April 29, 2025 • 66 mins
Deciding whether or not to have kids is a tough decision to make and this isn't spoken about openly enough. For me, I always wanted and assumed I would one day have kids and I just happened to wait long enough to where I knew a lot more about the world, and I really enjoyed my life. Things are peaceful for me and my husband in our mid-30s- something we didn't really have in childhood so we've been really struggling to choose 100% yes or no to this.
Heads up: I mention abortion in this episode.
While it might be clear from listening to this episode that I have way more reasons to NOT want kids than to say yes, it's still really difficult to make that permanent decision.
This is me vulnerably reading out my list of reasons to not have kids both because I know there's at least one other person that will benefit from hearing this and because I just don't want to think about this anymore. For me, it feels like I still have time at 35 so I'm going to stop obsessing and will revisit this decision sometime after I turn 36.
Conversations like this don't happen often enough and it's still considered by a lot of people a taboo to not have kids. But the most important thing is that you are making a choice that YOU would be happy with in your life. Thanks for reading this and I hope you enjoy the episode!
Xo, Cilia
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello, welcome to Openly Spoken, the podcast to help you show up, speak out, and be seen
(00:05):
in healthy relationships.
And one of those important things in healthy relationships is to really make your decisions
for your life based on what you truly want rather than what society is telling you to
do.
So in that thread, in this episode, I am basically reading out to you the reasons why I don't
(00:26):
want to have kids and the reasons why I might want to have kids.
And this is a very real and raw, vulnerable, diary entry style video that I recorded on
the floor back there.
Enjoy and be kind in the comments, please.
And having children is not a requirement for us to be a family.
(00:47):
I came from a family.
Do I not belong to that family anymore?
Do I not have a family now?
Because I'm supposed to have a kid?
(01:09):
Welcome to Openly Spoken, the podcast to help you show up, speak out, and be seen in healthy
relationships.
On the show, we talk about self-love, sexuality, relationship tips, including ending the cycle
of toxic relationships, and healing and thriving after heartbreak.
Hi, I'm your host Cilia, and I'm a certified sex, love and relationship coach helping
(01:34):
ambitious women with a history of toxic relationships feel deeply connected in healthy love.
These are such important topics that every woman deserves.
So if you could leave this show a rating and a review on Apple podcasts or Spotify to help
more women find this, it would mean the absolute world to me.
Thank you so much for being here today.
(01:54):
Now let's dive into the show.
Hello, we are on the floor today, cozy.
(02:15):
Hopefully a cat joins us.
My money is on Paxton.
Today we were also recording at night, which I don't usually do.
So I'm feeling a little bit more of a slow vibe.
Yeah, and I really just felt inspired to come on today and to share about the very hard
decision of whether or not to have kids.
(02:38):
Because I know this is such a big issue.
It's such a huge decision for so many women and for people who are on the fence about
it or thinking about it.
It's so hard to land on a side.
And I've had a couple of episodes about this for one was a solo episode and then one was
with Caitlin Rose.
(03:00):
I'm going to link that up here and both of those episodes got a lot of views.
So I'm guessing that you listening really resonate with grappling with this decision.
And in that episode with Caitlin, I read out to her some reasons that I had in a Google
Doc.
Well, today, I just printed that Google Doc without looking at it again since that call
(03:25):
with Caitlin.
And I'm going to share all of these reasons.
I have reasons why I don't want kids and reasons why I might want to have kids.
The reasons not to have kids is significantly longer.
It's very long.
There are 67 reasons to not have kids on my list and 13 reasons to have kids.
(03:50):
And for me, I started questioning whether or not I want kids in 2023.
Before then, I always assumed I would have kids.
My husband and I talked about having kids before we got married.
And I honestly assumed I'd have a baby by now.
Like I wanted a baby by now.
And then I started questioning it in 2023.
(04:12):
And I think in 2023 was the first time that I entertained the idea of what if I don't
have kids.
And then that caused a little bit of questioning my decision.
It sparked a lot of conversations with friends and other women to just really have open discussions
about this.
And then this past summer in July of 2024, I decided to fully step into the no, I'm not
(04:37):
going to have kids.
And then as of now, which is the time that I'm recording this, it is January 2025.
I'm recording this ahead of time because I want to just share these reasons, have that
documented and I don't want to think about this decision for the rest of the year.
(04:59):
I've decided I have time.
I can just put on hold not thinking about it for a year.
I'm 35.
I can revisit this when I'm 36.
Yeah, I'm going to read all of these to you.
And because I don't know if I will ever, I don't know which side of the fence I'm going
to land on.
So I do want to preface this with if I did end up having kids, this does not mean that
(05:23):
I don't love you.
Just case my future children are watching this.
That would be weird.
It's a weird thought to have.
Okay, so let's dive in to this.
I am drinking Waterkeeper today.
I have to remember to hold the mic next to me.
That is a peach Waterkeeper.
(05:45):
I won't say the brand, but it's just really popular kombucha brand that recently started
making Waterkeeper.
And it is so good.
You probably know what brand I'm talking about.
I'm just not going to mention it because my grandmother will come at me if I give anyone
free advertising like she always does.
Good looking out Uma.
Ich habe dich lieb.
(06:06):
So I'm going to read off my reasons and we'll see how it goes.
Maybe I'll add some extra thoughts.
Maybe more reasons will come up.
And at the end, I'm going to share my reasons why to have kids.
I'm going to start off with my reasons I don't want kids.
And this is in no particular order.
This is just how it came to me when I braindumped.
Reasons to not have kids.
(06:26):
Number one, your child could be special needs and end up needing a lot more resources and
attention as a child without special needs.
Yeah, that's something you don't have control over.
It is definitely something you can screen for during pregnancy.
However, I'm sure that some things you can only screen for really late in pregnancy and
(06:50):
then you're in pretty deep.
It would either be a really tough decision to decide to end it or it would be so late
that it's illegal to end it.
And who knows what the laws are by the time this comes out since we're about to have
a new like by the time I'm at the time of this recording, we're on like the last three
days of Biden.
(07:11):
Okay, anyways, number two, the US has the highest maternal death rate and something
could go wrong during my birth.
I feel like that is one that that's a fear that has come up recently.
It's not a fear that I ever had when I would envision myself having kids.
(07:36):
It's come up recently more probably because I'm already at that 35 age and the medical
establishment does a really good job at scaring women into thinking that because you're older,
there's going to be more complications and that mentality has definitely sunk it into
(07:58):
me a bit.
And so for me with with birth, it was always important that I do a home birth.
But now that I'm already over, I'm already 35 and I'm not yet pregnant.
I don't know if I would feel safe doing a home birth.
I do know there are so many options and that's also like bringing something up in me that
(08:20):
as I share these reasons why I don't want to have kids, I just want to set a boundary
here that I am not sharing this to have my mind changed in the comments.
I am not like this is not an open discussion of like, yeah, but you can do this, that these
are my honest thoughts and I'm sharing it because I know there are other women out there
(08:43):
who also are struggling with this decision and this is a conversation that isn't had
enough and I think having kids isn't typically done with as much thought as in my opinion
as someone who really loves children and loves babies, it's not done with as much thought
as I think is necessary because when you have a baby, that's not just a cute little baby
(09:08):
like that is a that'll be an adult one day.
You know, it's not your mini me.
It's not your best friend.
It's not a little version of you like that is a person and something else that's coming
up.
I don't think I wrote it on here, but this is a reason I actually thought of last night
as I was falling asleep and that was when I was like, huh, I should read all my reasons
(09:34):
out loud for the podcast.
But as someone who loves babies and who loves children, another reason why I don't want
kids is because babyhood goes by so fast and I feel like that would be so heartbreaking
for me.
Like I would be a mess and I think it sounds more fulfilling to me to try and find some
(09:59):
sort of career I can do part time while I'm still doing my coaching, doing the podcast
where I get to work with babies.
I feel like that would be more fulfilling to me than raising my own babies because my
own babies would only be babies for such a short time and it's going to go by so fast.
It goes by so fast.
(10:21):
I can't even believe my niece is about to turn eight years old.
It's just it's very unfair how fast it goes.
And when I see that and I think of what it must be like from the parent's perspective,
especially for me as someone who's highly sensitive, I would be an emotional wreck.
I don't know how you parents do it.
Okay, the third reason, well now it's the fourth because I just added an extra one,
(10:45):
but the third reason on my printed out list is pregnancy and birth will leave your body
forever changed.
In some cases, it could be long term physical health issues for the rest of your life.
And that is something that I never really thought about until recently when a friend
of mine shared a couple of medical issues that she has that started in pregnancy and
(11:08):
never went away.
And I know that you could adopt and then you don't have to go through pregnancy and birth.
So yeah, there's that one.
The fourth one reason not to have kids is the newborn phase.
Being to wake up every two hours and feed a baby sounds like something that would kill
me and my husband has to work so I would be the one needing to do that all on my own.
(11:34):
To be honest, when I think of the newborn phase, I think both that it would kill me
and I also think both that it would be just like so precious that that preciousness in
and of itself might be very nourishing and would give me this like, I don't even care
that I'm sleep deprived.
However, I am someone who does not do well on sleep.
(11:58):
I have heard that when you have a baby that something changes with your sleep.
I think you need less sleep or you sleep lighter or something like that.
I would hope that if I had kids, I would sleep lighter because I sleep like a rock.
I sleep through alarms.
I can sleep through, I've slept through an earthquake before when I was a kid.
(12:18):
I slept through Northridge, the Northridge earthquake.
Okay, number five, you could pay for support like a postpartum doula, nanny, et cetera.
But that is so expensive and we probably could not afford it.
That's my fifth reason I wrote not to have kids.
Yeah, I think that's pretty self-explanatory, especially as time has gone on, things have
just gotten more and more expensive.
(12:41):
The income that our household brings in now, like we would have so much more financial
freedom if it was in the nineties, then I'm sure all of you watching can relate to that.
Okay, number six is we have no in-person support system.
I wrote that one down because currently where we live, we don't have any family here.
(13:03):
I mean, we have some distant family here.
We have some family members who just aren't available emotionally or they're just not
available to give us the type of support that would be helpful for having a newborn, which
is why I would definitely want to at least get a postpartum doula because doing everything
(13:27):
by yourself, I don't think that's natural.
And I think that that is, okay, let me put my paper down a little bit.
That is the one thing that pisses me off the most about this decision of whether or not
to have kids is that we live in this society where it's so normalized to raise a baby
just within a couple.
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Yes, parents, your parents could be involved.
However, as time has gone on, it doesn't seem as common that people are staying in the same
cities as their parents because of having better job opportunities if you would move,
having better prices for rent, for homes to buy.
(14:10):
It's very common nowadays to move.
And this is why like anytime my husband and I are in our hometown that we met in, we don't
see anyone that we know at the grocery store anymore.
And when we were growing up, like he would always run into somebody.
And that is the one thing that pisses me off the most with this decision because I just
(14:31):
feel like at the societal level, what is present, how do I want to say this?
What is present with how we have created this like nuclear family system is not, it's like
a recipe to burn out.
And it's not only a recipe to burn out.
It's like inevitable that you're not going to meet your child's needs because you have
(14:56):
to go to work or you're going to be just emotionally drained.
I think we really were meant to stay living in some sort of tribal communal kind of society.
And I don't see that where I live.
I am not experiencing that at the moment.
This year I am really working on creating more in-person community because my husband
(15:21):
and I are about to move out of state.
That's actually what we're doing as of now, which is why I'm recording this podcast episode
so far in advance and I'm ready to just like feed that in-person community.
However, I'm not creating the community from the lens of like, I need my tribe so I can
have a baby.
So anyways, I get really mad when I look at the state of the world because I feel like
(15:47):
the decision of motherhood has kind of been robbed from me, which I know is, you know,
my own belief.
It's probably not true.
However, I truly do feel that way because if I'm being honest in my heart of hearts,
I would love to have a baby.
But when I look around at the world, I'm like, not here.
(16:10):
Like this place isn't good enough for a child that I would make.
No.
I think that's the problem with why I've started to change my mind is that I just,
I got to a point in life where I learned a little bit too much about the world, learned
a little bit too much about the three companies that own everything, about the just like detrimental
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effects that corporations have on our environment, about so many things, sociology-wise, which,
you know, I find very fascinating to study sociology and study like the way the world
works.
But knowing that more and being more educated on that makes me go, no, no, I don't want
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to birth someone in this.
Like this is a no.
Maybe if I lived in a different country, I have yet to go to a country where I would
want, I mean, I would want to have a country, I would want to have a baby in the country
I was born in.
It's at least a little bit better there, but it would still be hard.
There would still be some of the same things there present that are present in America,
(17:20):
although it would be like 10 times better to have a baby in Germany.
Okay.
I think that's also what started to change my mind a little bit is I went to Germany
for the first time and I was three when I left and I was 34 when I finally went to Germany.
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It took that long for me to go because I had immigration issues and my immigration status
was so that I could leave, but then I wouldn't be able to come back.
And then I had DACA for a while and had DACA actually for the 11 years, I want to say.
And even with DACA, you could technically leave the country, but it's not guaranteed
(18:03):
that you'll get back in and immigration lawyers recommend they do not leave.
And so when I finally got my green card last year, I went home to Germany.
That was the first trip I booked.
And just being home with my dad and my grandparents and my brother and just being in family and
made me be like, I like the family unit.
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I really do.
I feel like the lifestyle of being a part of a family is something that calls to me
a lot more than the lifestyle of just being a couple.
I love being just a couple and I love the freedom that we have.
However, it is also so nice to have that family unit.
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And I feel like I'm a better person when I have family around me.
When my siblings visit, I tend to wake up a lot earlier and get my yoga in and do all
my practices, exercise and stuff because I'm like preparing to have a day of connecting
with my family all day.
And I'll do that when I'm alone, but I slip a lot.
(19:11):
At least as of the time of this recording, I've been slipping a lot with my self care
and I find it easier to really lean into my self care when I'm a part of a unit.
Maybe that's depression.
It could be it probably is a little bit of depression, but we're working on it.
Okay.
I feel like there were more thoughts there I wanted to share, but we will move on to
what else is on the list and we will trust whatever comes up.
(19:33):
Okay.
What number are we on?
Okay.
Number seven reasons not to have kids is the mental anxiety around being responsible for
a child.
Sounds like something that will always take up real estate in my brain.
Even when they are away at school, at an activity or with a friend slash family member, I think
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that anxiety will still be present and it will be corpuling.
As I read that, I fucking feel that because this world is terrifying.
I know this world is also so beautiful and the world is so terrifying at the same time
and you have no control over anything.
You never know when you're going to die.
You never know when a natural disaster like an earthquake, for example, like never know
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when that's going to happen.
You have no control at all.
And I can't imagine that reality of having no control if I have a human in my life that
I am responsible for it.
Like that anxiety.
No, thank you.
I already have enough anxiety in my life.
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I like this episode.
I feel like it's really fun to share just such like a vulnerable.
I feel like I'm reading a diary entry to you right now and I like it.
I feel like I don't I don't really get like this on the solo episodes.
I'm more of like, here's how you do this or we're going to learn about that.
So this is really nice.
Okay, we are on number eight.
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Number eight reasons not to have kids.
I've already on and off dealt with depression in my life.
So that puts me at high risk for postpartum depression and the baby will feel that which
I think is very sad.
Yeah, I totally think I would have postpartum depression.
Depression is something that I've been familiar with for as long as I can remember.
(21:25):
Not that I knew that it was depression when I was little.
But yeah, that one is real for me.
Very real.
At least it's talked about more, which is good.
So even if I was in that place, I know I would have the I would like have the ability to
get help.
It's so helpful to be self aware and to realize that that's what's happening.
(21:48):
And I feel like I have that level of self awareness.
That's probably what's like, I mean, we're going to get to the reasons why to have kids
at the end.
But when I say the self awareness piece, that that for me is a reason why it might actually
be really great to have a child at an older age, because you're you're at this place of,
(22:10):
you know, you've grown a lot.
You've had you've had the time to grow your self awareness.
And I think that makes you a very good guide for a being that is growing up and down.
Yeah, I don't know if that makes sense.
Let's move on.
Number nine of reasons why to not have kids.
I love babies, toddlers and small kids.
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But they grow up to be older ages.
And I don't know if I'd like them or be able to be a good mom to an older child, teenager
and then adult.
What I think is cool about this one, though, is I'm remembering I have a friend who's 10
years older than me.
And her and I were talking about having kids back when I was 30, you know, back when I
(22:54):
just assumed I would have kids.
And she told me that you have she was like, Cilia, you have so much time to prepare once
you know you're pregnant, you have nine whole months, and then the baby is born, they sleep
a lot and it just been so gradually.
So it's not like one day you have a teenager.
So that's something that comes to mind as like, yeah, that that might actually not be
(23:17):
the map might actually not bad.
And I think I wrote that one because I used to work at a daycare.
I worked there during the week and the mornings, so I would have kids, kids there, I think
five months old was the age that we started letting letting them in because that's how
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old they are when they can hold their head up by themselves.
And four was the oldest they were like right before they're starting to go to school.
And in the summers, we would get kids that were five and up.
When the older kids came, it just felt like awkward.
It felt like I didn't really know how to talk to them and all of that.
But again, if you're their parent, that happens gradually.
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So it probably would be different.
Okay, number 10 reasons to not have kids is simply just it's expensive.
That's all I wrote.
Self explanatory.
Number 11 reasons why to not have kids climate change.
Something I think about a lot is, you know, especially right now, as of the time of this
(24:20):
reporting, there are some really bad fires happening in LA and the Eaton fire evacuation
zone and did like five miles away from where I live last week.
That's where it was at.
We're having more fires because of climate change.
And there's, you know, harsher winters happening as well in colder parts of the US.
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And something I always think about is if there's this if climate change in our in my lifetime
brings like a reality where there's no more food in the grocery stores, or there's no
clean water or something like that.
I wouldn't want to have the extra stress of having a child during that time.
(25:06):
Because I feel like, yeah, that means that would just be extra stress.
And I feel like just being a person that doesn't have that responsibility of being a parent,
it's so much easier to just go up and evacuate to live out of a backpack.
My husband and I have really good survival skills.
(25:29):
Like we like to go backpacking, and we're just with backpacks and we go out there for
days and that gives me so much confidence that if something were to happen, we don't
really like need to live in a shelter like we could.
We could be on foot.
We could be like people who survive in the apocalypse.
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But having a child like that just sounds like an extra thing.
Like if the apocalypse happens and we form little tribes again because of that to survive,
I would love to be in charge of helping take care of the children, but I wouldn't want
to one of the children to be my own because no, there's that like your child is your heart
(26:12):
outside of your body, like that extra piece of like, it's really like a fear of that
deep love that you have for somebody that you made with, you know, I'm in a loving,
aligned, beautiful relationship and like thinking about the human being that would be part me
(26:33):
and part my husband.
Like that level of love is pretty scary.
And I know that level of love would also change my life positively because a lot of parents
out there, I don't know if any parents would be listening to this.
If you are, thanks for being here and entertaining my thoughts.
But I know that you like that love that you feel is just like, like you can't explain
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it in words.
Number 13, if the child is a girl, she'll have to live in a world where she doesn't
have access to abortion if she should need or want it.
Yeah, I mean, hopefully those laws would change by the time she is old enough to possibly
need one, but that's a really scary one.
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And related to that, I'm going to add another reason.
The overturning of Roe v. Wade is also something that gives me fear.
Like one of the reasons I had here was like anything can happen during pregnancy.
Oh no, it was something could go wrong during birth.
Okay, so then this is a totally separate reason.
Anything could go wrong during pregnancy and with Roe v. Wade being overturned, it feels
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really dangerous to be a pregnant person.
And yeah, it just feels like I wouldn't have rights.
I mean, I don't obviously have rights, but there are some rights that were taken away.
And I have had two abortions.
And one of the states I lived in for the first abortion I had, it's illegal to have an abortion.
(28:08):
And I cannot imagine if it was illegal at that time, I was so broke, I would not have
been able to get a plane ticket and go to a different state.
I mean, maybe I could.
I could have put it on a credit card or something.
But then when I get arrested, when I come back home, that's terrifying.
And then I would have a baby from a relationship that was just an abusive relationship.
(28:33):
It was a bad situation, which is why it was easy for me to, I mean, it was easy and hard.
It was easy to make that decision and say no, but it was also a huge heartbreak.
It's not an easy decision to have an abortion.
I mean, the decision might be easy, but even if the decision is easy, it's not an easy
(28:53):
thing to go through for any woman, even if she's 100% sure that she wanted to terminate
that pregnancy.
So yeah, there's some, another like, diary entry moment.
14, reasons not to have kids.
The child of the girl shall have to work twice as hard for less pay.
(29:15):
Yeah, fuck the gender wage gap.
Number 15, if the child is a boy, he'll have to live in a world that tells him not to cry
or have feelings.
That is just, once I became an aunt to a nephew, I have a niece and a nephew, but the nephew
is younger.
(29:35):
Once I became an aunt to a nephew, once he started like walking and talking and this
mom would send me videos of him dancing.
I remember just like, look at that.
I remember just, I'm getting emotional.
I remember just like looking at the joy on his face and him just like dancing freely
(29:58):
and just having this realization like, holy fuck, the world could stomp that out of him.
Like the world, this world is not easy to live in, whether you're a man, a woman, a
non-binary person, it's not an easy world to live in.
And I think because on my show, like we talk about like womanhood and we talk about womanhood
(30:22):
a lot and I bring up some feminist topics like abortion.
I think in the feminist space, it can be hard to realize that it's also hard to be a man
or a non-binary person.
Like it's not just hard to be a woman.
Like yes, the patriarchy is real, but the patriarchy does not just harm women.
(30:43):
It's harming everybody.
And that's a whole different topic to get into.
Oh my, my hair, my hair is really wild right now.
Number 16, reasons to not have kids.
If the child is a boy, he'll have to live in a world where people use online dating
apps and it's harder for boys to match with people there.
(31:06):
Recent studies have shown since the introduction of Tinder, there's been a rise in men over
30 not having sex in three years or more.
Another example of how it's also hard to be a man.
Okay, another one that's related to gender.
If they are non-binary or gay or part of the LGBTQIA plus community, I would still love
(31:28):
them, but I would be so afraid for them existing in the world because the world is not kind
to the LGBTQIA plus community.
That just like I have goosebumps in my body.
Like it's just wild to me that we can't just be safe being who we are.
I mean, we can, we, I think, I think the journey is learning to feel so safe in yourself and
(31:53):
so secure in yourself that you take that energy out into the world and you don't allow bullies
to take that away from you.
However, it is very real that in some parts of the US and in other countries, it's even
worse.
It's legit dangerous to exist for some people.
Violence will just be thrusted upon them.
(32:17):
And that is just awful.
I wish more people in general would remember that like every human being out there, most
once a baby, every human being has a parent or parents and like we all have, like, I don't
even know how to put it words that I'm trying to say, but I just wish people realized how
(32:38):
beautiful human beings are instead of hating on each other all the time.
I only talked about this one already when I expanded on climate change, but it was climate
change will lead to food shortage and having to survive in that with just us would be hard,
but much harder and more heartbreaking if we also had a child to worry.
Okay, moving on to number 18.
(33:00):
Reasons to not have kids.
I like this one.
Reasons not to have kids.
No drop offs or pickups from school every single day of the week.
No fucking thank you to that.
Like it is.
That sounds I mean, it's such a little thing that I'm sure gets routine.
(33:21):
I'm sure it's getting some like even I'm rolling my eyes at that.
Like girl, you could drop your kid off every day.
You go figure that out, but just as a child free person thing about that.
I'm like, you know, I don't want to do that.
Like for example, tomorrow I have nowhere to be.
I don't have any clients or any calls until one in the afternoon.
(33:44):
And so I don't need to set an alarm in the morning.
I can wake up when my body wants to wake up and I love that freedom and I have that freedom
because I don't have a child.
Reason number 19 to not have kids.
Summers are chaos because school is out.
Holy shit.
My friends that are moms, I don't hear from them all summer.
And if I do, they're just like they the energy they're giving off a chicken with its head
(34:08):
cut off.
I don't want that.
Doesn't sound fun.
I'm sure it's worth it.
But it's not for me.
Okay.
Number 20.
Number 20.
Related to the summer one.
Vacations are chaos because you have to schedule around your kids or maybe take them with you.
And I've heard from a lot of parents that a family vacation a lot of times isn't actually
(34:34):
really a vacation because you're parenting the whole time.
Number 21 of reasons not to have kids.
Mental capacity to develop yourself as a person or develop your career.
Yeah, learning is basically my hobby.
So that's why I came up with that one.
Less ability to be spontaneous or go on a road trip or take a flight somewhere new because
(34:56):
your kids are in school.
There's, you know, probably all these extra logistics you have to figure out.
Number 23 reasons not to have kids is when you travel to foreign places, you don't have
any worries about your child getting sick or kidnapped.
Can you tell I'm an anxious person?
(35:16):
These are the things I think about my child getting kidnapped.
Reason number 24 of why I don't want kids is.
Oh, this one.
I guess this comes with the territory, but I wrote it down.
So I'm going to share with you getting thrown up on shit on and peed on number 25, someone
saying mom, mom, mom.
(35:38):
I'm thinking of what's his name?
Sue Griffin.
Mama, mommy, mama.
So annoying.
Or a child saying dad, dad, dad all day long.
Like that would probably drive me nuts.
So how do you work from home if you have clients, if you're recording stuff, if someone screaming
(35:59):
in the background.
I mean, I'm sure you can get that under control, but that's one of the reasons I wrote.
Reason number 26 of why I don't want kids, having to entertain someone all hours of the
day from the time they wake up until bedtime.
Yeah, I've seen my brother go through that and it looks pretty exhausting.
He's done a really good job at that.
It's been really great to watch.
It's so cool to watch your youngest sibling when you are the oldest of the siblings.
(36:25):
Being a dad kind of like it breaks my brain a little bit.
Reason number 27 why I don't want kids.
It's already hard for us to stick to structure and routines.
That's a tough one for us.
And kids really strive in having routines.
I think the reason why we have a hard time with routines is because we both came from
(36:48):
families that didn't have routines.
Like we didn't have much stability and we had a lot of dysfunction in our households
of origin.
That's probably another reason to add there is our childhoods weren't super rosy.
And so being at this stage of life where it's, you know, mid thirties, you're just like,
hold on this peaceful place.
Like, why would I want to, why didn't you even finish reading that one?
(37:12):
Okay, it's already really hard for us to stick to structure and routines and kids really
strive in having routines.
I think it would be hard for us to implement that.
Even if we did, I worry I might hate and resent it.
We're not sharing reason number 28 today.
I think this is already enough of a diary entry that I want to keep that one to myself.
(37:33):
But reason number 29, it goes by way too fast.
And you're broke, fucking tired, and maybe even heartbroken at the end.
And it's all over and they've moved out and it's a thankless job.
That's like such a negative view on parenthood.
To be honest, I would be ready for it to be a thankless job.
I'm like, I'm ready to give you my all and to just have you hate me anyways, because
(37:57):
it's part of the territory.
Reason number 30 to not have kids.
Possibility of war and our child living through a collapsing society.
The possibility of war is very top of mind for my family because they all live in Germany
and Russia is like right there.
(38:19):
So yeah, that's why that one came up.
Reason number 31 to not have kids.
Climbing wildlife and natural landscapes that add to a child's exploration and health.
And having a child is so resource dependent and that's something that adds to the decline
(38:42):
in natural wildlife and landscapes.
And that only adds to it again because of how our society has been structured.
A lot of what we're doing now are like old ideas that we came up with a long time ago.
Before we had enough information about the earth as a living being and because our economies
(39:09):
are so dependent on the structures that we've built.
One of those structures being just the industry of oil and needing oil to get around.
Yeah, I feel like society needs a redesign but I understand why that redesign is not
(39:30):
realistic in my lifetime because that redesign would come with complete and total economic
collapse at least temporarily.
I think humans most violent invention is not a gun.
Our most violent invention is the automobile.
And I think the automobile is the most violent invention because it's putting shit out into
(39:56):
the air that every single living being breathes in, like not just humans.
It's violent because of roadkill that happens, car accidents.
And it's also violent because it completely changed the structure of having society and
being connected with all of your neighbors.
(40:18):
It really broke apart tight knit communities.
I know tight knit communities still exist in pockets of the country, but the invention
of the car has really separated us even more and made us more individualistic.
I really, really enjoy cities where cities like New York where it's easy to get around
(40:41):
without a car.
I feel like you have more of a sense of belonging to a community when you aren't in a box
trapped on the 405 going five miles an hour for an hour to work and back every single
day.
(41:01):
It's already so hard for our generation to exist.
For example, how out of reach it is to buy a home.
And so for our child, it would be way harder and it seems almost cruel, cruel, hopefully
that's coming out right.
Cruel, not cool, cruel.
It seems cruel to bring them into that kind of existence.
(41:22):
I don't know if I'm an anti-natalist, but I do.
Like there is a part of me that thinks it's a little unethical.
Not that I'm, you know, walking around being like, Hey, why are you having kids?
Just when I think about me having kids, I feel like it would be, it would just feel
unethical because of the world and all of these reasons that I'm listing out because
(41:49):
of that.
Reason number 33, to not have kids.
There is data that shows parents in the US are less happy than people who live in the
US and decide not to have children.
Reason number 34, to not have kids, if we ever wanted to move to a different country,
it would be a lot easier with the kid.
(42:09):
But I guess, I don't know, is that a Freudian?
If we ever wanted to move to a different country, it would be harder with a kid and we wouldn't
be ripping them away from their social support system.
If friends they've made, that one definitely comes from my own like childhood trauma.
I moved around a lot as a kid.
(42:30):
I was born out of the US and I moved to the US when I was three.
I don't really remember that.
But then from the time I was three until I was 11, we moved a lot.
I changed schools a lot that by the time when I was 11, we stayed in that same town when
I entered high school.
(42:52):
And by the time I was in high school, I would like fight with my parents and be like, we
are not moving.
You can't do this to me.
I cannot move.
You can't be the new girl while I'm in high school.
And because of that moving around, sometimes I think of friends that I had in elementary
school that I remember their face.
I remember their energy.
I have like memories of what we did together, but I don't necessarily remember their name.
(43:16):
Or if I do remember their name, I have no idea what their last name is.
And so we're not in touch anymore.
And sometimes I'm like, I have like this grief that's like, oh my God, my best friend from
like second grade.
I wonder how she's doing.
And I have no idea how to contact her.
Reason number 35 to not have kids.
If one of us gets any big work opportunities that ask us to up and move to another state
(43:39):
or country, it's so much more doable if we don't have children.
That again, kind of leads to the first one.
Like I wouldn't want to be uprooting my child's life.
And yeah, it's nice to have that freedom to be able to go anywhere for any opportunity.
Reason number 36.
I like this one because this is another, this like points to a, like a lot of, okay.
(44:06):
I like this one because it points to something that people will say sometimes when you say
that you don't want kids and they'll say, who's going to take care of you in the fold?
And so this reason is when we are old, there's no guarantee that our kid or kids would take
care of us for many reasons.
(44:28):
They could have other obligations.
They could be in a tough financial place.
They could live really far away.
They could even not have a great relationship with us.
And currently right now, I, my grandparents on my mother's side, well, I mean, all my
grandparents live in Germany, also living once.
I have three living grandparents.
They all live in Germany.
And one of them is currently in a home and he had a child with my grandmother, but she
(44:55):
lives here in the U S.
And so that, you know, that's another thing.
It's like, if you have a kid, there's no guarantee they'll take care of you when you're old.
A, it's not like, it's kind of messed up to expect that.
I mean, it's, it's nice to do that.
Like I would, I would want to help in any way that I can.
(45:17):
And when I was in Germany, I visited my grandfather every day in the nursing home.
I live in a different country.
It could be not accessible.
So there's many reasons why your children wouldn't take care of you when you're old.
As we age, I think we might be healthier because we're not losing sleep with kids.
We'd be having more sex.
(45:37):
We'd have less anxiety and stress by not having to provide for a child.
I know that for a lot of parents, your sex life gets put on holds for good reasons.
And yeah, that sounds really tough.
Number 38 reason to not have kids.
My husband travels for work a lot.
His job is also very difficult.
(45:59):
Like it takes a lot out of him, which means that if we were to have a child, the brunt
of the parenting work would fall on me.
Like I wouldn't, I wouldn't be a single mom, obviously, but it would at times feel that
way because I would be the parent that is physically present.
(46:21):
And I would be the parent that is physically present by myself.
Most of the time.
And then even when my husband would be home for a local job or if he has time off of work,
because his work is so hard, he might not have the energy to like really put his soul
into.
I mean, I feel like that's like underestimating my husband's potential because he wouldn't
(46:44):
be a fucking amazing dad, but it like, it sounds like it would be very, very hard logistically
with the job that he has.
Reason number 39 to not have kids is probably my top reason.
This is probably my top reason why I don't want kids.
And I'm just going to read it out to you.
This is again, another like diary entry reason.
(47:06):
I have a fear of experiencing a psychotic break or a snap or extreme mental health conditions
because of the weight of responsibility put on mothers.
And also that a mother is judged no matter what she does.
And also the mom guilt, the lack of sleep, all the things I put all the things in all
(47:28):
caps, all the things combined sounds like something that would be way too much to handle.
I'm a highly sensitive person if you can't, if you couldn't tell.
And what else did I write?
I think if we were living a life that was more community oriented, I wouldn't feel that
way.
But America isn't really a community friendly place unless you're part of a church is what
(47:52):
I wrote.
I don't fully believe that.
Because there is definitely like you can find your community at a yoga studio.
Like you can find, you can find community.
I think it's harder to find community now than it used to.
But anyways, the psychotic break or snap, like that is my biggest fear.
(48:15):
Because I'm highly sensitive, I have a history of depression, of anxiety, and I would be
doing the brunt of the work.
I would have lack of sleep.
I would, you know, my body would be exhausted from pregnancy, from birth, from all the things.
I feel like I would just nap and not recognize myself.
(48:38):
And what if I would be a horrible mom then?
Because I'm so depleted that I'm in the space of like, and I would not want a child to experience
that trauma.
But yeah, that's probably my biggest reason is that fear of that psychotic break.
(48:59):
I feel like I would be very prone to postpartum depression and like mental health issues from
the lack of sleep and all of the things.
Reason number 41, to not have kids.
Happiness will take a hit due to the anxiety, stress, financial aspects you experience when
you have kids.
I feel like we mentioned that before, but just in other words.
(49:22):
Reason number 42.
I like this one.
We are already a family.
I think part of the way our society is set up and like serve to us.
It's like you get married, and when you have kids, you have your own family.
And I think that's really fucked up because like I came from a family.
(49:43):
Do I not belong to that family anymore?
Do I not have a family now because I'm supposed to have a kid?
I think that's that.
I don't know if that's really what people mean when they say that, but that's something
that I think of.
So I wrote, we are already a family as a couple with cats.
Yeah, we're already a family as a couple with cats, parents, siblings, et cetera.
(50:09):
And having children is not a requirement for us to be a family.
We are enough as we are.
Reason number 43 to not have kids.
Oh, this one's funny.
We don't have to listen to row your boat or any other annoying kid songs when we drive
in the car, dot, dot, dot, ever.
That sounds nice.
My husband and I are really big into music.
(50:30):
And I would not want to listen to row your boat in the car.
I think now I understand why my parents didn't play kid songs.
I remember in the nineties being like six or seven and my parents would just like blast
Tupac in the car and I hated it.
Reason number 44, pelvic floor prolapse can happen and peeing a little bit every time
(50:56):
I sneeze could happen.
I know that's very common.
Reason number 45, having a period for an entire month after giving birth.
I didn't know that that happened until I was in my twenties and one of my friends had a
kid and she told me about that.
And I was like, mom, why didn't you tell me this?
This is another reason that is associated with overturning of Roe V Wade.
(51:19):
So reason number 46 to not have kids is the overturning of Roe V Wade and abortion makes
me angry.
And it feels powerful to protest against that Roe V Wade overturning by not using my uterus
to make children.
(51:40):
Like that makes me feel like an absolute powerful woman to be like, oh, you're taking my, you're
taking my rights away if I was a pregnant person.
Well then no.
Reason number 48 to not have kids.
There is such a push from conservative politicians to both have kids and then do absolutely nothing
(52:01):
to protect those kids or give them a high quality of life.
Period end of sentence.
Reason number 49 to not have kids, school shooters.
Reason number 50 to not have kids, public school is shit.
You could do private school, but realistically, I don't know if I could, I have no idea how
much private school is, but reason number 51.
(52:23):
Home schooling sounds exhausting.
I wrote that because the first one, public school is shit.
Like if I had a child, I would want to teach them school myself because I feel like there's
a lot in school that we are not taught that needs to be taught.
But then when I think of, I mean, I don't, I haven't looked into the specific logistics
(52:48):
of it, but it sounds like a lot.
Reason number 52 to not have kids.
Again in response to number 50 and 51 is hiring a private teacher is expensive and we probably
couldn't afford that.
Reason number 53 to not have kids.
Cilia will have less time and opportunity to work and make money, both because of the
(53:11):
mental load and time commitments of motherhood and the bias in the job markets against mothers
and against people who take a break from the work from the workforce.
I think that's really messed up that we are penalized for having gaps in our CV or gaps
in our resume.
I think that's still bullshit.
(53:31):
Number 54 to not have kids.
Even if Cilia worked, I don't know why I wrote this in third person.
Even if Cilia works still, care costs are expensive and could eat up her entire paycheck.
Reason number 55 to not have kids is ripping from vagina to asshole during birth.
Reason number 57 not have kids.
(53:53):
A possible major surgery during birth like a C-section if things aren't progressing
naturally.
Now that again goes to the thing of like you never know what's going to happen during pregnancy
or during birth.
Reason number 57 to not have kids.
High medical costs of birth and having debt to pay off because of that for years.
Yeah, I can't believe how expensive birth is even when you have insurance.
(54:17):
That is insane in America.
Please send help whenever we are.
Reason number 59 to not have kids.
I think I might have skipped one, but 59 is no privacy.
I will just forgo the numbers because I think I skipped a couple.
Another reason not have kids when you're working on a project and you have a kid, you'll most
likely be interrupted 50 times.
(54:38):
Reason 60.
We'll go back to the numbers, number 60 to not have kids.
We don't have to worry about living in a neighborhood with a good school, which usually are the
more expensive places to live.
Reason number 61 to not have kids.
All the places in the world that we could travel to and explore because we're not obligated
to the parent life and because we have that extra disposable income to be able to travel
(55:02):
more often.
Reason number 62 to not have kids.
This reason of not knowing what could happen during pregnancy and childbirth I'm realizing
is a reason that comes up a lot.
I'm just saying it in a bunch of different ways.
This one is dying during childbirth can totally happen and there's no way of controlling
(55:25):
that.
Then I put in parentheses that 808 women die daily.
I'm guessing that's the US statistic, but don't quote me on that.
I really wish I would have put some sources in here about the couple of research things
that I listed in my list so that I can tell you, but do your own research.
Reason number 63 to not have kids.
(55:46):
We both didn't have good examples of parents, so would we even know what the fuck we're
doing?
Nobody knows what the fuck they're doing and that's part of it.
Nobody has it figured out anyways.
So that isn't a reason that's really fully alive in me anymore.
Number 64 I don't want to share.
I don't want that recorded.
Reason number 65 to not have kids.
(56:08):
Okay, I don't want that one recorded either.
Reason number 66 to not have kids.
We can do a fire plan for financial independence, retire early.
You could probably do that with kids.
I know someone who's doing that who's about to have a baby.
Reason number 67, I think having kids brings forth a lot of quote unquote extroverted activities,
(56:29):
which sounds exhausting.
It kind of does sound fun too.
Like when I think of being a mom and like making friends because they are the mom of
my kids' friends.
It sounds kind of fun, but it also sounds like, what if I don't like her, but my kid
(56:50):
really likes their kid and I have to hang out with her?
Like that would suck.
I'd feel really bad about that.
Okay, those were all the reasons on my printout sheet of why, like reasons I came up with
why to not have kids.
And now I have 13 reasons to share with you that I came up with to have kids.
(57:12):
So these are reasons why I might consider having a child.
Number one, experiencing that unexplainable love that everyone talks about.
Number two, watching Ashton be a dad.
That's my house.
Number three, watching Ashton.
I already, I'm reading this, I won.
(57:32):
Number three is being witnessed being a mom by my husband.
Number four, I love this one.
I think this one might be my favorite.
Witnessing a little bean grow up and explore the world, learn things and become an adult.
I think this one's my favorite too.
Reason number five that I might consider having kids, getting to see the world through a child's
(57:53):
eyes.
Honestly though, when I think of the comparison of all the reasons why I would not have kids,
even though these reasons to have kids are great, I don't know if it's worth it because
the number one thing, if I would narrow down the two reasons why I'm not, why I'm like
(58:16):
really like, oh, I don't want to have kids.
It's that psychotic break, the fear of having a psychotic break and the feeling a little
bit unethical to bring a child into this insane world.
Okay, reason number six that I might consider having kids is going to events that are family
friendly and maybe having fun doing something that we wouldn't be interested in if we didn't
(58:41):
have a child and those family memories we would have.
That one sounds really nice because like I said before, I really do enjoy the family
unit dynamic.
I came from a household of multiple children.
I have three siblings.
I grew up with two of them here in the US and one of them is overseas.
(59:02):
We always like every Sunday it was family day, like we weren't allowed to hang out with
friends because we had family time and we would go for bike rides, go to the movies
and do stuff.
And at the time, at some times I thought it was annoying, but now I look back at those
times fondly and just having that kind of tradition sounds really nice.
(59:28):
Although you can do that just with your partner.
If you have a partner, I could just do traditions with my husband, but it also sounds fun to
have that whole unit and be more a part of that family unit life.
And if my brother didn't live in Florida, which is basically like my husband describes
(59:50):
it as, I can say this because I've already dropped a couple of curse words, so this is
going to be marked as explicit, but my husband describes South Florida as Satan's hot asshole
and the environment is not comfortable living there and the politics.
Otherwise I would live there because then I'd be near my brother who has two kids.
See let's continue.
Reasons why I might consider having kids or reasons to have kids.
(01:00:15):
I didn't really title, it's not title, it's just listed out.
Making friends with other parents.
Number eight, the spiritual slash personal growth from what a taxing job it is.
Number nine, maybe it will feel like something that brings us closer together, us being my
husband and I and deepens our relationship and love, dot, dot, dot, but also the opposite
(01:00:36):
could happen.
Number 10, having someone you need to provide a good life for and who's looking up to you
could be a great motivation to be better.
I said in parentheses I put, but maybe a dog can do this for you too.
Oh, I'm thinking of the dog that we got when I was 15.
Troy Mickey, rest in peace.
(01:00:58):
That dog saved my life.
Reason number 11 to have kids, the memories and the silliness.
Reason number 12, I wrote, this is exactly what I wrote.
I wrote not a good reason, but tax benefits, LOL.
Reason number 13, if we are not living in the US, for example, if we live in Germany,
the government provides a lot of support for pregnancy, postpartum and childcare.
(01:01:23):
And then this one I didn't write down, but I will add a 14th reason of why I would want
to have kids.
It's a selfish reason.
As someone who is a deeply spiritual person, I feel like the spiritual, primal experience
of going through birth would be so amazing.
(01:01:49):
Going through an unmedicated birth.
I mean, granted that nothing, everything goes well and nothing bad happens, but going through
that and really just surrendering to your body and trusting your body, that trusting
that your body knows what she's doing sounds just like a huge portal to go through.
Yeah, so that is my unfiltered, I mean, a little filtered because there are a couple
(01:02:14):
of reasons that I did not want recorded and didn't want to share, but we got very vulnerable
in this episode and I like my intention with putting this out there is to help you feel
seen if you are also someone that is grappling with this decision with this blah blah blah
can't talk.
(01:02:34):
Okay.
My intention is to help you feel seen if you are someone who's also grappling with this
decision of should I have kids, should I not have kids?
And if you feel that it's possible, I would invite you to do what I am doing and that
is I am taking a complete year off of watching any more content that are videos like this
(01:02:58):
where it's like, should I have a kid, should I not?
These are my reasons.
This is like, I'm not watching any more of that content.
I'm taking a complete break from listening to the podcast episodes, all the stuff out
there about whether or not to have kids or the child free lifestyle.
I'm taking a complete break for this entire year as of the time of this recording.
(01:03:23):
It is January, but this episode is probably coming out in the summer.
So if you are listening in the summer, maybe you can take the rest of this year off of
trying to make this decision.
If you feel that that time is on your side.
There's a really good argument that one of my friends was also grappling with this decision
(01:03:45):
who is 40.
That she came up with was like, if adoption is something you want to consider, it can
be kind of helpful to realize that adoption kind of gives you more time because then you're
not having to deal with your fertility window closing out.
(01:04:10):
I also do want to share that I know people who have had kids after the age of 40 and
have had totally healthy and totally fine pregnancies.
I know someone who had a child at 43 last year.
I know someone who the year before had a child at, I think she was 45.
And yeah, their babies are healthy and thriving.
(01:04:33):
So we have time.
It can probably be for me when I think about having a child after the age of 40 or even
at 40, it sounds very exhausting for me.
However, I am only 35 and I'm taking this entire year off.
And when I am 36, I will probably open this episode and listen to it or I don't know what
(01:05:00):
I'll do.
I'll do something to revisit this decision.
But for now, it feels good to release this and just let this out and to just leave it
up here for whoever wants to engage with it and listen to it.
If that is you, thank you so much for being here.
I really do appreciate it.
(01:05:20):
It's not lost on me that there's so much other content you could be listening to or watching.
And yeah, I hope that you come back to the show.
Being child free or choosing whether or not to have a kid is not a regular topic.
We usually talk about sexuality, self-love, relationships, healing and thriving after
a heartbreak.
(01:05:41):
Those are like the topics that we usually lean in more.
So if this is your first time listening or watching, subscribe, follow and come back
next week for more or go and look at the other episodes we've had.
We've talked to over hundreds of women.
We did not start posting this show onto YouTube until 2023, but this show started in 2021.
(01:06:05):
And yeah, I feel like I'm rambling at this point.
So I am signing off.
Thank you so much.
I'll see you next time.
Hello, welcome to Openly Spoken, the podcast to help you show up, speak out, and be seen
(00:05):
in healthy relationships.
And one of those important things in healthy relationships is to really make your decisions
for your life based on what you truly want rather than what society is telling you to
do.
So in that thread, in this episode, I am basically reading out to you the reasons why I don't
(00:26):
want to have kids and the reasons why I might want to have kids.
And this is a very real and raw, vulnerable, diary entry style video that I recorded on
the floor back there.
Enjoy and be kind in the comments, please.
And having children is not a requirement for us to be a family.
(00:47):
I came from a family.
Do I not belong to that family anymore?
Do I not have a family now?
Because I'm supposed to have a kid?
(01:09):
Welcome to Openly Spoken, the podcast to help you show up, speak out, and be seen in healthy
relationships.
On the show, we talk about self-love, sexuality, relationship tips, including ending the cycle
of toxic relationships, and healing and thriving after heartbreak.
Hi, I'm your host Cilia, and I'm a certified sex, love and relationship coach helping
(01:34):
ambitious women with a history of toxic relationships feel deeply connected in healthy love.
These are such important topics that every woman deserves.
So if you could leave this show a rating and a review on Apple podcasts or Spotify to help
more women find this, it would mean the absolute world to me.
Thank you so much for being here today.
(01:54):
Now let's dive into the show.
Hello, we are on the floor today, cozy.
(02:15):
Hopefully a cat joins us.
My money is on Paxton.
Today we were also recording at night, which I don't usually do.
So I'm feeling a little bit more of a slow vibe.
Yeah, and I really just felt inspired to come on today and to share about the very hard
decision of whether or not to have kids.
(02:38):
Because I know this is such a big issue.
It's such a huge decision for so many women and for people who are on the fence about
it or thinking about it.
It's so hard to land on a side.
And I've had a couple of episodes about this for one was a solo episode and then one was
with Caitlin Rose.
(03:00):
I'm going to link that up here and both of those episodes got a lot of views.
So I'm guessing that you listening really resonate with grappling with this decision.
And in that episode with Caitlin, I read out to her some reasons that I had in a Google
Doc.
Well, today, I just printed that Google Doc without looking at it again since that call
(03:25):
with Caitlin.
And I'm going to share all of these reasons.
I have reasons why I don't want kids and reasons why I might want to have kids.
The reasons not to have kids is significantly longer.
It's very long.
There are 67 reasons to not have kids on my list and 13 reasons to have kids.
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And for me, I started questioning whether or not I want kids in 2023.
Before then, I always assumed I would have kids.
My husband and I talked about having kids before we got married.
And I honestly assumed I'd have a baby by now.
Like I wanted a baby by now.
And then I started questioning it in 2023.
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And I think in 2023 was the first time that I entertained the idea of what if I don't
have kids.
And then that caused a little bit of questioning my decision.
It sparked a lot of conversations with friends and other women to just really have open discussions
about this.
And then this past summer in July of 2024, I decided to fully step into the no, I'm not
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going to have kids.
And then as of now, which is the time that I'm recording this, it is January 2025.
I'm recording this ahead of time because I want to just share these reasons, have that
documented and I don't want to think about this decision for the rest of the year.
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I've decided I have time.
I can just put on hold not thinking about it for a year.
I'm 35.
I can revisit this when I'm 36.
Yeah, I'm going to read all of these to you.
And because I don't know if I will ever, I don't know which side of the fence I'm going
to land on.
So I do want to preface this with if I did end up having kids, this does not mean that
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I don't love you.
Just case my future children are watching this.
That would be weird.
It's a weird thought to have.
Okay, so let's dive in to this.
I am drinking Waterkeeper today.
I have to remember to hold the mic next to me.
That is a peach Waterkeeper.
(05:45):
I won't say the brand, but it's just really popular kombucha brand that recently started
making Waterkeeper.
And it is so good.
You probably know what brand I'm talking about.
I'm just not going to mention it because my grandmother will come at me if I give anyone
free advertising like she always does.
Good looking out Uma.
Ich habe dich lieb.
(06:06):
So I'm going to read off my reasons and we'll see how it goes.
Maybe I'll add some extra thoughts.
Maybe more reasons will come up.
And at the end, I'm going to share my reasons why to have kids.
I'm going to start off with my reasons I don't want kids.
And this is in no particular order.
This is just how it came to me when I braindumped.
Reasons to not have kids.
(06:26):
Number one, your child could be special needs and end up needing a lot more resources and
attention as a child without special needs.
Yeah, that's something you don't have control over.
It is definitely something you can screen for during pregnancy.
However, I'm sure that some things you can only screen for really late in pregnancy and
(06:50):
then you're in pretty deep.
It would either be a really tough decision to decide to end it or it would be so late
that it's illegal to end it.
And who knows what the laws are by the time this comes out since we're about to have
a new like by the time I'm at the time of this recording, we're on like the last three
days of Biden.
(07:11):
Okay, anyways, number two, the US has the highest maternal death rate and something
could go wrong during my birth.
I feel like that is one that that's a fear that has come up recently.
It's not a fear that I ever had when I would envision myself having kids.
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It's come up recently more probably because I'm already at that 35 age and the medical
establishment does a really good job at scaring women into thinking that because you're older,
there's going to be more complications and that mentality has definitely sunk it into
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me a bit.
And so for me with with birth, it was always important that I do a home birth.
But now that I'm already over, I'm already 35 and I'm not yet pregnant.
I don't know if I would feel safe doing a home birth.
I do know there are so many options and that's also like bringing something up in me that
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as I share these reasons why I don't want to have kids, I just want to set a boundary
here that I am not sharing this to have my mind changed in the comments.
I am not like this is not an open discussion of like, yeah, but you can do this, that these
are my honest thoughts and I'm sharing it because I know there are other women out there
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who also are struggling with this decision and this is a conversation that isn't had
enough and I think having kids isn't typically done with as much thought as in my opinion
as someone who really loves children and loves babies, it's not done with as much thought
as I think is necessary because when you have a baby, that's not just a cute little baby
(09:08):
like that is a that'll be an adult one day.
You know, it's not your mini me.
It's not your best friend.
It's not a little version of you like that is a person and something else that's coming
up.
I don't think I wrote it on here, but this is a reason I actually thought of last night
as I was falling asleep and that was when I was like, huh, I should read all my reasons
(09:34):
out loud for the podcast.
But as someone who loves babies and who loves children, another reason why I don't want
kids is because babyhood goes by so fast and I feel like that would be so heartbreaking
for me.
Like I would be a mess and I think it sounds more fulfilling to me to try and find some
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sort of career I can do part time while I'm still doing my coaching, doing the podcast
where I get to work with babies.
I feel like that would be more fulfilling to me than raising my own babies because my
own babies would only be babies for such a short time and it's going to go by so fast.
It goes by so fast.
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I can't even believe my niece is about to turn eight years old.
It's just it's very unfair how fast it goes.
And when I see that and I think of what it must be like from the parent's perspective,
especially for me as someone who's highly sensitive, I would be an emotional wreck.
I don't know how you parents do it.
Okay, the third reason, well now it's the fourth because I just added an extra one,
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but the third reason on my printed out list is pregnancy and birth will leave your body
forever changed.
In some cases, it could be long term physical health issues for the rest of your life.
And that is something that I never really thought about until recently when a friend
of mine shared a couple of medical issues that she has that started in pregnancy and
(11:08):
never went away.
And I know that you could adopt and then you don't have to go through pregnancy and birth.
So yeah, there's that one.
The fourth one reason not to have kids is the newborn phase.
Being to wake up every two hours and feed a baby sounds like something that would kill
me and my husband has to work so I would be the one needing to do that all on my own.
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To be honest, when I think of the newborn phase, I think both that it would kill me
and I also think both that it would be just like so precious that that preciousness in
and of itself might be very nourishing and would give me this like, I don't even care
that I'm sleep deprived.
However, I am someone who does not do well on sleep.
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I have heard that when you have a baby that something changes with your sleep.
I think you need less sleep or you sleep lighter or something like that.
I would hope that if I had kids, I would sleep lighter because I sleep like a rock.
I sleep through alarms.
I can sleep through, I've slept through an earthquake before when I was a kid.
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I slept through Northridge, the Northridge earthquake.
Okay, number five, you could pay for support like a postpartum doula, nanny, et cetera.
But that is so expensive and we probably could not afford it.
That's my fifth reason I wrote not to have kids.
Yeah, I think that's pretty self-explanatory, especially as time has gone on, things have
just gotten more and more expensive.
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The income that our household brings in now, like we would have so much more financial
freedom if it was in the nineties, then I'm sure all of you watching can relate to that.
Okay, number six is we have no in-person support system.
I wrote that one down because currently where we live, we don't have any family here.
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I mean, we have some distant family here.
We have some family members who just aren't available emotionally or they're just not
available to give us the type of support that would be helpful for having a newborn, which
is why I would definitely want to at least get a postpartum doula because doing everything
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by yourself, I don't think that's natural.
And I think that that is, okay, let me put my paper down a little bit.
That is the one thing that pisses me off the most about this decision of whether or not
to have kids is that we live in this society where it's so normalized to raise a baby
just within a couple.
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Yes, parents, your parents could be involved.
However, as time has gone on, it doesn't seem as common that people are staying in the same
cities as their parents because of having better job opportunities if you would move,
having better prices for rent, for homes to buy.
(14:10):
It's very common nowadays to move.
And this is why like anytime my husband and I are in our hometown that we met in, we don't
see anyone that we know at the grocery store anymore.
And when we were growing up, like he would always run into somebody.
And that is the one thing that pisses me off the most with this decision because I just
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feel like at the societal level, what is present, how do I want to say this?
What is present with how we have created this like nuclear family system is not, it's like
a recipe to burn out.
And it's not only a recipe to burn out.
It's like inevitable that you're not going to meet your child's needs because you have
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to go to work or you're going to be just emotionally drained.
I think we really were meant to stay living in some sort of tribal communal kind of society.
And I don't see that where I live.
I am not experiencing that at the moment.
This year I am really working on creating more in-person community because my husband
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and I are about to move out of state.
That's actually what we're doing as of now, which is why I'm recording this podcast episode
so far in advance and I'm ready to just like feed that in-person community.
However, I'm not creating the community from the lens of like, I need my tribe so I can
have a baby.
So anyways, I get really mad when I look at the state of the world because I feel like
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the decision of motherhood has kind of been robbed from me, which I know is, you know,
my own belief.
It's probably not true.
However, I truly do feel that way because if I'm being honest in my heart of hearts,
I would love to have a baby.
But when I look around at the world, I'm like, not here.
(16:10):
Like this place isn't good enough for a child that I would make.
No.
I think that's the problem with why I've started to change my mind is that I just,
I got to a point in life where I learned a little bit too much about the world, learned
a little bit too much about the three companies that own everything, about the just like detrimental
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effects that corporations have on our environment, about so many things, sociology-wise, which,
you know, I find very fascinating to study sociology and study like the way the world
works.
But knowing that more and being more educated on that makes me go, no, no, I don't want
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to birth someone in this.
Like this is a no.
Maybe if I lived in a different country, I have yet to go to a country where I would
want, I mean, I would want to have a country, I would want to have a baby in the country
I was born in.
It's at least a little bit better there, but it would still be hard.
There would still be some of the same things there present that are present in America,
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although it would be like 10 times better to have a baby in Germany.
Okay.
I think that's also what started to change my mind a little bit is I went to Germany
for the first time and I was three when I left and I was 34 when I finally went to Germany.
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It took that long for me to go because I had immigration issues and my immigration status
was so that I could leave, but then I wouldn't be able to come back.
And then I had DACA for a while and had DACA actually for the 11 years, I want to say.
And even with DACA, you could technically leave the country, but it's not guaranteed
(18:03):
that you'll get back in and immigration lawyers recommend they do not leave.
And so when I finally got my green card last year, I went home to Germany.
That was the first trip I booked.
And just being home with my dad and my grandparents and my brother and just being in family and
made me be like, I like the family unit.
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I really do.
I feel like the lifestyle of being a part of a family is something that calls to me
a lot more than the lifestyle of just being a couple.
I love being just a couple and I love the freedom that we have.
However, it is also so nice to have that family unit.
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And I feel like I'm a better person when I have family around me.
When my siblings visit, I tend to wake up a lot earlier and get my yoga in and do all
my practices, exercise and stuff because I'm like preparing to have a day of connecting
with my family all day.
And I'll do that when I'm alone, but I slip a lot.
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At least as of the time of this recording, I've been slipping a lot with my self care
and I find it easier to really lean into my self care when I'm a part of a unit.
Maybe that's depression.
It could be it probably is a little bit of depression, but we're working on it.
Okay.
I feel like there were more thoughts there I wanted to share, but we will move on to
what else is on the list and we will trust whatever comes up.
(19:33):
Okay.
What number are we on?
Okay.
Number seven reasons not to have kids is the mental anxiety around being responsible for
a child.
Sounds like something that will always take up real estate in my brain.
Even when they are away at school, at an activity or with a friend slash family member, I think
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that anxiety will still be present and it will be corpuling.
As I read that, I fucking feel that because this world is terrifying.
I know this world is also so beautiful and the world is so terrifying at the same time
and you have no control over anything.
You never know when you're going to die.
You never know when a natural disaster like an earthquake, for example, like never know
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when that's going to happen.
You have no control at all.
And I can't imagine that reality of having no control if I have a human in my life that
I am responsible for it.
Like that anxiety.
No, thank you.
I already have enough anxiety in my life.
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I like this episode.
I feel like it's really fun to share just such like a vulnerable.
I feel like I'm reading a diary entry to you right now and I like it.
I feel like I don't I don't really get like this on the solo episodes.
I'm more of like, here's how you do this or we're going to learn about that.
So this is really nice.
Okay, we are on number eight.
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Number eight reasons not to have kids.
I've already on and off dealt with depression in my life.
So that puts me at high risk for postpartum depression and the baby will feel that which
I think is very sad.
Yeah, I totally think I would have postpartum depression.
Depression is something that I've been familiar with for as long as I can remember.
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Not that I knew that it was depression when I was little.
But yeah, that one is real for me.
Very real.
At least it's talked about more, which is good.
So even if I was in that place, I know I would have the I would like have the ability to
get help.
It's so helpful to be self aware and to realize that that's what's happening.
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And I feel like I have that level of self awareness.
That's probably what's like, I mean, we're going to get to the reasons why to have kids
at the end.
But when I say the self awareness piece, that that for me is a reason why it might actually
be really great to have a child at an older age, because you're you're at this place of,
(22:10):
you know, you've grown a lot.
You've had you've had the time to grow your self awareness.
And I think that makes you a very good guide for a being that is growing up and down.
Yeah, I don't know if that makes sense.
Let's move on.
Number nine of reasons why to not have kids.
I love babies, toddlers and small kids.
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But they grow up to be older ages.
And I don't know if I'd like them or be able to be a good mom to an older child, teenager
and then adult.
What I think is cool about this one, though, is I'm remembering I have a friend who's 10
years older than me.
And her and I were talking about having kids back when I was 30, you know, back when I
(22:54):
just assumed I would have kids.
And she told me that you have she was like, Cilia, you have so much time to prepare once
you know you're pregnant, you have nine whole months, and then the baby is born, they sleep
a lot and it just been so gradually.
So it's not like one day you have a teenager.
So that's something that comes to mind as like, yeah, that that might actually not be
(23:17):
the map might actually not bad.
And I think I wrote that one because I used to work at a daycare.
I worked there during the week and the mornings, so I would have kids, kids there, I think
five months old was the age that we started letting letting them in because that's how
(23:39):
old they are when they can hold their head up by themselves.
And four was the oldest they were like right before they're starting to go to school.
And in the summers, we would get kids that were five and up.
When the older kids came, it just felt like awkward.
It felt like I didn't really know how to talk to them and all of that.
But again, if you're their parent, that happens gradually.
(23:59):
So it probably would be different.
Okay, number 10 reasons to not have kids is simply just it's expensive.
That's all I wrote.
Self explanatory.
Number 11 reasons why to not have kids climate change.
Something I think about a lot is, you know, especially right now, as of the time of this
(24:20):
reporting, there are some really bad fires happening in LA and the Eaton fire evacuation
zone and did like five miles away from where I live last week.
That's where it was at.
We're having more fires because of climate change.
And there's, you know, harsher winters happening as well in colder parts of the US.
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And something I always think about is if there's this if climate change in our in my lifetime
brings like a reality where there's no more food in the grocery stores, or there's no
clean water or something like that.
I wouldn't want to have the extra stress of having a child during that time.
(25:06):
Because I feel like, yeah, that means that would just be extra stress.
And I feel like just being a person that doesn't have that responsibility of being a parent,
it's so much easier to just go up and evacuate to live out of a backpack.
My husband and I have really good survival skills.
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Like we like to go backpacking, and we're just with backpacks and we go out there for
days and that gives me so much confidence that if something were to happen, we don't
really like need to live in a shelter like we could.
We could be on foot.
We could be like people who survive in the apocalypse.
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But having a child like that just sounds like an extra thing.
Like if the apocalypse happens and we form little tribes again because of that to survive,
I would love to be in charge of helping take care of the children, but I wouldn't want
to one of the children to be my own because no, there's that like your child is your heart
(26:12):
outside of your body, like that extra piece of like, it's really like a fear of that
deep love that you have for somebody that you made with, you know, I'm in a loving,
aligned, beautiful relationship and like thinking about the human being that would be part me
(26:33):
and part my husband.
Like that level of love is pretty scary.
And I know that level of love would also change my life positively because a lot of parents
out there, I don't know if any parents would be listening to this.
If you are, thanks for being here and entertaining my thoughts.
But I know that you like that love that you feel is just like, like you can't explain
(26:56):
it in words.
Number 13, if the child is a girl, she'll have to live in a world where she doesn't
have access to abortion if she should need or want it.
Yeah, I mean, hopefully those laws would change by the time she is old enough to possibly
need one, but that's a really scary one.
(27:19):
And related to that, I'm going to add another reason.
The overturning of Roe v. Wade is also something that gives me fear.
Like one of the reasons I had here was like anything can happen during pregnancy.
Oh no, it was something could go wrong during birth.
Okay, so then this is a totally separate reason.
Anything could go wrong during pregnancy and with Roe v. Wade being overturned, it feels
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really dangerous to be a pregnant person.
And yeah, it just feels like I wouldn't have rights.
I mean, I don't obviously have rights, but there are some rights that were taken away.
And I have had two abortions.
And one of the states I lived in for the first abortion I had, it's illegal to have an abortion.
(28:08):
And I cannot imagine if it was illegal at that time, I was so broke, I would not have
been able to get a plane ticket and go to a different state.
I mean, maybe I could.
I could have put it on a credit card or something.
But then when I get arrested, when I come back home, that's terrifying.
And then I would have a baby from a relationship that was just an abusive relationship.
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It was a bad situation, which is why it was easy for me to, I mean, it was easy and hard.
It was easy to make that decision and say no, but it was also a huge heartbreak.
It's not an easy decision to have an abortion.
I mean, the decision might be easy, but even if the decision is easy, it's not an easy
(28:53):
thing to go through for any woman, even if she's 100% sure that she wanted to terminate
that pregnancy.
So yeah, there's some, another like, diary entry moment.
14, reasons not to have kids.
The child of the girl shall have to work twice as hard for less pay.
(29:15):
Yeah, fuck the gender wage gap.
Number 15, if the child is a boy, he'll have to live in a world that tells him not to cry
or have feelings.
That is just, once I became an aunt to a nephew, I have a niece and a nephew, but the nephew
is younger.
(29:35):
Once I became an aunt to a nephew, once he started like walking and talking and this
mom would send me videos of him dancing.
I remember just like, look at that.
I remember just, I'm getting emotional.
I remember just like looking at the joy on his face and him just like dancing freely
(29:58):
and just having this realization like, holy fuck, the world could stomp that out of him.
Like the world, this world is not easy to live in, whether you're a man, a woman, a
non-binary person, it's not an easy world to live in.
And I think because on my show, like we talk about like womanhood and we talk about womanhood
(30:22):
a lot and I bring up some feminist topics like abortion.
I think in the feminist space, it can be hard to realize that it's also hard to be a man
or a non-binary person.
Like it's not just hard to be a woman.
Like yes, the patriarchy is real, but the patriarchy does not just harm women.
(30:43):
It's harming everybody.
And that's a whole different topic to get into.
Oh my, my hair, my hair is really wild right now.
Number 16, reasons to not have kids.
If the child is a boy, he'll have to live in a world where people use online dating
apps and it's harder for boys to match with people there.
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Recent studies have shown since the introduction of Tinder, there's been a rise in men over
30 not having sex in three years or more.
Another example of how it's also hard to be a man.
Okay, another one that's related to gender.
If they are non-binary or gay or part of the LGBTQIA plus community, I would still love
(31:28):
them, but I would be so afraid for them existing in the world because the world is not kind
to the LGBTQIA plus community.
That just like I have goosebumps in my body.
Like it's just wild to me that we can't just be safe being who we are.
I mean, we can, we, I think, I think the journey is learning to feel so safe in yourself and
(31:53):
so secure in yourself that you take that energy out into the world and you don't allow bullies
to take that away from you.
However, it is very real that in some parts of the US and in other countries, it's even
worse.
It's legit dangerous to exist for some people.
Violence will just be thrusted upon them.
(32:17):
And that is just awful.
I wish more people in general would remember that like every human being out there, most
once a baby, every human being has a parent or parents and like we all have, like, I don't
even know how to put it words that I'm trying to say, but I just wish people realized how
(32:38):
beautiful human beings are instead of hating on each other all the time.
I only talked about this one already when I expanded on climate change, but it was climate
change will lead to food shortage and having to survive in that with just us would be hard,
but much harder and more heartbreaking if we also had a child to worry.
Okay, moving on to number 18.
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Reasons to not have kids.
I like this one.
Reasons not to have kids.
No drop offs or pickups from school every single day of the week.
No fucking thank you to that.
Like it is.
That sounds I mean, it's such a little thing that I'm sure gets routine.
(33:21):
I'm sure it's getting some like even I'm rolling my eyes at that.
Like girl, you could drop your kid off every day.
You go figure that out, but just as a child free person thing about that.
I'm like, you know, I don't want to do that.
Like for example, tomorrow I have nowhere to be.
I don't have any clients or any calls until one in the afternoon.
(33:44):
And so I don't need to set an alarm in the morning.
I can wake up when my body wants to wake up and I love that freedom and I have that freedom
because I don't have a child.
Reason number 19 to not have kids.
Summers are chaos because school is out.
Holy shit.
My friends that are moms, I don't hear from them all summer.
And if I do, they're just like they the energy they're giving off a chicken with its head
(34:08):
cut off.
I don't want that.
Doesn't sound fun.
I'm sure it's worth it.
But it's not for me.
Okay.
Number 20.
Number 20.
Related to the summer one.
Vacations are chaos because you have to schedule around your kids or maybe take them with you.
And I've heard from a lot of parents that a family vacation a lot of times isn't actually
(34:34):
really a vacation because you're parenting the whole time.
Number 21 of reasons not to have kids.
Mental capacity to develop yourself as a person or develop your career.
Yeah, learning is basically my hobby.
So that's why I came up with that one.
Less ability to be spontaneous or go on a road trip or take a flight somewhere new because
(34:56):
your kids are in school.
There's, you know, probably all these extra logistics you have to figure out.
Number 23 reasons not to have kids is when you travel to foreign places, you don't have
any worries about your child getting sick or kidnapped.
Can you tell I'm an anxious person?
(35:16):
These are the things I think about my child getting kidnapped.
Reason number 24 of why I don't want kids is.
Oh, this one.
I guess this comes with the territory, but I wrote it down.
So I'm going to share with you getting thrown up on shit on and peed on number 25, someone
saying mom, mom, mom.
(35:38):
I'm thinking of what's his name?
Sue Griffin.
Mama, mommy, mama.
So annoying.
Or a child saying dad, dad, dad all day long.
Like that would probably drive me nuts.
So how do you work from home if you have clients, if you're recording stuff, if someone screaming
(35:59):
in the background.
I mean, I'm sure you can get that under control, but that's one of the reasons I wrote.
Reason number 26 of why I don't want kids, having to entertain someone all hours of the
day from the time they wake up until bedtime.
Yeah, I've seen my brother go through that and it looks pretty exhausting.
He's done a really good job at that.
It's been really great to watch.
It's so cool to watch your youngest sibling when you are the oldest of the siblings.
(36:25):
Being a dad kind of like it breaks my brain a little bit.
Reason number 27 why I don't want kids.
It's already hard for us to stick to structure and routines.
That's a tough one for us.
And kids really strive in having routines.
I think the reason why we have a hard time with routines is because we both came from
(36:48):
families that didn't have routines.
Like we didn't have much stability and we had a lot of dysfunction in our households
of origin.
That's probably another reason to add there is our childhoods weren't super rosy.
And so being at this stage of life where it's, you know, mid thirties, you're just like,
hold on this peaceful place.
Like, why would I want to, why didn't you even finish reading that one?
(37:12):
Okay, it's already really hard for us to stick to structure and routines and kids really
strive in having routines.
I think it would be hard for us to implement that.
Even if we did, I worry I might hate and resent it.
We're not sharing reason number 28 today.
I think this is already enough of a diary entry that I want to keep that one to myself.
(37:33):
But reason number 29, it goes by way too fast.
And you're broke, fucking tired, and maybe even heartbroken at the end.
And it's all over and they've moved out and it's a thankless job.
That's like such a negative view on parenthood.
To be honest, I would be ready for it to be a thankless job.
I'm like, I'm ready to give you my all and to just have you hate me anyways, because
(37:57):
it's part of the territory.
Reason number 30 to not have kids.
Possibility of war and our child living through a collapsing society.
The possibility of war is very top of mind for my family because they all live in Germany
and Russia is like right there.
(38:19):
So yeah, that's why that one came up.
Reason number 31 to not have kids.
Climbing wildlife and natural landscapes that add to a child's exploration and health.
And having a child is so resource dependent and that's something that adds to the decline
(38:42):
in natural wildlife and landscapes.
And that only adds to it again because of how our society has been structured.
A lot of what we're doing now are like old ideas that we came up with a long time ago.
Before we had enough information about the earth as a living being and because our economies
(39:09):
are so dependent on the structures that we've built.
One of those structures being just the industry of oil and needing oil to get around.
Yeah, I feel like society needs a redesign but I understand why that redesign is not
(39:30):
realistic in my lifetime because that redesign would come with complete and total economic
collapse at least temporarily.
I think humans most violent invention is not a gun.
Our most violent invention is the automobile.
And I think the automobile is the most violent invention because it's putting shit out into
(39:56):
the air that every single living being breathes in, like not just humans.
It's violent because of roadkill that happens, car accidents.
And it's also violent because it completely changed the structure of having society and
being connected with all of your neighbors.
(40:18):
It really broke apart tight knit communities.
I know tight knit communities still exist in pockets of the country, but the invention
of the car has really separated us even more and made us more individualistic.
I really, really enjoy cities where cities like New York where it's easy to get around
(40:41):
without a car.
I feel like you have more of a sense of belonging to a community when you aren't in a box
trapped on the 405 going five miles an hour for an hour to work and back every single
day.
(41:01):
It's already so hard for our generation to exist.
For example, how out of reach it is to buy a home.
And so for our child, it would be way harder and it seems almost cruel, cruel, hopefully
that's coming out right.
Cruel, not cool, cruel.
It seems cruel to bring them into that kind of existence.
(41:22):
I don't know if I'm an anti-natalist, but I do.
Like there is a part of me that thinks it's a little unethical.
Not that I'm, you know, walking around being like, Hey, why are you having kids?
Just when I think about me having kids, I feel like it would be, it would just feel
unethical because of the world and all of these reasons that I'm listing out because
(41:49):
of that.
Reason number 33, to not have kids.
There is data that shows parents in the US are less happy than people who live in the
US and decide not to have children.
Reason number 34, to not have kids, if we ever wanted to move to a different country,
it would be a lot easier with the kid.
(42:09):
But I guess, I don't know, is that a Freudian?
If we ever wanted to move to a different country, it would be harder with a kid and we wouldn't
be ripping them away from their social support system.
If friends they've made, that one definitely comes from my own like childhood trauma.
I moved around a lot as a kid.
(42:30):
I was born out of the US and I moved to the US when I was three.
I don't really remember that.
But then from the time I was three until I was 11, we moved a lot.
I changed schools a lot that by the time when I was 11, we stayed in that same town when
I entered high school.
(42:52):
And by the time I was in high school, I would like fight with my parents and be like, we
are not moving.
You can't do this to me.
I cannot move.
You can't be the new girl while I'm in high school.
And because of that moving around, sometimes I think of friends that I had in elementary
school that I remember their face.
I remember their energy.
I have like memories of what we did together, but I don't necessarily remember their name.
(43:16):
Or if I do remember their name, I have no idea what their last name is.
And so we're not in touch anymore.
And sometimes I'm like, I have like this grief that's like, oh my God, my best friend from
like second grade.
I wonder how she's doing.
And I have no idea how to contact her.
Reason number 35 to not have kids.
If one of us gets any big work opportunities that ask us to up and move to another state
(43:39):
or country, it's so much more doable if we don't have children.
That again, kind of leads to the first one.
Like I wouldn't want to be uprooting my child's life.
And yeah, it's nice to have that freedom to be able to go anywhere for any opportunity.
Reason number 36.
I like this one because this is another, this like points to a, like a lot of, okay.
(44:06):
I like this one because it points to something that people will say sometimes when you say
that you don't want kids and they'll say, who's going to take care of you in the fold?
And so this reason is when we are old, there's no guarantee that our kid or kids would take
care of us for many reasons.
(44:28):
They could have other obligations.
They could be in a tough financial place.
They could live really far away.
They could even not have a great relationship with us.
And currently right now, I, my grandparents on my mother's side, well, I mean, all my
grandparents live in Germany, also living once.
I have three living grandparents.
They all live in Germany.
And one of them is currently in a home and he had a child with my grandmother, but she
(44:55):
lives here in the U S.
And so that, you know, that's another thing.
It's like, if you have a kid, there's no guarantee they'll take care of you when you're old.
A, it's not like, it's kind of messed up to expect that.
I mean, it's, it's nice to do that.
Like I would, I would want to help in any way that I can.
(45:17):
And when I was in Germany, I visited my grandfather every day in the nursing home.
I live in a different country.
It could be not accessible.
So there's many reasons why your children wouldn't take care of you when you're old.
As we age, I think we might be healthier because we're not losing sleep with kids.
We'd be having more sex.
(45:37):
We'd have less anxiety and stress by not having to provide for a child.
I know that for a lot of parents, your sex life gets put on holds for good reasons.
And yeah, that sounds really tough.
Number 38 reason to not have kids.
My husband travels for work a lot.
His job is also very difficult.
(45:59):
Like it takes a lot out of him, which means that if we were to have a child, the brunt
of the parenting work would fall on me.
Like I wouldn't, I wouldn't be a single mom, obviously, but it would at times feel that
way because I would be the parent that is physically present.
(46:21):
And I would be the parent that is physically present by myself.
Most of the time.
And then even when my husband would be home for a local job or if he has time off of work,
because his work is so hard, he might not have the energy to like really put his soul
into.
I mean, I feel like that's like underestimating my husband's potential because he wouldn't
(46:44):
be a fucking amazing dad, but it like, it sounds like it would be very, very hard logistically
with the job that he has.
Reason number 39 to not have kids is probably my top reason.
This is probably my top reason why I don't want kids.
And I'm just going to read it out to you.
This is again, another like diary entry reason.
(47:06):
I have a fear of experiencing a psychotic break or a snap or extreme mental health conditions
because of the weight of responsibility put on mothers.
And also that a mother is judged no matter what she does.
And also the mom guilt, the lack of sleep, all the things I put all the things in all
(47:28):
caps, all the things combined sounds like something that would be way too much to handle.
I'm a highly sensitive person if you can't, if you couldn't tell.
And what else did I write?
I think if we were living a life that was more community oriented, I wouldn't feel that
way.
But America isn't really a community friendly place unless you're part of a church is what
(47:52):
I wrote.
I don't fully believe that.
Because there is definitely like you can find your community at a yoga studio.
Like you can find, you can find community.
I think it's harder to find community now than it used to.
But anyways, the psychotic break or snap, like that is my biggest fear.
(48:15):
Because I'm highly sensitive, I have a history of depression, of anxiety, and I would be
doing the brunt of the work.
I would have lack of sleep.
I would, you know, my body would be exhausted from pregnancy, from birth, from all the things.
I feel like I would just nap and not recognize myself.
(48:38):
And what if I would be a horrible mom then?
Because I'm so depleted that I'm in the space of like, and I would not want a child to experience
that trauma.
But yeah, that's probably my biggest reason is that fear of that psychotic break.
(48:59):
I feel like I would be very prone to postpartum depression and like mental health issues from
the lack of sleep and all of the things.
Reason number 41, to not have kids.
Happiness will take a hit due to the anxiety, stress, financial aspects you experience when
you have kids.
I feel like we mentioned that before, but just in other words.
(49:22):
Reason number 42.
I like this one.
We are already a family.
I think part of the way our society is set up and like serve to us.
It's like you get married, and when you have kids, you have your own family.
And I think that's really fucked up because like I came from a family.
(49:43):
Do I not belong to that family anymore?
Do I not have a family now because I'm supposed to have a kid?
I think that's that.
I don't know if that's really what people mean when they say that, but that's something
that I think of.
So I wrote, we are already a family as a couple with cats.
Yeah, we're already a family as a couple with cats, parents, siblings, et cetera.
(50:09):
And having children is not a requirement for us to be a family.
We are enough as we are.
Reason number 43 to not have kids.
Oh, this one's funny.
We don't have to listen to row your boat or any other annoying kid songs when we drive
in the car, dot, dot, dot, ever.
That sounds nice.
My husband and I are really big into music.
(50:30):
And I would not want to listen to row your boat in the car.
I think now I understand why my parents didn't play kid songs.
I remember in the nineties being like six or seven and my parents would just like blast
Tupac in the car and I hated it.
Reason number 44, pelvic floor prolapse can happen and peeing a little bit every time
(50:56):
I sneeze could happen.
I know that's very common.
Reason number 45, having a period for an entire month after giving birth.
I didn't know that that happened until I was in my twenties and one of my friends had a
kid and she told me about that.
And I was like, mom, why didn't you tell me this?
This is another reason that is associated with overturning of Roe V Wade.
(51:19):
So reason number 46 to not have kids is the overturning of Roe V Wade and abortion makes
me angry.
And it feels powerful to protest against that Roe V Wade overturning by not using my uterus
to make children.
(51:40):
Like that makes me feel like an absolute powerful woman to be like, oh, you're taking my, you're
taking my rights away if I was a pregnant person.
Well then no.
Reason number 48 to not have kids.
There is such a push from conservative politicians to both have kids and then do absolutely nothing
(52:01):
to protect those kids or give them a high quality of life.
Period end of sentence.
Reason number 49 to not have kids, school shooters.
Reason number 50 to not have kids, public school is shit.
You could do private school, but realistically, I don't know if I could, I have no idea how
much private school is, but reason number 51.
(52:23):
Home schooling sounds exhausting.
I wrote that because the first one, public school is shit.
Like if I had a child, I would want to teach them school myself because I feel like there's
a lot in school that we are not taught that needs to be taught.
But then when I think of, I mean, I don't, I haven't looked into the specific logistics
(52:48):
of it, but it sounds like a lot.
Reason number 52 to not have kids.
Again in response to number 50 and 51 is hiring a private teacher is expensive and we probably
couldn't afford that.
Reason number 53 to not have kids.
Cilia will have less time and opportunity to work and make money, both because of the
(53:11):
mental load and time commitments of motherhood and the bias in the job markets against mothers
and against people who take a break from the work from the workforce.
I think that's really messed up that we are penalized for having gaps in our CV or gaps
in our resume.
I think that's still bullshit.
(53:31):
Number 54 to not have kids.
Even if Cilia worked, I don't know why I wrote this in third person.
Even if Cilia works still, care costs are expensive and could eat up her entire paycheck.
Reason number 55 to not have kids is ripping from vagina to asshole during birth.
Reason number 57 not have kids.
(53:53):
A possible major surgery during birth like a C-section if things aren't progressing
naturally.
Now that again goes to the thing of like you never know what's going to happen during pregnancy
or during birth.
Reason number 57 to not have kids.
High medical costs of birth and having debt to pay off because of that for years.
Yeah, I can't believe how expensive birth is even when you have insurance.
(54:17):
That is insane in America.
Please send help whenever we are.
Reason number 59 to not have kids.
I think I might have skipped one, but 59 is no privacy.
I will just forgo the numbers because I think I skipped a couple.
Another reason not have kids when you're working on a project and you have a kid, you'll most
likely be interrupted 50 times.
(54:38):
Reason 60.
We'll go back to the numbers, number 60 to not have kids.
We don't have to worry about living in a neighborhood with a good school, which usually are the
more expensive places to live.
Reason number 61 to not have kids.
All the places in the world that we could travel to and explore because we're not obligated
to the parent life and because we have that extra disposable income to be able to travel
(55:02):
more often.
Reason number 62 to not have kids.
This reason of not knowing what could happen during pregnancy and childbirth I'm realizing
is a reason that comes up a lot.
I'm just saying it in a bunch of different ways.
This one is dying during childbirth can totally happen and there's no way of controlling
(55:25):
that.
Then I put in parentheses that 808 women die daily.
I'm guessing that's the US statistic, but don't quote me on that.
I really wish I would have put some sources in here about the couple of research things
that I listed in my list so that I can tell you, but do your own research.
Reason number 63 to not have kids.
(55:46):
We both didn't have good examples of parents, so would we even know what the fuck we're
doing?
Nobody knows what the fuck they're doing and that's part of it.
Nobody has it figured out anyways.
So that isn't a reason that's really fully alive in me anymore.
Number 64 I don't want to share.
I don't want that recorded.
Reason number 65 to not have kids.
(56:08):
Okay, I don't want that one recorded either.
Reason number 66 to not have kids.
We can do a fire plan for financial independence, retire early.
You could probably do that with kids.
I know someone who's doing that who's about to have a baby.
Reason number 67, I think having kids brings forth a lot of quote unquote extroverted activities,
(56:29):
which sounds exhausting.
It kind of does sound fun too.
Like when I think of being a mom and like making friends because they are the mom of
my kids' friends.
It sounds kind of fun, but it also sounds like, what if I don't like her, but my kid
(56:50):
really likes their kid and I have to hang out with her?
Like that would suck.
I'd feel really bad about that.
Okay, those were all the reasons on my printout sheet of why, like reasons I came up with
why to not have kids.
And now I have 13 reasons to share with you that I came up with to have kids.
(57:12):
So these are reasons why I might consider having a child.
Number one, experiencing that unexplainable love that everyone talks about.
Number two, watching Ashton be a dad.
That's my house.
Number three, watching Ashton.
I already, I'm reading this, I won.
(57:32):
Number three is being witnessed being a mom by my husband.
Number four, I love this one.
I think this one might be my favorite.
Witnessing a little bean grow up and explore the world, learn things and become an adult.
I think this one's my favorite too.
Reason number five that I might consider having kids, getting to see the world through a child's
(57:53):
eyes.
Honestly though, when I think of the comparison of all the reasons why I would not have kids,
even though these reasons to have kids are great, I don't know if it's worth it because
the number one thing, if I would narrow down the two reasons why I'm not, why I'm like
(58:16):
really like, oh, I don't want to have kids.
It's that psychotic break, the fear of having a psychotic break and the feeling a little
bit unethical to bring a child into this insane world.
Okay, reason number six that I might consider having kids is going to events that are family
friendly and maybe having fun doing something that we wouldn't be interested in if we didn't
(58:41):
have a child and those family memories we would have.
That one sounds really nice because like I said before, I really do enjoy the family
unit dynamic.
I came from a household of multiple children.
I have three siblings.
I grew up with two of them here in the US and one of them is overseas.
(59:02):
We always like every Sunday it was family day, like we weren't allowed to hang out with
friends because we had family time and we would go for bike rides, go to the movies
and do stuff.
And at the time, at some times I thought it was annoying, but now I look back at those
times fondly and just having that kind of tradition sounds really nice.
(59:28):
Although you can do that just with your partner.
If you have a partner, I could just do traditions with my husband, but it also sounds fun to
have that whole unit and be more a part of that family unit life.
And if my brother didn't live in Florida, which is basically like my husband describes
(59:50):
it as, I can say this because I've already dropped a couple of curse words, so this is
going to be marked as explicit, but my husband describes South Florida as Satan's hot asshole
and the environment is not comfortable living there and the politics.
Otherwise I would live there because then I'd be near my brother who has two kids.
See let's continue.
Reasons why I might consider having kids or reasons to have kids.
(01:00:15):
I didn't really title, it's not title, it's just listed out.
Making friends with other parents.
Number eight, the spiritual slash personal growth from what a taxing job it is.
Number nine, maybe it will feel like something that brings us closer together, us being my
husband and I and deepens our relationship and love, dot, dot, dot, but also the opposite
(01:00:36):
could happen.
Number 10, having someone you need to provide a good life for and who's looking up to you
could be a great motivation to be better.
I said in parentheses I put, but maybe a dog can do this for you too.
Oh, I'm thinking of the dog that we got when I was 15.
Troy Mickey, rest in peace.
(01:00:58):
That dog saved my life.
Reason number 11 to have kids, the memories and the silliness.
Reason number 12, I wrote, this is exactly what I wrote.
I wrote not a good reason, but tax benefits, LOL.
Reason number 13, if we are not living in the US, for example, if we live in Germany,
the government provides a lot of support for pregnancy, postpartum and childcare.
(01:01:23):
And then this one I didn't write down, but I will add a 14th reason of why I would want
to have kids.
It's a selfish reason.
As someone who is a deeply spiritual person, I feel like the spiritual, primal experience
of going through birth would be so amazing.
(01:01:49):
Going through an unmedicated birth.
I mean, granted that nothing, everything goes well and nothing bad happens, but going through
that and really just surrendering to your body and trusting your body, that trusting
that your body knows what she's doing sounds just like a huge portal to go through.
Yeah, so that is my unfiltered, I mean, a little filtered because there are a couple
(01:02:14):
of reasons that I did not want recorded and didn't want to share, but we got very vulnerable
in this episode and I like my intention with putting this out there is to help you feel
seen if you are also someone that is grappling with this decision with this blah blah blah
can't talk.
(01:02:34):
Okay.
My intention is to help you feel seen if you are someone who's also grappling with this
decision of should I have kids, should I not have kids?
And if you feel that it's possible, I would invite you to do what I am doing and that
is I am taking a complete year off of watching any more content that are videos like this
(01:02:58):
where it's like, should I have a kid, should I not?
These are my reasons.
This is like, I'm not watching any more of that content.
I'm taking a complete break from listening to the podcast episodes, all the stuff out
there about whether or not to have kids or the child free lifestyle.
I'm taking a complete break for this entire year as of the time of this recording.
(01:03:23):
It is January, but this episode is probably coming out in the summer.
So if you are listening in the summer, maybe you can take the rest of this year off of
trying to make this decision.
If you feel that that time is on your side.
There's a really good argument that one of my friends was also grappling with this decision
(01:03:45):
who is 40.
That she came up with was like, if adoption is something you want to consider, it can
be kind of helpful to realize that adoption kind of gives you more time because then you're
not having to deal with your fertility window closing out.
(01:04:10):
I also do want to share that I know people who have had kids after the age of 40 and
have had totally healthy and totally fine pregnancies.
I know someone who had a child at 43 last year.
I know someone who the year before had a child at, I think she was 45.
And yeah, their babies are healthy and thriving.
(01:04:33):
So we have time.
It can probably be for me when I think about having a child after the age of 40 or even
at 40, it sounds very exhausting for me.
However, I am only 35 and I'm taking this entire year off.
And when I am 36, I will probably open this episode and listen to it or I don't know what
(01:05:00):
I'll do.
I'll do something to revisit this decision.
But for now, it feels good to release this and just let this out and to just leave it
up here for whoever wants to engage with it and listen to it.
If that is you, thank you so much for being here.
I really do appreciate it.
(01:05:20):
It's not lost on me that there's so much other content you could be listening to or watching.
And yeah, I hope that you come back to the show.
Being child free or choosing whether or not to have a kid is not a regular topic.
We usually talk about sexuality, self-love, relationships, healing and thriving after
a heartbreak.
(01:05:41):
Those are like the topics that we usually lean in more.
So if this is your first time listening or watching, subscribe, follow and come back
next week for more or go and look at the other episodes we've had.
We've talked to over hundreds of women.
We did not start posting this show onto YouTube until 2023, but this show started in 2021.
(01:06:05):
And yeah, I feel like I'm rambling at this point.
So I am signing off.
Thank you so much.
I'll see you next time.
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