In my wildest dreams, I would not have imagined that the most popular post on my site would have been Why I Don’t Want Kids!
I wrote the post to address the not-too-uncommon opinion my friends have that either Sandrine or I are broody, or that we should have kids despite our opinion.
After finally approving a number of new comments on the original post, I noticed that I still hadn’t addressed Toni’s comment from last year! I would like to address them in this post, and digress from kids to respect.
Toni said that by not having children, I’m not allowing myself to mature myself in a unique way. Well, I’m of the opinion that there are many ways to mature myself. Traveling the world is a great way to meet new people and cultures. Volunteering your time for a good cause is a great way of giving back to society and helping those that are less fortunate or going through rough times. Those are just two activities that will “make you a better person”, and while I agree they, along with having children, are not mutually exclusive, it’s a matter of balance - you can’t do everything in life.
That said, I do not abstain from interacting with children. They are (mostly) beautiful beings. They are like small adults. They have opinions (some of them not all that wacky). Watching them learn is amazing. Having them teach you something is even more amazing. I love kids to bits, I just don’t want my own.
Toni also said: “if everyone thought like you there would be no you to enjoy life”. Well just think, if everyone thought like me, there would be no politicians, public health service, telephone repair people, cooks. There would be a world of software developers who all wish to pay off their mortgage and then go traveling, buy some land near a beach, build their own house and be self sufficient. There would be no project managers to direct those developers and there would be no clients to buy the software.
Thank god not everyone’s like me.
I respect Toni’s opinion that everyone should have kids. I respect it, but I completely and utterly disagree with it. Everyone’s different. I’m not telling anyone not to have kids. I would like Toni to respect my decision, but I don’t expect him/her to.