I’m 18F, and I see a lot of different posts talking about how either amazing being a parent is, or how they lost themselves and their lives to it.
Do you lose yourself? How drastic of a change is it? What is it like. I worry about like what if being a parent prevents me from reaching my career goals, or if my partner were to switch on a dime and leave or be a bad person
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It’s fine (41M, parent of 2). Kids are fun to be around, I would definitely prefer spending time with kids to running the rat race lol. That said I’ve got the best partner ever, am generally healthy and happy, and not struggling financially too much. I can see how for people in different circumstances kids can become a heavy burden.
There are two things that can make or break being a parent: who you have children with and where you are mentally, physically, and financially before having kids.
I had kids with the wrong person and I was not in a good place before I had them, which has made parenting all the more difficult. I love my kids and I wouldn’t trade them for the world. I love being their mom. But yes, it’s been so, so hard.
I would strongly recommend that anyone make sure they have a career, stability, a good partner, and are in good shape before they even think about having kids. Yes, your partner can change after marriage or having kids, but most of the time, people are ignoring and making excuses for red flags beforehand.
marriage & raising children are 2 of the hardest jobs in life!
It’s the hardest, most wonderful thing in the world.
It’s hard. It’s exhausting. It’s stressful. And it’s 100% worth every bit of it.
It pushes me in ways that I never thought it would, and it rewards me in ways that I would not get anywhere else.
As a step-mom of fraternal twins and biological mom to two sets of twins it’s definitely a lot but as the kids have grown with me and my husband sharing our combined knowledge the kids have all grown into independent thinking teenagers we know that can always make smart decisions and know to trust their instincts.
if you have career goals, don’t be a parent unless your goal is to be a parent.
the traditional family with the man making money and the wife at home really works. It’s the goal with my wife, she wants to be a mom.
otherwise you will have a stressful life trying to balance your child’s life and your career life. Can’t really have both unless you’re rich and even then we see what happens to rich kids who are raised without parents.
It brought out the best in me and the worst. For me it was worth it.
Best thing I’ll ever do. Sure there are stressful parts, name something totally stress free…..
You lose a part of yourself yes, but if you do it right, it’s your ego and self-centeredness that you lose. My heart grew 100% the day she was born.
It’s the best thing ever. Even the hard times and emotional times are a blessing. My life would be sad and lonely without my family.
My daughters are now 16 and 20 and they’ve grown to be more than just my children, they’re my best mates. I love spending time with them and they make me proud every day.
It wasnt easy raising kids but it was very rewarding. Im 51 with 3 adult daughters,I went through a break up 3 years ago and on my lonliest nights they happen to pop up. One hard night after a long day at work my youngest daughter and i pulled into the driveway at the same time and we both had pizzas and ate together. Being a mom has healed me from day 1.
I’m a 52-year-old male, married for 10 years, with a five-year-old daughter
I spent most of my 20s to 40s traveling and pursuing my career. I used to be on the road 150-200 days a year and really enjoyed that lifestyle. I never wanted to have kids, live in the burbs or get into a rut.
I’m totally shocked to find how much more I enjoy being a parent and having a family than I did my old life.
I remember being on a group call with the president of Starbucks who is now retired. He talked about the difference between happiness and fulfillment. I now see what he meant completely. I find the responsibility and rewards of having a family so much more fulfilling.
Tbh can be touugh but it’s worth it
You’ll never love something as much as your child and you’ll never look forward to something as much as them going to bed.
I tell my kids and young folks all the time. Do not have kids. Just don’t have kids, it isn’t worth it and you absolutely lose yourself and your dreams for a slow painful death until you are an empty husk of who you once were. Abortions should be free and readily available to anyone.
Love my kids alot, hard to describe to someone without them. But neither of my kids are particularly happy, neither take much enjoyment in day to day things. So the enjoyable time of being a parent was maybe 15 plus years ago when they were little, like under 10. They are in their 20s currently.
I can’t say I’d do it again. Probably wouldn’t.
They seem determined to be unhappy with their lives, in spite of both being intelligent, upper middle class with most every opportunity to pursue whatever career they prefer. Who knows maybe when they are in theire 40s they’ll find life enjoyable.
Absolutely life changing.
To younger people I tell them to wait 5 or 10 years. If you can’t wait that long, you’re probably not ready. If you can, you’ll know in 5 or 10 years that you’re ready and you’ll know you’re with the right person (and if not, hopefully you’re wise enough to realize that and wait a bit more). I said this to a few people who were anywhere from 15-20 years old and convinced that they’d met their future life (husband or wife). None of them were anywhere near their “future life” person 5 or 10 years later.
I grew up with 2 brothers, 1 sister, loving mom, an old fashioned but duty bound dad (he did everything he could to provide for us, sacrificing his enjoyment to make it happen).
I changed jobs because it was affecting me at home, and therefore my son. I probably would have been okay at that same job if we didn’t have a son, but we did, and so I went into a different career so I could be at home more, be more involved with my son. For example tonight I was the one that cooked dinner, talked to him about school, listened to his stories about the game he plays or the kids at school, and reminded him to do the one or two new things we have him do around the house.
HOWEVER… I would not become a parent unless I had 10000% faith in the other parent. No doubts whatsoever. 1000% trust. 1000% gentleness. Zero drama. Good communication. No “I wish the person would change like so”. You should never feel like they don’t respect you. You can’t be dealing with couples issues when you’re trying to be a parent, all your relationship problems bleeds off onto the kid.
I read here on Reddit about how people get in fights regularly (“we have our share of arguments but overall we get along fine”). That’s horrifying to me. I got super upset around my wife twice (only twice! 2005 and 2014) in 23-24 years, and both times it wasn’t about her, it was me. Never hit or threatened to hit her (or choke or any other assault). Literally do not raise my voice otherwise. We hash things out, we listen, we compromise. She is the best person I’ve ever met and I am so lucky to be where I am.
I waited a long, long time to be a father. For many years (20-ish, after I was 18 years old) I didn’t think I could be a good dad, and I didn’t feel ready to commit my life to caring for a new human for 15 or 20 years. I met my now wife more than 10 years before we had our son. We got to live out our stuff and then we looked at each other and realized we wanted to have children. After our son was born, we saved everything for a second child. One day, two years later, looking at the bins of baby stuff we’d carefully stored, we looked at each other and realized that the second one wasn’t going to happen. So we gave away and donated all that baby stuff and we have one son who is now 13.
We were in a pretty comfortable position financially when we had our son so we never had to worry about money. It wasn’t cheap ($8k out of pocket for birth?) but we didn’t rack up any credit card bills or anything. I was throttling back from an intense but lucrative IT life, we live frugally, and the last thing I want to do is stress about money.
When our son was born I was working a minimum wage job just to get out of the house. I quit the job and was a stay at home dad for almost 5 years (used up a lot of savings, wife worked at her own business which was taking off), until he went to kindergarten. I started working again (not in IT) and am in another career now, one chosen for work life balance so I can be at home more with him.
The key is a stable and happy family life BEFORE the kid. The kid will only add stress to the relationship, and any disagreements on beliefs, behaviors, etc, will get amplified.
All that free time you had to do whatever unscheduled activity or hobby you want dissappears once you become a parent.
Even something so easily taken for granted like sleeping in on a weekend no longer is possible.
Wouldn’t have it any other way.
It was a really fun time for me and the kids. I wasn’t ambitious untiI I had kids and when they started school I got a chemistry degree. It’s not for everyone though and nothing wrong with that
Sounds like you are being exposed to messaging trying to get you as a young woman to drop out of society and get pregnant. What awful times we live in! I hate this trad wife shit. That’s what they exposed my mother’s generation to in the fifties.The advertising from that time was thick
Motherhood is great. Motherhood without a back up plan in the form of a career is gonna most likely come back to bite you hard in the ass when your man decides on another model.
Best thing I ever did in my life was becoming a parent. It’s challenging, tiring, stressful, but 100% worth it.
My wife and I had our first of three when we were 30. We had a house, paid off cars and money in the bank. We could afford to have my spouse stay at home with the kids. We were ready for children and enjoyed them through all ages. When we went out, it was to places where we could take our kids. We didn’t pine for the “good old days when we were without kids”. Of course there were times when we were tired or cross with the kids. My spouse sublimated her career for 17 years; I turned down a couple of promotions that would have required me to travel more. I didn’t view this as losing ourselves, but rather being at home with my family and raising my kids became my priority and I enjoyed the heck out of it. My kids are now 44, 42, 38. They and their kids are my favorite people on the planet.
I have a 1-year old. It is equally as challenging as it is rewarding. Your life will change and most of your free time will be dedicated to caring for them.
You always run risks of partners leaving, changing, dying, etc. These risks will always exist and which is why you have to trust your partner when you go down this path. Life is what it is sometimes. Plan for the worst and hope for the best and you’ll be alright.
The first year is tough and entering toddler stage is difficult too. You change as a person and don’t quite lose yourself but you need a strong support system if you have hobbies you want to keep up with at full speed.
All in all don’t let it scare you if it’s what you want out of life. I wouldn’t trade my kid for anything.
I feel so calm and normal around my son. But he’s just like me and we just get each other. I worry that he got my personality but I’m glad I can teach him how to navigate it.
My children are everything to me. They give my life meaning. I am so happy they are here. All of the hard times are so worth it. My life is better because they exist – there is no question about that.
The best and worst at different times. Kids are 21, 16, and 6. I’ve spent 21 years worrying about everything… do I love and adore them? Yes. Do I regret them? No. If I had to do it over, would I have had kids? Also, no.
It’s a ton of work and can drive you 100% bonkers. Buts it’s totally worth it. IMO
I’m on a family holiday right now with my 3 kids, their spouses and my 4 grandchildren. Everyday I know how lucky I am. They’re good people, they picked good people and are raising good people. You and you partner have to be strong, supportive and fun!