Like It Is

If you’re childfree and you already feel that mothers get advantages in the workplace this article should give you some idea that when it comes to politics, there’s nowhere too low to stoop. And far from things getting better, they can get worse. Even if you don’t live in the UK, this article should still ring alarm bells. It has overtones of the French system, only it’s trying to be subtle - and failing. Thanks to Mercurior for finding this interesting link.

The UK Conservative Party plans to reward families where one parents chooses to stay at home to look after a child.

It seems that buying the female – (read Stay-At-Home-Mother) vote has become all important.

Tories Plan Rewards For Stay At Home Mothers

According to the Daily Mail, David Cameron, Tory party leader says:

“Millions of mothers have been “pressurized” by Labour to return to work.

And, according to a report ordered by David Cameron the Government’s approach to working women had been to “compel, to lecture and to condescend”.

Funny, I thought that going to work meant bringing in money…which you have to do to pay the mortage, put food on the table and presumably all those other things that working enables us to do.

The report also says that benefits and regulations have been skewed to help working mothers – to the disadvantage of those mothers who stay at home, such as tax breaks.

In response, the Tories are pledging to:

“re-balance the tax system to reward families where one parent chooses to stay at home to look after a child.” These “reforms” could mean an extra £3,000 a year for some couples. Read the rest of this entry »

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I’m beginning to think that Childfree people must be some of the most sane folk around. Not for us the uncontrollable breeding of multiple replicants (a la Duggar). Not for us the incubating of eggs to consider passing on to possible daughters to ensure that they continue the tradition of kids. (I hear that there may even be sister to sister in the offing, too).

But is this -

How a 40 Something publisher used 20 something eggs to impregnate a 30 something uterus

the ultimate in outsourcing? I thought the cryptic puzzle of mommy freezing eggs for daughter was bad enough – this one makes even less sense.

In a nutshell this woman was so determined to have a baby with her own (or her husbands?) DNA that:

She had a 20–something beauty queen to donate the egg and a healthy 30–something carry the fertilised embryo to term (in other words she donated her uterus). The mother, 40 who in fact had no part of actually birthing the child still says that “she never thought for a moment that she (the baby) would not feel like “hers.”

She had practically no connection with this child yet, she feels a “connection?” Of course there is the chorus that says “well why shouldn’t she, she can afford to do it (IVF) and it’s her “choice.” Don’t dare say no, or we’ll have the usual “I want a child and why shouldn’t I spend $$$$$ to have a kid if I want one?”

Basically the fact was that she was so determined to have a beautiful child with her DNA that, well anything goes it seems.

That’s going to be one confused child. I mean, who is it’s mother? Really.

What a message to women all over – go to any length to have a child…having a child with your DNA is what counts, get the eggs, rent the uterus!

But hey. It’s called having it all.

Have a read of the story and comments.

And thanks Carisa for the link to this story.

Technorati Tags: Childfree

No, it isn’t quite the same as the previous articles, but it is eerily similar. I came across this particular Google search: “how do I make my husband want kids” and it led me to this message board. A woman wants a baby and her husband doesn’t.

She posted on the Women’s Sexual Health – Australian Health Message boards. I had a sinking feeling as I read the question, but I was appalled at the responses, which ranged from “your husband is a selfish man with no thought for your needs,” to “leave him,” to “you should go and find someone to do the job while your husband is abroad,” to “poke holes in the condom, to “leave him, but get pregnant and prepare to bring up the child on your own…”

Simply awful. John Hanson in his comment on this blog yesterday is not far off. For some women (and if the responses on the board are representative, more than just a few) babies, not their husbands – and certainly not their partners – come first. No babies, the husband’s value is negligible, judging by the feedback. This is sad. Very sad.

The writer of the question (to her credit) was also appalled and said so, although, in my view, her fundamental problem is that she wants to force her husband to want baby when he doesn’t want one.

Below is my response to the thread. I’ll probably be called selfish for even mentioning that I’m childfree…but I felt had to say something. Read the rest of this entry »

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I thought this thought-provoking comment to my post My Husband Doesn’t Want Any More Children and I Do from Anonymous Female was worthy of being an article in itself. So I’ve made it into one. It’s also my way of saying thanks to AF for sharing her story on Like It Is. To those selfish people who feel that trying for a particular sex is a good enough reason to have child, or that your childhood dream of having four kids, your own ego, need for a child or your dream of a cooing baby are good reasons for bringing a child into the world and for insisting that, by the way, to be childfree is the “selfish” option – read on. I would call this story a cautionary tale. As AF says, think before you breed.

“I think that trying for another child just to have one of the opposite sex is really stupid!!! This is my life. Read this carefully before you decide to have more kids based on their male/female sex.”

“My mom had 2 boys already ages 9 and 11 years old when I was born. She had all of us with the same man, also had fertility problems which delayed my coming along when she’d planned to have me 2 years after my middle brother as they were 2 years apart. She actually told my dad that since he had ”raised the 2 boys” that she was ”raising this girl”. Read the rest of this entry »

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She has two of her own, thought she was done… and then the unexpected hits.

This article from Salon is almost the reverse of my last article in which the husband does not want more children but the wife does. Fascinating. The actual situation is interesting. The advice from Cary Tennis – well, read on. The reader responses are equally interesting.

Summarizing the Salon article, RM (Reluctant Mommy) did not want to have children past a certain age. She’s been married for two years (her second) to a man she loves dearly. She has 14 year old twins from her first marriage. He is 13 years her senior and has never had children. It’s his first marriage. Before they got married she had said she did not want to have children past a certain age. Even though she loves her children, she did not love parenting at all.And she told her hubby that children were not a guarantee.

After they married she discovered she had endometriosis. Interestingly, she wanted to have her tubes tied – her husband asked her to hold off. She held off.

Before trying hormone therapy for the endometriosis RM wanted to have a hysterectomy. She allowed her gynaecologist and her husband to talk her out of it.

Then she became pregnant. Read the rest of this entry »

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“My husband tells me today that he made an appt. to get a vasectomy because he doesn’t want anymore children. We have two wonderful sons that we both adore more then life itself but I have always dreamed of having a daughter since I was a little girl. I wanted to keep trying for her..”

I came across an interesting forum thread through following a Google search term used to find Like It Is. I thought that it made an interesting read coming shortly after my article
Men, Vasectomies and the Childfree Choice. This article isn’t so much about childfree men as much as men who don’t want any more kids and are having vasectomies to ensure they don’t make any more additions to the world.

Tip – I’ve provided excerpts, but you need to read the responses in the thread. (I have also left the excerpts exactly as is in terms of spelling etc.) Read the rest of this entry »

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My earlier article titled Fertility Treatment To Be Rationed touched on the changes the Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority (HFEA) wants to make to IVF. I mentioned that some quarters are none to pleased at the changes. They see it as taking away their choice.

To summarise, the HFEA is proposing to limit the number of embryos a woman can have implanted to reduce the risks to the mother and, more importantly, the risk to the children. The regulator in particular wants to cut down the unacceptably high number of IVF-assisted multiple births, that occur because of assisted conception.

The more I read about fertility treatments – or rather the quest for them, the harder I find it to understand why women will go to these lengths to have a baby. It can’t possibly be because they are so desperate to bring another worker bee into the world to support them in their old age, or to keep the economy moving or even to keep the human race in existence. Can it? Even though these are the reasons (sorry, bingoes) routinely trotted out for why childfree women have no business being so, and should be pursuing IVF if it’s even remotely possible. Read the rest of this entry »

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The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) has announced new restrictions on what form of treatment infertile couples can receive and the types of procedures that doctors are allowed to perform to help women have babies. The Observer article of April 1 states:

“The HFEA will unveil a series of measures based on an approach called ’single embryo transfer’ under which women normally receive only one embryo, except for a minority - including older women - whose medical condition means they need two embryos to stand a realistic chance of conceiving.”

The regulator wants to cut down on the unacceptably high number of IVF-assisted multiple births that are a result of women or their doctors choosing how many embryos to implant. Read the rest of this entry »

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According to the Guardian Unlimited, FHM recently commissioned a magazine survey that revealed that men are increasingly yearning for more work-life balance. Before I go any further, let me vent my irritation on that phrase “work-life balance”.

Work-life balance, in the context it is used in general parlance, is referring to balance only for parents with children.

Not for those of us who are childfree, whether by choice or by happenstance. Childfree people need not apply, unless they want the questions like, “but you don’t have a family, do you? I mean, you don’t have kids.” That’s when I wish I could do an “Ally McBeal” scene where the head that produced the idiot comment swells up and explodes… but I digress.

Men apparently want a 50/50 deal with their partners, sharing the childcare and the housework. The problem is, just when the men have got to feeling this way (and isn’t this what women really want?) the ground’s shifted. Read the rest of this entry »

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At last!

A Canadian book about childfree people, long overdue. A big thanks to Timethief for highlighting this prize-winning book – Nobody’s Mother: Life Without Kids. Given the discussion here over the past few days, this book is timely in more ways than one. I for one am planning to add it to my library.

I am looking forward to more and more books like this one being published. Hopefully that will go some way to removing the stigma that childfree women and their partners continue to undergo from society and sometimes family, in addition to validating our choice in the face of criticism, questions and the inevitable bingoes.

I can hardly wait to find out what the “Yummy Mummy” is.

I think the book write up is worthy of more highlighting, so, as well as the link, I have added a couple of screen captures.

Edited by Lynne Van Luven, finalist in the 2007 BC Book Prizes. Foreword by Shelagh Rogers.

Technorati Tags: childfree, stigma, childfree women, choice