that people who say that they don't want kids are SELFISH!!! Okay... before you get your panties in a knot, I was TOTALLY KIDDING!!! I have 2 of my own, but I have a sister who chose not to have kids, yet she loves mine to pieces. It's kind of the same idea of me having more kids. The thought makes me go "ugh"... some people are done before they start, and some done after 2... and some done after 12. LOL!!! Have a great day all!!!

Hubby and I are child-free by choice. :-) I'm 33, he's 34, and we've been married for almost 9 blissful years. We discussed this prior to marriage, and were both okay with this. Children just aren't for us.

I can honestly say that I've never had that maternal feeling for children (my two other sisters and their hubbies feel the same). It is not something I can change, or want to change - it is a part of who I am. I do call my 3 cats my "fur babies", though. ;-)

I respect others' choices to have a family, and I expect others to respect mine.

In January of this year, I had a hysterectomy due to complications with fibroids, and while I certainly would not have such a serious operation for 'birth control' only, that side effect was definitely a bonus for me!

Me! My husband and I don't want children. We're not anti-kids, they're just not for us. And to be honest, we are a bit selfish with our lives, our time, our money. . . we just don't feel it's necessary to have children to have a meaningful, full life together. Don't get me wrong, we LOVE our nephews and niece and I greatly respect people out there that are parents, but it's just not what we want. It's nice to find like-minded people. I swear, I get such a pitiful look from people when they ask when we're having kids and I tell them we aren't because we choose not to.

Well, I was going to be child-free. In fact, both my boyfriend and I never intended to have kids, because neither of us were every big child people.

And then we ended up with a major oops (condoms don't always work, apparently), and found ourselves with one. Which is cool, I love her to death, she's an awesome baby, and I wouldn't trade her for the world. There are moments where she drives me crazy, and all I want is to have my adult, alone life back again (like the ability to just go to a coffee shop and read quietly for an hour by myself would be AWESOME), but really, at the end of the day, she makes me quite happy, and I wouldn't have done it differently.

That being said, I'm not doing it again. Period. I hated being pregnant. Absolutely loathed every minute of it, and I had a great pregnancy. I also still don't particularly like kids. (I like her, but I still don't really do much besides put up with other peoples' kids.)

I also will admit, I don't want any more kids because I'm selfishly enjoying having my body to myself. I can go for a run and run myself into the ground with exhaustion, and that's perfectly fine, because I'm not pregnant. And I don't want to have to lose the weight again. It really wasn't terribly hard for me to drop the last bit of weight, but I didn't like the yo-yo effect that gaining and losing weight had on my body, since even though I now weight less than I did when I got pregnant, my overall body composition has changed, and I don't like it. Combine all that with the up and down effects of hormones that still leave me an emotional, weeping moron at random times during the week, and you have me really wanting to get sterilized at the ripe old age of 24.

Though I have to say, having one child gets almost as much obnoxious criticism as having none. People continually ask if I'm going to have more, and when I say no, I always get things like "But she'll be all alone! Don't you want to give her a playmate?" Because she's not ever going to meet and greet with other children in her entire life and consider any of them playmates..

I had planned on not having children...well, at 18 I became a mom. I haven't had another and nor do I plan to. I'm 26 now and the age gap is increasing even more, my daughter will be 8 this year, I'm recently divorced, and do not want to put my body though another pregnancy. While it was easy...I was severly high risk and was at the doctors every other week (I was born with a few health issues). My daughter was born perfectly healthy and I couldn't ask for more. I applaud those of y'all who have your minds made up. Just don't attack others for having an opposing view point. We're all entitled to what we want in this life and our own opinion.

I am 27 and child free by choice. I have considered, at some more financially stable point in the future, fostering or adopting a child. Not like a newborn child, though. I'm not even sure if I would ever even do that. I've always said ever since I was a young child that I didn't want to have any kids. Everyone always said it would change. It didn't.

I think we're all selfish and do things for our own selfish reasons. And that's ok!

I can't count the number of people who said one of the reasons they wanted children was to have someone who'd love them unconditionally, and/or someone to care for them when they're older. Both of those reasons sound pretty selfish to me.

I always joke with my nieces and nephews that I have to suck up to them now, because they'll be the ones picking my nursing home when I'm older.

I'm 48 and childless by choice. It's not that I dislike kids, it 's just a lifestyle that I never saw myself living personally. I make a pretty good aunt though, do all the fun stuff, then when they start squaking, i can hand them back

46 and must've been absent the day they passed out attraction to baby humans...

Have 3 furry "kids" (we adopt elderly and special needs dogs). They exercise more than plenty of my nurturing skills! Been married 22 years and he feels the same as I do. When he asked me to marry him the first thing I said was "I don't want kids. Ever. And I won't change my mind. So if you think you'll ever want kids, don't do this!" Obviously, neither of us has changed our minds.

It's funny, but of all my close friends from high school/college, none of us had kids. Guess birds of a feather is true!