Having Kids Makes You Happy

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  • Posted By: camaro98541 @ 06/30/2008 1:26:52 PM

    I am a father of 7.And i got full cousity of 5 from 2 diferent mothers. When am i going to get child support ?? the mothers are shacked up with guys and refusing to work. If it was me ( a man ) i would be in jail for not paying . Wemen fought for Equal rights Ok thats fine but when are Us men going to get the same in return ??? I just got remarried ( to my babysitter ) and we got a new born baby girl. It was hard to find a date when your a male with 5 little kids ages-13,10,8,6,5. BUT men dont have a problum with wemen with 5 kids. WHY IS THAT ! Kids make me happyer then anything. They depend on me and I feel Needed.. Thats the most happyest feeling a person can want in life... TIM ( nadaclu4u@hotmail.com

    • Posted By: fuzzys @ 07/01/2008 11:05:42 AM

      Good lord, wrap that thing up! You've got 7 kids and you're still making more? AND you're practically illiterate? Jeez... that just proves the point made in the movie Idiocracy.

    • Posted By: wichart @ 06/30/2008 4:23:56 PM

      Camaro, you are a prime example of someone who should not be allowed to have children. Please, get a vasectomy. There's no reason to ever generate more children than it will take to replace yourself and your partner. BTW, I think you're wrong about the dating scene. I think it would be much more difficult for a woman with 5 children to find a date than for a man with 5 children, because single mothers are pariahs on the dating scene.

      Feeling "needed" is not a good reason to have children, nor is it something you should base your happiness on. I'd much rather be "wanted", myself. You could satisfy your need for felling "needed" in a much better way by just getting a dog.

      NOBODY, man or woman, should ever have to rely on child support to raise their children. If you can't afford to take care of the kids without your partner's help, then don't have any.

  • Posted By: Lysistrata @ 07/01/2008 9:29:42 AM

    The ecological damage wrought by our species cannot be overstated. Before you breed (adoption is wonderful...not trying to discourage that) PLEASE check out this website...it is NOT a joke. The groups is the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement: http://www.vhemt.org/

    • Posted By: katjones37 @ 07/01/2008 11:01:20 AM

      This is a silly idea. While we most definitely need to improve our ecological practices, voluntarily sending ourselves into extinction is the most radical loony notion I've seen in a long time.

      Further, could the childless contingent please cease and desist from calling having children "breeding"?? "Breeding" -- in agricultural terms -- is the initial fertization process, and implies that the parents involved have no choice in having the child. (Yeah, we just bred our mare to Johnson's stud) "Having children" is the more accurate term. Thanks.

  • Posted By: Manee1 @ 06/30/2008 3:58:14 PM

    "I might stress more than the average woman my age, but I'll bet I the joy and satisfaction that I do experience surpasses that of any childless adult."

    Why do people think that THEIR experience trumps anyone else's? How can you know that YOUR joy and satisfaction doing one thing TRUMPS someone else's experience? It's so incredibly odd, this one-upping. "I'm more fullfilled than you!" Well, who knows if you are or not, but as long as I'm happy and fullfilled being childfree, it doesn't matter, does it? Why do so many parents need to feel superior by stating they are happier and trivializing others? It's very sad, this need for superiority. Be happy and let others be happy their way. Being a parent doesn't make you better than someone who made a different choice.

    • Posted By: Igloo0609 @ 06/30/2008 5:17:20 PM

      So true, totally agree with you. One can be extremely happy either way, w/ kids or w/o kids. I respect people w/ kids and would like to be respected for deciding not to have kids.

      • Posted By: fuzzys @ 07/01/2008 10:45:21 AM

        The people that make those statements (I'm happier and mor e fulfilled than you!) are probably just trying to compensate for unhappy they really are. If they keep telling themselves and others how wonderful their life is, they think maybe eventually it will come true.

  • Posted By: Lysistrata @ 07/01/2008 9:29:18 AM

    The ecological damage wrought by our species cannot be overstated. Before you breed (adoption is wonderful...not trying to discourage that) PLEASE check out this website...it is NOT a joke. The groups is the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement: http://www.vhemt.org/

  • Posted By: Ocvoice @ 06/30/2008 4:51:55 PM

    having children is the most unselfish contribution you can make to society. whether your happy or not doing it is a topic only relevant to the self-centered. this is not a slap on the childless couple. in fact, this is an example of natural selection. the self-centered segment of society usually makes for horrible parents anyway, and we would rather you not have children.

    • Posted By: summer4077 @ 07/01/2008 8:12:36 AM

      Lol, ok, your comment makes no sense. If that's true, then all the people on welfare are SO much better than us! Natural selection? Why is it that those who can't take care of kids (crack addicts, welfare recipients, child abusers) seem to have 4 or 5 kids when normal, intelligent, caring people have 1-3? Natural selection, indeed.

    • Posted By: desertgirl @ 07/01/2008 2:42:48 AM

      So Mother Teresa never made an unselfish contribution to society?

      How about the Dalai Lama?

    • Posted By: fuzzys @ 06/30/2008 5:34:01 PM

      Comment: Or, in light of overpopulation, it could be looked at as the most selfish contribution. I would tend to look at adoption as far less selfish than bringing yet another child into this world of dwindling resources. As far childless couples being bad parents, well that may be true, in which case isn't it for the best that they not have children? On the other hand you cannot know that - many people who choose not to have children are wonderful with their neices and nephews, students, etc. And look at the many millions of bad parents who DO have children. The main issue I have with the whole thing is that so few people really think about having kids before they do it. They just follow whatever hormonal "need" or societal expectation that they perceive. Some regret it, some don't. I just wish everyone would THINK about it first.

  • Posted By: sadie7730 @ 06/30/2008 4:54:21 PM

    I am facing a full hysterectomy in September, after never having a child. I always did things in the order they were supposed to be done. Graduated high School, College, established a great career, dated and engaged, finally married at 33, and wouldn???t you know it I missed my fertility window. What kills me the most is that: what I wanted more than anything in the world was to be a mother. I did everything that I did, so that a child would and could be well taken care of, and not be a surprise. The real killer is that my best friend got pregnant in High School, and oh how I pitied her. I thought all of her dreams were over. They just went on pause, after having 4 children; she returned to college and now, is just as successful as myself, if not more so! And with 4 beautiful kids!!! Oh well, I guess you have to play with what your dealt, right? At least that is what I am telling myself until I get to heaven and can ask God "What the Hell, didn???t I always do right by everyone?" "Why Me?"

    • Posted By: desertgirl @ 07/01/2008 2:41:05 AM

      Why can you not adopt a child? There are literally millions who need and deserve loving homes and parents.

      • Posted By: summer4077 @ 07/01/2008 8:11:13 AM

        Exactly. You're looking at it the wrong way. You may not be able to have biological children, but maybe the reason for that is because you're needed in a child's life that otherwise would have a terrible existence. Adopting a child is one of the most noble acts a person can do, and there are many resources available for financial assistance to do so if you need it. While I haven't personally adopted a child, I know a few who have, and they can assure you that the love you have for an adopted child is no different than what you'd feel for a biological one.

  • Posted By: BrotherLou @ 06/30/2008 5:15:07 PM

    Given time American society may find its way, but right now there's something wrong with our attitude towards children in general. How can you NOT be able to control a small child? Something is hampering the emotional maturity of too many of our PARENTS, not the children, except by contagion. How can more than one sick individual condone the handcuffing of a five year old? Why would a child be arrested for slapping a playmate on the butt? Whatever happened to detention? Why would a ten year old boy be tried in court for something he drew to amuse himself? Why would a five year old boy be written up for sexual harrassment for kissing a playmate? Why are so many female teachers seducing their underage charges? These are not evidence of perverted children, but of perverted ADULTS, and I use the word perverted not as a term of abuse, but as a diagnosis. With that in mind, the thrust, or followup, of this research, to make it meaningful, should be: "What is perverting the attitude of American adults away from the optimal or even traditional norms?"

    • Posted By: summer4077 @ 07/01/2008 7:59:39 AM

      Moreover, parents can't even discipline their kids anymore. If you spank your child, you're an abuser. Obviously there's a difference between a swat and beating your children, but the ones who beat are going to do so regardless of a law in place. I was spanked as a child and have turned into an accomplished, grounded adult with great love and respect for my parents.
      Parents also need to be held accountable for the actions of their kids. Your 14 year old hoodlum is part of a drive by and kills someone? You need to be tried for the crime, too. And the whole "children's rights" to not be tried as adults is complete nonsense, too. A 15 year old pulling a trigger or beating someone should be treated exactly as a 25 year old doing the same.

    • Posted By: fuzzys @ 06/30/2008 5:35:47 PM

      Enter Your CommentBut who decides what is an "optimal norm"?

  • Posted By: Iron Felixia @ 06/30/2008 5:56:18 PM

    What century are we in? An OBLIGATION to society, you say? Do you still think a woman is complete only when she is married with children?
    I can see the agenda behind this article. The opening paragraph about the Sloans is extremely condescending and mean. I can read through the lines here to your ???family values??? agenda.
    I have seen enough results of overpopulation: overcrowding, food shortages, environmental pollution and damage that can NEVER be reversed as long as people keep on spitting out babies.
    I actually think China???s ???One Child??? policy is very sensible considering it has a population of over 1 billion people. Overpopulation usually contributes to ripe conditions for war (which could be seen as population control, sadly).
    I know that war keeps the economy ???booming??? and breeding creates the army of the future.
    What kind of progress have we made as women? What happened to the ERA/equal rights movement?
    Oh, yeah - a new generation of girls is coming up with cable TV programs glamorizing weddings and promoting breeding, and glamorizing multiples.
    I am not against children per se. I think that people should have children because they love them, not because they feel a sense of entitlement or feel OBLIGATED to do so.
    I come from a broken home and didn???t feel compelled to breed when I could not find adequate husband material, let alone ???daddy??? material. I come from a very strict, authoritarian family in which I was brought into a home of violence and chaos.
    There are many people not qualified to have children, and I actually think a test and ???license to breed??? is a good idea.
    Sure, I might sound like one of those hated ???liberal??? progressives, and I can see the Man Behind the Curtain.
    And if you don???t like my attitude, THANK MY PARENTS for it!

    • Posted By: wichart @ 06/30/2008 9:06:32 PM

      The only problem with a "license to breed" is that we have to rely on the government to run it properly. My thought was that we just give all the boys vasectomies before they reach puberty. It's reversible 70% of the time, and the other 30% could have sperm withdrawn directly from the testes for in vitro fertilization. The net effect is that only couples who REALLY want to have kids will get pregnant. It also eliminates the abortion issue.

      • Posted By: summer4077 @ 07/01/2008 7:56:39 AM

        Why not use a more effective way? Men can be given hormones to chemically castrate them. Depo-provera (the shot) is one that is highly effective--it's given to the worst sex offenders. Of course, getting everyone to comply would be an issue. Anyway, I think we should stop the welfare payouts, or limit the number of children. As it is now, it's an incentive to have more children because the benefits are greater from the government. I think we need to put a limit on how many kids will be covered--no more than 2, and if you have more kids than that, too bad. Make do with the same amount of money and food. Plus, we should encourage people to WORK. One of my co-workers left an abusive husband; she has 2 boys. The ONLY thing she has ever asked for from the government is childcare assistance so she can work. Yet, at $34,000 year for a family of 3, she makes too much. She is now paying $1084/month in child care. The system is set up to encourage people to stay jobless and feed off of the system.

    • Posted By: fuzzys @ 06/30/2008 6:59:36 PM

      I agree with some of your points but lighten up on the ??'s please!

  • Posted By: Tan Boon Tee @ 07/01/2008 4:34:00 AM

    Do not equate children to happiness too soon, nor should one jump into conclusion too fast in likening them to a bundle of joy.

    Happiness and joy are relativistic, and they can mean different things at dissimilar levels to heterogeneous people. As parents, few would want to tell others that their children distress them. Nonetheless, to every ecstasy there is always an agony. To many parents, kids can always be a source of joy at one moment and sadness at another. It often depends on how the parents carry themselves under myriad circumstances as well as how the children behave themselves in everyday life ??? there just isn???t any hard and fast rule.

    Perhaps I know what I am talking, having brought up 7 children into adulthood in 4 decades.

    Do not equate children to happiness too soon, nor should one jump into conclusion too fast in likening them to a bundle of joy.

    Happiness and joy are relativistic, and they can mean different things at dissimilar levels to heterogeneous people. As parents, few would want to tell others that their children distress them. Nonetheless, to every ecstasy there is always an agony. To many parents, kids can always be a source of joy at one moment and sadness at another. It often depends on how the parents carry themselves under myriad circumstances as well as how the children behave themselves in everyday life ??? there just isn???t any hard and fast rule.

    Perhaps I know what I am talking, having brought up 7 children into adulthood in 4 decades.

    Do not equate children to happiness too soon, nor should one jump into conclusion too fast in likening them to a bundle of joy.

    Happiness and joy are relativistic, and they can mean different things at dissimilar levels to heterogeneous people. As parents, few would want to tell others that their children distress them. Nonetheless, to every ecstasy there is always an agony. To many parents, kids can always be a source of joy at one moment and sadness at another. It often depends on how the parents carry themselves under myriad circumstances as well as how the children behave themselves in everyday life ??? there just isn???t any hard and fast rule.

    Perhaps I know what I am talking, having brought up 7 children into adulthood in 4 decades.






  • Posted By: sunshine12345678@hotmail.com @ 06/30/2008 12:50:50 PM

    I'm sorry but I believe it is human nature to be happy with offspring... scientifically this means that your lineage goes on... that there is someone to care for you.... that humanity is continuing... it is counterintuitive to believe otherwise. Besides any scientific facts I as a mother have the most wonderful and happy feelings I have ever felt bringing children into this world. I have absolutely NEVER been as happy in my life. But how can you know complete happiness without the opposite- stress, saddness, anger? Therefore, I have all of these emotions probably in great quantities. But HAPPINESS has been by far the greatest since I have had children!

    • Posted By: desertgirl @ 07/01/2008 3:34:46 AM

      I am child free by choice, but I find your comment incredibly insensitive to infertile couples who WANT to have biological children and are unable to do so (Do you have any concept of the heartache they experience?). I also find it incredibly insensitive to those couple (infertile or not) who choose to adopt children. Are you suggesting couple in both instances cannot be happy without biological offspring?

  • Posted By: maine22 @ 06/30/2008 2:05:24 PM

    The Author Lorraine Ali Probably can not have children. Therefore would like to spend time writing an article pursuading others on the negative aspects of having children. This is too bad she focuses on the negative when we really need more happy people in the world to assist with the growth and development of our children.

    • Posted By: Nikki1018 @ 06/30/2008 3:27:28 PM

      Her article seems to be about a scale of happiness. I don't think she is saying that parents are unhappy in relation to those who are not parents. She is expalining simply that parents might be a little more happy than those who are not. But it is possible I misread, maybe she does just dislikes people with children.

      • Posted By: desertgirl @ 07/01/2008 3:19:13 AM

        Well if that's true, then she must dislike herself.

        Read more closely: She very obviously refers to her own child at the end.

  • Posted By: childfreeandlovingit @ 07/01/2008 12:08:56 AM

    My husband and dogs make me very happy! No stress nor worries, just unconditional love from all three of them.

  • Posted By: wyldhair @ 06/30/2008 10:50:11 PM

    My husband and I are members of the childless by choice genre, we made that decision 12 years ago and as we see many of our friends start a family, we are more and more sure that we made the right decision for us. I just wish more people were making a family decision instead of letting it happen to them. The study that I would be most interested in is the one that rates happiness of those that planned a family (or not) and those that did not.

  • Posted By: msred @ 06/30/2008 10:37:58 PM

    gnodab: Amen! Why would someone do something they don't want to, simply because others expect them to? Especially with such a huge decision as bearing and raising children. I'm glad I was self-aware enough to know I wasn't cut out to be a parent. Instead I'm an aunt to my niece, nephews and friends' kids.

  • Posted By: gnodab @ 06/30/2008 9:39:05 PM

    Why can't people just respect each others' choices about having children? I don't feel that my childfreedom is somehow impugned by others choosing to having children, and my choice not to have kids isn't an attempt to appear smarter or otherwise better than parents. Do people really need to be validated in their choices so much that this difference merits antipathy? And honestly, are you really happy if you have to defend your choices to Internet strangers?

  • Posted By: ppcgm @ 06/30/2008 9:11:28 PM

    there are enough people on this planet, stop the uncontrolled breeding !

  • Posted By: mojiwan @ 06/30/2008 8:57:30 PM

    Has anyone seen the movie "Idiocracy"? A silly movie to be sure...but some of the satire is based on the truth behind who is furthering this God forsaken species. I'm childless & ecstatic about it. I laugh in the face of those guys who are miserable with the confines of marriage & parenthood. Viva la intelligence!

  • Posted By: Lysistrata @ 06/30/2008 6:30:07 PM

    If you want kids, I urge you to adopt, not bring more people into the world. Humans are causing massive ecological damage around the world. Please read this excerpt from a United Nations report that came out a couple of years ago:
    ???Humans spur worst extinctions since dinosaurs??? By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent. ???Habitats ranging from coral reefs to tropical rainforests face mounting threats,??? the Secretariat of the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity said in the report. "In effect, we are currently responsible for the sixth major extinction event in the history of earth, and the greatest since the dinosaurs disappeared, 65 million years ago," said the 92-page Global Biodiversity Outlook 2 report??? ???A rising human population of 6.5 billion was
    undermining the environment for animals and plants via pollution, expanding cities, deforestation, introduction of "alien species" and global warming, it said. It estimated the current pace of extinctions was 1,000 times faster than historical rates, jeopardizing a global goal set at a 2002 U.N. summit in Johannesburg "to achieve, by 2010, a significant reduction in the current rate of biodiversity loss??????

  • Posted By: Gsquared @ 06/30/2008 1:13:39 PM

    If I were to judge childless couples by the responses here I would think they were all a bunch of ignorant, bitter and spiteful misanthropes.

    Luckily I know couples without children who aren't like that.

    • Posted By: Johnsonium @ 06/30/2008 3:39:49 PM

      People with children can often be narcissists themselves. They want a little copy of themselves to control like a puppet. If that weren't true, then why to couples who have trouble conceiving go to so much trouble to have a child with their own DNA? Why not adopt a child that has no parents? It's because having a kid is a narcissistic act. I have three and I admit that part of the motivation is to have a piece of you live on after you are dead. That's narcissistic. At least folks who choose not to have kids don't have this hang-up.

      • Posted By: Igloo0609 @ 06/30/2008 6:25:30 PM

        Well said, can't be more truthful. I prefer adoption since I do not see the need to propagate my genes.
        I get annoyed when friends of mine keep parading about how smart and unique their kids are. ...while I respect their love and admiration for their own offsptring, it appears that every kid or human being is unique, not more so than each other.

  • Posted By: Johnsonium @ 06/30/2008 2:09:01 PM

    I have three kids from 3 months to 11. I love them dearly. However, they are certainly a source of stress and anguish at times. I do think that without them, I'd have a more free and flexible life. However, they also bring a sense of purpose to my life. If I had stayed single without children, I might have ended my existence by now, it's hard to say. In the end, it might be a wash.

    • Posted By: Igloo0609 @ 06/30/2008 6:16:37 PM

      Self-worth and purpose of life can found in other places, not solely by bringing up kids. W/ child or childless, w/ spouse or w/o spouse will not lead me to terminate my existence.

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