I Don't Want Children

I don’t want to have children.

Ever.

I think I was seventeen the first time I uttered that sentence out loud. My then-boyfriend and I had discussed how many children we’d have someday, and what their names would be. Because that’s what you did when you were in a loving relationship, wasn’t it? Get married, buy a house, get a dog, then have children. Even though I have long had complicated feelings about marriage, I’m more of a cat person, and… I don’t want children.

I’d not yet heard the phrase “childfree by choice” when I realised that parenthood didn’t fit with the vision I had for my future. I wanted to write, I wanted to travel, I wanted to adopt animals and make a home with my partner. But could I see myself as a mother? Every time I thought about it, it just didn’t fit.

Why Are People More Concerned About Hypothetical Children Than About My Happiness?

I’ve been polyamorous my entire adult life. Whenever I come out to someone, one of the first questions I get asked is how this will impact my children someday.

Firstly, there is no compelling evidence to suggest polyamorous families are inherently worse for children than monogamous ones (and plenty of evidence to suggest that kids raised in poly households can thrive!) Second, and more important in my case: I don’t want children. I’m never having any, and I don’t date people who have them, so the impact of my polyamory on them is a completely moot hypothetical argument.

I think this speaks to the broader habit of calling childfree by choice women “selfish.”

Since I was a teenager, I’ve been told I’d change my mind and that I was too young to make this choice. (Ironically, I think I will be “too young to make this choice” until the day I become “too old to have kids” in the eyes of society.) The implication is that these hypothetical, unborn, unconceived, never-going-to-exist children matter more than the happiness of an actual living, breathing, already-existing human.

How Being Childfree By Choice Has Impacted My Dating Life

Honestly, it really hasn’t.

I’ve always been very upfront about the fact that I don’t want children at the start of any new relationship, casual or otherwise. This allows prospective partners to self-select out if this doesn’t work for them. I have a strong preference to date other people who are committed to the childfree by choice life, and I won’t have anything but a very casual relationship with anyone who has children or wants them in the future. There is no point wasting each other’s time if our big picture life goals don’t match.

I use two methods of birth control at all time, and I’ve always been very clear with anyone I have potentially pregnancy-causing sex with that an accidental pregnancy will result in a hasty abortion and that this is not up for debate.

How Do I Know I Won’t Regret It?

I know because every time I allow myself to imagine being a parent, I am filled with an immediate and visceral sense of “absolutely the fuck not.”

Can I 1000% guarantee I won’t wish I’d had kids when I’m 70? Of course not. But I think it’s tremendously unlikely, given how much I love my life as it is. I have loving partners, friends, and chosen family. I’m not going to end up alone. And really, is a vague fear of being alone at some unspecified point in the future a good reason to bring a new life into this world? I don’t think it is.

If I pushed myself to become a parent out of some misguided sense of duty or pressure, I think I’d regret that.

Late last year, my nesting partner Mr C&K had a vasectomy. My risk of unintended pregnancy was low already (thanks, Mirena!) but that decision removed any remaining possibility. When it was done, all we vboth felt was an overwhelming, searing relief. No lingering “what if?” No sadness for what might have been. Just, thank God, that’s one less thing to worry about.