Do You Regret Not Having Kids? Parents vs Childfree | Middle Ground

Summary

In Jubilee's thought-provoking discussion, "Do You Regret Not Having Kids? Parents vs. Childfree" from the Middle Ground series, various perspectives on parenthood and living a childfree life are examined. The conversation delves into the societal pressures, personal decisions, and the emotional and practical aspects that influence people's choices about having or not having children. Participants shared their personal journeys, highlighting the misconceptions and challenges faced by both parents and those who choose to remain childfree. The dialogue aims to shed light on the diverse reasons and experiences that shape individual choices concerning family and legacy.

Highlights

• Discussing the maturity associated with parenthood versus a childfree lifestyle. 🤔
• Addressing societal expectations and pressures regarding having children. 🏡
• Highlighting the happiness and personal fulfillment in choosing a childfree life. 🎉
• Parents and childfree individuals can both leave a lasting impact on the world. 🌎
• Reevaluating the traditional notion of legacy beyond just children. 📚

Key Takeaways

• Parenthood is often seen as a sign of maturity, but living childfree can also reflect self-awareness and responsibility. 🌟
• Societal and cultural pressures heavily impact individuals' decisions to have children or remain childfree. 🌍
• Choosing to be childfree can lead to happiness and fulfillment, challenging traditional family norms. 😄
• Both parents and childfree individuals can live meaningful and impactful lives, breaking stereotypes. 💪
• The concept of legacy is multi-dimensional, encompassing more than just biological offspring. 🧬

Overview

In this episode of Jubilee's Middle Ground series, participants engage in a dynamic conversation about the decision to have children or live a childfree life. The discussion highlights various viewpoints, emphasizing that maturity does not solely hinge on parenthood. Instead, it can stem from the self-awareness and selflessness involved in any significant life choice.

Societal and cultural norms play a significant role in influencing decisions around parenthood. Many participants shared experiences of societal pressures and expectations, illustrating how these factors can shape personal choices, whether leading to embrace or reject having children. The conversation reflects on how choosing to stay childfree does not equate to avoiding responsibility or maturity, but rather can signify a deliberate choice for personal fulfillment and happiness.

Throughout the discussion, the notion of leaving a legacy is reconsidered. Participants note that legacy extends beyond simply having children, reflecting on how impact can be made in various forms, such as through career achievements, personal development, and contributions to society. As the dialogue unfolds, it becomes clear that both parents and childfree individuals can lead rich, meaningful lives, each with their unique form of legacy.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 00:30: Introduction This chapter introduces the complexities involved in parenting, particularly within the context of marriage. It highlights that traditional frameworks, such as being married, are often seen as ideal for having children. However, these frameworks are only effective when genuinely adhered to by all parties involved. The chapter underscores that parenting is a true test of maturity and responsibility, suggesting that the challenges of raising children require a deep commitment to these values.
• 00:30 - 07:00: Maturity and Responsibility in Parenting The chapter discusses the concept of maturity, emphasizing that it is fundamentally about selflessness and thinking about others before oneself. It suggests that one of the key ways to demonstrate maturity and responsibility is through parenting, specifically by bringing a child into the world and prioritizing the child's needs over one's own.
• 07:00 - 13:30: Challenges and Perspectives on Parenting The chapter explores the concept of maturity in parenting, emphasizing that maturity involves caring for others. It reflects on the incredible learning experience that having children provides. The discussion presents personal anecdotes, noting one individual's experience of having three grown children who are also described as best friends. Another personal account mentions having eight children, highlighting the unique dynamics and lessons learned from parenting multiple children. The chapter closes by stressing the invaluable teachings and perspectives gained through the journey of raising children.
• 13:30 - 20:00: Childfree Perspectives The chapter 'Childfree Perspectives' examines the motivations and personal growth associated with having or not having children. It presents a narrative of a couple who have been married for 15 years and have had eight children, emphasizing the extensive opportunities for personal growth through caring for others. A contrasting viewpoint is introduced by a disagreer who steps forward to discuss the responsibilities and long-term consequences of bringing children into the world without forethought. This highlights differing perspectives on the commitments involved in raising children and the personal versus societal implications of being childfree versus raising a large family.
• 20:00 - 30:00: Impact of Religion and Society on Parenting Choices The chapter discusses the societal and religious pressures on young individuals to become parents, often before they are mature enough or ready for the responsibility. It highlights that many young parents may have children either accidentally or due to external expectations rather than personal readiness. Examples include teenagers who express the desire to have children at a very young age, influenced by what society or family might deem appropriate.
• 30:00 - 41:00: Gender and Career Implications in Parenting The chapter explores the impact of societal norms on gender roles, particularly regarding the aspiration to have children. It highlights how societal expectations often assign caregiving roles to women from a young age, influencing their career choices and personal development. The discussion critiques the notion that having children equates to maturity, emphasizing that many individuals, regardless of age, might be ill-prepared for parenthood. The chapter calls for a deeper understanding of self before taking on parenting responsibilities.
• 41:00 - 51:00: Importance of Partnership in Parenting The chapter discusses the transformative experience of becoming a parent at a young age. The speaker recounts their initial unpreparedness and the sudden realization that parenthood requires a significant lifestyle shift, moving away from self-centeredness to being responsible for another life. The unexpected nature of the pregnancy is highlighted as a "sweet surprise," underscored by the recognition of a new phase of life requiring maturity and partnership in raising a child.
• 51:00 - 58:00: Legacy and Parenthood This chapter explores the themes of legacy and parenthood, with reflections from an older individual on the societal expectations of previous generations regarding marriage and having children. The individual speaks to the adjustments and happiness brought by parenthood, highlighting differences between past and current perceptions of family and life choices. It emphasizes how options regarding marriage and having children were limited in the past, unlike today.
• 58:00 - 60:00: Conclusion The speaker reflects on societal expectations around having children, sharing their personal experience of having their first child in their early 20s. They advise the next generation to wait until they are near 30 to have kids, as they believe that in their 20s, individuals may not be mature enough to ask the right questions regarding marriage and parenthood. Additionally, they acknowledge the harm caused by societal pressures to have children, noting that this sometimes leads to children being raised in poverty, similar to their own upbringing.

Do You Regret Not Having Kids? Parents vs Childfree | Middle Ground Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 the framework for having children with was married and that's gone the framework only works if everybody actually lives that and the truth is that's not [Music] true parenting is the ultimate sign of maturity and responsibility
• 00:30 - 01:00 I hesitated to come forward on this one because uh the term ultimately kind of has a lot of power to it um I think there are other ways that people show maturity but when I think of what maturity is I think that maturity is fundamentally selflessness right the thinking about others before yourself and I do believe that one of the primary ways that a person can show concern for somebody else other than themsel is when they bring a child into the world you know and I totally agree with you um I
• 01:00 - 01:30 think ultimate is not the word we want but I think it is about maturity and I think part of maturity is caring for other people and one of the things about having kids that's so incredible is they have so much to teach us how many kids have you got I have three you have three kids and I assume H I have terrible thing to say are they all grown three grown kids my best friends I have I have eight kids my wife and I got
• 01:30 - 02:00 married 15 years ago we've had eight kids together um and there's certainly a lot of room uh for personal growth and and having a lot of children because there's a lot of opportunities to care for somebody else again like I said more than I'm concerned for myself can the disagreer please step forward if you bring children in the world just to bring children in the world and not think about the consequences that you have to take care of this human being for more than 18
• 02:00 - 02:30 years it's an entire lifetime and your entire lifetime the rest of your lifetime um so a lot of people just are not prepared for that they're just 21 year olds that don't know what they're doing but they're having kids just because Society or their family has told them that they should now do you think that is um primarily accidental children people who weren't planning on having it or do you think that's true of everybody I think there are some people that like the kids on the Mory show you see them they're like I'm 14 and I'm going to have a baby and it's like there's
• 02:30 - 03:00 they're being taught this because they're bought baby dolls and all this kinds of stuff so that's their aspiration is to have children instead of like you know becoming a human being understanding who you are and then you know having children after that just because you have children it doesn't mean you're necessarily mature I run into people all the time I'm 26 so I run into people in their 20s and their 30s and their 40s who literally should have never had children all all it takes is
• 03:00 - 03:30 for somebody to be born and depending on how they grow up um it's it's going to make make you or break you so how old were you when you had her and did you feel like what was that kind of turning point when you felt you were ready so I was 21 when I had her and she was a really sweet surprise but it was a surprise inone the least and I honestly at the time I wasn't ready to stop being selfish I was like oh my gosh like my my youth that's it like I'm have to do a 180 now because I'm going to raise a
• 03:30 - 04:00 young girl um and you know it was a lot to adjust to but at the end of the day nothing makes me happier than being a parent but you know I just want to chime in as someone who's older than most of the people here what's fascinating is my generation it kind of wasn't there just that there weren't that many options in terms of not having a kid so like a lot of times it happened by accident it was just a assumed you would get married and
• 04:00 - 04:30 then it was assumed you would have kids so I had my first one when I was like in my early 20s and now that I have grown kids my message to them was you need to wait till you're close to to 30 because when you're in your 20s you don't even know the questions to ask in terms of a marriage let alone having kids y I think there are a lot of people that have been damaged from people believing that they should just have children um and then they were born and sometimes born into poverty like I grew up with in poverty
• 04:30 - 05:00 um it wasn't fun like I'm not I'm not going to hold you it wasn't fun um a lot of things happened to me as a child that wasn't fun um I didn't have an easy life in order for me to break my own generational curses it was best if I waited and that was the most selfless thing I could possibly do even if I wanted children which I did yeah I agree and I think if we get back to the definition of maturity right because we can be mature if we're holding down a job if we're being finan finally
• 05:00 - 05:30 responsible if we're emotionally in intelligent if we're self-aware if we're kind to others there's a big list that we can fall under as being mature and I think that it gets a little complicated when people who don't have kids I am happily childree uh are said um to be irresponsible because it just doesn't fit and it doesn't make sense because if you take that theory someone who um decides you have a child who is not
• 05:30 - 06:00 ready for one who's not emotionally ready for it who's not financially ready who is just has no idea what they're getting themselves into then that's calling that person responsible versus someone let's say who's in their 30s has really thought this out has looked at all their options and has made the decision that this isn't for them so the theory of one being more mature than another doesn't make sense yeah I like what you said because I I truly feel
• 06:00 - 06:30 like being responsible um or being mature and having kids are two mutually exclusive aspects right like I think you can be mature on both sides right um but definitely if you take a step back for those who choose not to have kids because you know they've done that self-reflection and they realize they're not there and maybe they just simply don't want it I think that also takes a lot of maturity a lot of times like women are just looked at down if they don't have kids and I think it takes
• 06:30 - 07:00 maturity as a woman to be like okay maybe I don't need to um adhere to these societal pressures yeah absolutely and oftentimes as child-free people we're told that we lack responsibility where in fact this is can be quite the opposite because sometimes for example I have a mother with Alzheimer's that I care for so some of us care for our elderly parents uh perhaps there's a partner that needs care per we're taking care of niea and nephews we're taking
• 07:00 - 07:30 care of friends so there's actually so much responsibility in our lives already that we're choosing not to have kids because the plate is already full with tons of responsibility so the fact that people still think that there is a lack of responsibility just doesn't add up so you have both kind of this idea of waiting and this idea of people having kids too young and I think that both of those are dangerous generalities because just because a kid K is Young does not
• 07:30 - 08:00 mean that they're ready they're not ready to have a child you said you had your child it was a surprise but you do not feel like you were ill equipped you did not express that you were ill equipped me and my wife totally intentionally had our first child pretty quickly after being married at 22 right we were we were ready and I so I agree that a person needs to be ready but it's not like ready is 31 or ready is 43 oh no person can be ready at 21 absolutely and then the question is well what are you waiting for right if I'm waiting for
• 08:00 - 08:30 all of my ducks to be in a row so that I've got the right amount of money and I've got the right job and I've got my house in Beverly Hills and you're never going to be ready right it's never going to happen I think there's there's just to uh touch on what you just said I think that's a common Mis uh conception you know like this this idea that people are not having children or waiting to have children simply for financial reasons like in my case um I was
• 08:30 - 09:00 sexually assaulted as a child um I went through a lot of very traumatic experiences uh the death of my father as a child and um I think W me waiting to have children was literally so I don't pass that trauma on to a Next Generation and also like as a black woman I just didn't want to be a baby mama I don't want to be anyone's baby mama I don't want to be a baby mama I don't want to be a baby mama I don't want to be a baby mama so
• 09:00 - 09:30 and and and that's that's that's a stigma that that black women not exclusively go through but I feel like we are criticized heavily for it like single motherhood is not respected especially for black women you you painted this picture as if the child was something that you were going to do by yourself that was the expectation is right you have these people telling you just have your baby by yourself well I would say you would never have a baby by yourself and I don't mean that as a stigma against single moms but I think a
• 09:30 - 10:00 child is fundamentally a thing that two partners share together and so if I was waiting on anything I'd be waiting on that partnership whereby the two of us can support each other in this endeavor of having a child because a child is a massive responsibility for one person I think that we're misconstruing the word waiting with the word desire because for one and I'm speaking for myself I am not waiting to be ready and I was never waiting to be ready there was a lack of
• 10:00 - 10:30 Desire from day one so if there's a lack of Desire you're just sorting through your feelings about what this means for you I had no desire to be married and no desire to have children this is not some thing that I carried with myself ever since my childhood or I've been you know writing in dream books or whatever I I really had no interest in a relationship with anybody and then I met my wife and it was from my relationship with my wife whereby I I Desir to have a a long-term
• 10:30 - 11:00 committed relationship with her I desired to express that long-term committed relationship in an intimate way and from that we had children so you know my encouragement that I give to people that I'm talking to who you know don't have that desire is are great fantastic don't have that desire when the time comes and the person's there the desire will come too yeah I completely disagree with that that's not the case with a lot of people um I'm going to be 50 years old soon and I have
• 11:00 - 11:30 zero regrets and every year I am more and more grateful for my choice I spent 10 years trying to figure out if I wasn't going to have kids but in hindsight it wasn't that I didn't know it was that I knew but everybody around me was telling me that I was making the biggest mistake of my life that I was being selfish that I was a terrible person that I only cared about myself so it just became so confusing to me I agree with you I'm with you but I did
• 11:30 - 12:00 have a similar experience um I I've lived honey I lived a thousand lives um I I was I was a dominatrix when I was younger I was uh homeless I needed money and just got into domination when I say I lived I've lived um and then I found my person like I found my partner in life and I got married and then everything shifted a little bit for me
• 12:00 - 12:30 they brought something that I've never really felt before I met them which is like that unconditional love that um that grounding aspect of like walking through life with someone it was the first time I ever even considered could I be a mother as I've grown and dated a lot of guys and had a lot of relationships since that divorce I find that the most incredible unconditional love in my life is from my grown kids and their
• 12:30 - 13:00 Partners childfree people are on average happier I go on Tik Tok and all I see are like parents after parents after parents complaining about Parenthood like they are just like I'm overwhelmed like I I watched like this Tik Tok of this lady crying into the camera and she's like I'm overwhelmed like she was
• 13:00 - 13:30 sitting in her car and she was having a full-fledged meltdown like you know my husband doesn't help me I'm doing everything by myself I feel like a single parent even though I'm married um I don't go out I don't have a life anymore I don't get dled up and I'm just watching this lady's Tik Tok and I'm like well damn well why would I want to be where she is I I I'll go I'll go out dancing you know I don't have to worry about a babysitter right now I don't have to do anything that that those kind of videos and that kind of content like they're being honest and I appreciate it
• 13:30 - 14:00 I don't want to shut them down and those feelings are 1,000% valid but as as someone that doesn't have children yet that watches that kind of like content sometimes it scares the the life out of me to have a child yeah I would say that if I don't have children I have one less thing to be stressed about one less life I have to be concerned about I have two dogs that's enough children for me um and so I don't have to like and I have I worry I I watch them on a camera every single day I go out to the bar and I'm like looking at the camera the whole
• 14:00 - 14:30 time that's kind of stress that I've put on myself from having a dog I couldn't imagine how it would be for having a child yeah for me it's about controlling or minimizing that risk of the extra stress like you said um and also just the trials and tribulations that you go through as a parent I mean like I think we can all resonate to having hurt our parents before and it's like oh my gosh like if I if someone did that to me I don't know how would I I don't know how they would do it like I would like Freak the Freak Out you know I mean happiness can also equate to you
• 14:30 - 15:00 know not wanting to physically go through it too I mean as a woman it changes your body completely your your brain is different your ab split apart like your boobs are just they're different after you have a kid and some I think personally I don't think I would be happy with you know going through that physical change I think for me personally I think it took a long time for me to feel comfortable in my body and now I feel like I'm there and I just know that like if I had a kid like I
• 15:00 - 15:30 would I mean I would just be so much different and I don't know if I would be able to accept that personally this is the life that I like and I'm happy with what I have I'm concerned that young people are being made to believe that one choice or the other is going to provide them the happiness that they need so if I see on Tik Tok in reals if I see when I see childree people at the Yacht on vacation having the best time ever and although
• 15:30 - 16:00 that can be true and I have those moments I don't want that to be a representation of if you don't have kids that means you're going to have a happy life just like I feel that if you do have kids that's not a guarantee for Joy either we all have moments in parenting when we're like oh my god what have I gotten myself into and the question is always going to be balance right A lot of people are now going to Tik Tok and recording themselves in those moments Plastering it for the world to see and
• 16:00 - 16:30 it's kind of like right we're watching highlights of either extreme right the reality really lives in the middle you have to be able to understand and identify your personality trait and how you respond to things and I don't have patience for children I would be miserable I would be absolutely like jumping off a bridge or something if you're not going into it wanting it you're not going into it with somebody to support you right that's where it doesn't come well that's why I wonder how many people are coerced into having children and then they change my thought processes and then I have a child I
• 16:30 - 17:00 didn't want to have before if that's not a conversation you're having before you go into the relationship and had coming to some understanding between the two of you about where y'all are going to exercise that something's wrong what your side sees from our side they're like oh well they're so stressed with kids all day at home and it's it is really it is really overwhelming we talk about it all the time as parents so maybe from your side I feel like people see us like oh well life stops and now because they're so overwhelmed like they must be unhappy well that's what people
• 17:00 - 17:30 tell us though I I I think I think if we're going to sit if we're going to have an honest conversation that's literally like what especially young women that's what we're told you have to pick a career or you have to be a mother you have to pick a a life of having fun but then when you have children it's all over and you have to give all of that up and be at home with your children or or your bad mother and if your children become you know not the best people in society it's all your fault we're going to blame the woman for everything that goes wrong with this being that you made
• 17:30 - 18:00 it's a lot of pressure so you say that Society is telling women they have to pick do you think that's arbitrary or do you think that there is an institution that exists in society that understands that there's they're going to get something more they want you to be that powerful woman they want you to do this they want you to give up childhood or CH having children because because that's what's going to make the society or the corporations or whoever you want to call it more successful I actually think that it's a little bit different for me personally it was the conditioning that
• 18:00 - 18:30 women to find Joy needed to do it all and have it all and you're raised to believe that that's where the joy is right people say you can do it all now you have the ability to do it all right now we're Beyond uh the women's movement where you're given the opportunity to work to go to school to have an education all that but you still need to be a good mother and be a good partner and take care of your local community so to me I was conditioned to believe that
• 18:30 - 19:00 that's where their Joy was and having it all so I really needed to deconstruct that but the whole point of roles and framework is to Pro is to create this environment that is likely to succeed right and it's not likely to succeed if a woman is having kids and going to work and cleaning the house and taking out the G it's you're not you can't do it that's too much yeah but then the alternative that and this is the issue that I have the alternative that we are given is you should be that if you can't
• 19:00 - 19:30 do at all so then you should just pick being a mother you should just stay home and if you don't aspire to be a mother something is wrong with you but here's the deal you don't you don't have the choice because there aren't men anymore who have been raised to be responsible contributing members of the household one of the sad outcroppings of the feminist movement was the to stay at home and live with their parents for 6 years after high school a
• 19:30 - 20:00 lot of them are happy to let their wife go and work and and all because of feminism you you said women what's going to make you happy and successful is to have all of this stuff that men have let's get them out of the way and give it to you but what did the men pick up in that did did they pick up staying at home raising the kids cooking breakfast for you no they didn't I that messaging didn't come I don't I don't agree with you at all I I'm not tracking what you're talking
• 20:00 - 20:30 don't get it I I was a boomer I I blocked out I was a boomer and I raised two sons and what those Sons saw was how hard their mother worked and I know because I know them today they're like my wife or the women in my life are not going to work like that so these young men who are in their 40s or 50s are cooking and loving taking care of the kids and they're very different than their fathers were and they're not
• 20:30 - 21:00 expecting the woman to do everything they're saying in fact one of my sons Cooks more than his wife cooks he loves it but when you talk about the proportion of men that are driven to success Now versus 20 years ago I don't think it's the same I could be wrong but I don't think it's the same but I do think that men have abdicated their responsibility and one of the primary places they've done it is in fatherhood what I wanted to kind of circle back to the promptu and say was that I there's a solution for everything in life like I
• 21:00 - 21:30 think if you find yourself really unhappy in a situation whether it's by yourself or with your partner you then have to look Inward and be like okay hey I'm not happy here for whatever reason why am I unhappy okay now you figure out why you're unhappy now what can I do and that's kind of um the rut that I see a lot of parents in a lot of just or or people who don't have children in they're scared to change I feel like happiness is also a very fine line cuz I I've seen around just in my personal life and I mean it it really hurts
• 21:30 - 22:00 seeing it that sometimes people have kids because they think that it'll make them happy and I think that there's a lot of there's a lot of risk there and I think there's a lot of assumptions and I don't think that you should bring in life in hopes that it'll make you happy yeah and I think that's that's where the disconnect is or to save a marriage it throws me off when I hear people say I had a child because I wanted to be happy you're putting so much pressure on that
• 22:00 - 22:30 child to make you happy that they cannot even grow into who they are who who who they were actually meant to be can they go out into the world and live the life that they actually want to live or are they living just to please you religion forces people into Parenthood too early there are are certain cultural and
• 22:30 - 23:00 religious reasons that people have children I mean in the Bible it says go forth and procreate so that's their goal and I feel like people have passed that forward with every generation and I feel like that's part of why I think that people should just wait a little bit longer to have kids because um like I said before financially and then also in my 20s I didn't I didn't know what the hell I was doing I was very aggressive when I would argue with people I grew up in that kind of argumentative household where arguing was normal like being aggressive and screaming at people and
• 23:00 - 23:30 like throwing hands and stuff like that was very normal and I had to once I started living life with other people other adults I realized that that stuff isn't normal I had to like deescalate how I react to things and like my anger and my issues I've had to work through all of that and I I finally found as I've hit my 30s I'm like oh I'm calm I don't need to go out and party anymore like I'm financially secure I've done everything I need to do so I could have
• 23:30 - 24:00 children I just I don't think I'm ever going to have kids I get that question or that statement a lot about religion about this is what I was meant to do that I was put here by God to procreate now it would be silly if I'm going to argue with someone's faith and belief systems right that's a whole other show and a whole other conversation but I do personally know people in my life and I have friends who actually went through many many many years of IVF in their mid
• 24:00 - 24:30 or early 20s because they were expected to have children in their faith-based communities and everybody around them was having children and they had lots of health issues surgeries and 5 10 years later they come to realize oh this is not actually what I want to do this is what my community my faith-based community around me wants to do they've kind of set those standards and like not necessarily force it upon people but in
• 24:30 - 25:00 so many ways there's um a popular song by a country artist Casey Musgraves it's called Mary go around and she's like if you're not having kids by 21 you're pretty much going to die alone and that's that's pretty much the sentiment is like um people look down on people who don't have children they think that they're miserable and alone and cat ladies and Cat men and whatever um I think that's just regressive and outdated way to think sometimes I talk to people who are originating from faith-based beliefs and when I asked
• 25:00 - 25:30 them well how many child-free people are you friends with how many childree people in your immediate circle and the answer has always been none zero so I can understand if I'm surrounded by a group of people that are all having kids I've never met anyone who doesn't have kids I don't know what they're like I don't know what their lives are like so I can definitely understand how people can just assume um that potentially that's the wrong decision yeah
• 25:30 - 26:00 religion is a is a framework right and and for people who are religious it's it's a it's a framework around what we believe to be true so you made a You made a statement specific statement in there where you're like you know I can go pursue this outside of my religion and still be a good person well that kind of defeats the point of having the framework I mean if I believe what I believe I'm going to operate within that framework that being said I don't think frame works are bad right you're going to have a framework of some sort whether
• 26:00 - 26:30 it's a secularism you're going to create some set of rules and ideas by which you operate your life right and so people who have a religious affiliation build a religious framework and in those religious institutions for the most part if the religious institution values children and family they will typically have institutions and structures to support children and family like your use of the word framework because I
• 26:30 - 27:00 understand the idea of sticking to a framework and believing that framework but I have a different thought about it because I think that Frameworks can be either really be solid or they can be permeable and I think that we each have the choice of what that frame look looks like for us if you think about framework it's not about how things have to be it's about how things can be and then people get to choose now there are some religions where you don't get to choose
• 27:00 - 27:30 if you're part of that religion they tell you what to do and you do it and whether you call it a cult some religions are like a cult and you don't have a choice unless you leave hopefully today especially young people coming up have so many options to consider different ideas and then decide well I could be part of that religion but I may not accept everything that they want me to do I don't necessarily think that it's specific religions uh pushing children onto others but more so about who they're having children with so for
• 27:30 - 28:00 example like one of my best friends is she's Hindi and her parents like they're like if you don't bring a brown boy home like it's not happening you know or a lot of parents are like if he's not Christian if he's not Muslim like you can't be with him I am a gay person so it's very hard for me to even remain religious because you know all of the Judgment all of the hatred that I have experienced religion sometimes can be oppressive I wasn't able to question my identity and you know really find out who I was as a person because I had I'm
• 28:00 - 28:30 supposed to be with a woman I'm supposed to have children and and on that on that topic there are people out there that don't think I should have kids at all I would assume that um most religions wouldn't wouldn't not support having kids I think if anything they probably would encourage having kids so that um you know The Offspring can continue that religion and you know you can create a family unit that supports and like believes in the same things so um yeah I
• 28:30 - 29:00 I just felt like the word force was strong and I think it's really hard to generalize woman's career is more impacted than men's when they have kids I think motherhood is beautiful and I think that a lot of people don't recognize that it's basically having another full-time job probably more you know more than a full-time job on top of your full-time job so I think there's also a stigma against women who um have
• 29:00 - 29:30 kids I think sometimes they are looked down on maybe they don't seem as competent because their minds aren't as focused on their jobs um yeah I just I definitely do think that women are more impacted by men and I think there's a reason why so many men are in power and I don't think that's a coincidence at all women are just judged way more harshly than than men when we don't have children I I like I I especially like on a timeline like hello tick tick I'm not going to sacrifice my career to
• 29:30 - 30:00 be a human incubator for the government to populate this country and they're not even supporting me when I have the child I'm on my own there's a lot of times in motherhood and in my Parenthood where I do feel alone and you know thankfully I her dad is very much present in the picture we're together we've been together for gosh like 11 years now so he is there but there's times where I'm like oh my gosh babe you're working all day and I I want you home like I'm so overwhelmed with the baby I mean it also did put a strain on on a little bit of my relationship a little bit because for
• 30:00 - 30:30 me him going to work wasn't enough I was a stay-at-home mom for 3 years and I it's crazy cuz while I was pregnant I was going to school and getting my degree uh for surgical technology I remember when I started working I got this great first job out of uh school for a plastic surgeon and I was so happy but it interfered so much with my schedule and the people I have to take care of that I had to stop working well again as a single mom it's like you just have to be more creative than the single
• 30:30 - 31:00 dad does and that that is our society you know the gender base of our society the women have to be more creative like I had to find somebody and I did somebody who lived with us I was teaching at the time and I found this student and she missed her big family and and I said you know what you need a family and I need a grown-up so why don't you come and live with us this is before we called them nannies so this wonderful woman came and lived with me with my three kids and and it worked but the point is you can't it's just too hard to do it on your own you have to
• 31:00 - 31:30 find someone to help you and again if we had a society where paternity leave was expected but it's not because they just assume the society just assumes well no the women will take maternity leave a short one but the men don't need to well why not if there was more support on a societal level like I think more people actually would have children I think the reason a lot of people well some people don't have children is because they don't have enough support So we had a we
• 31:30 - 32:00 had a bad institution before women came into the workforce which is that success for a man was based off of essentially how far you were up the career ladder right if you were the CEO that meant you were better than the VP which meant you were better than the president God forbid you be a labor worker right that was kind of the attitude and when women came into the workforce y'all inherited that but the reality is that children are not a competing piece they're a different piece right they're a different things that adds fulfillment so I may be a person who gets my
• 32:00 - 32:30 fulfillment by being the CEO of a company and making millions of dollars a year or I may be a person who gets my fulfillment by having children and I don't need to be that way up on that high up on the career ladder so yeah I think it impacts women more because you don't have a choice you do have to go deliver a baby you do have to recover from that men we you know they can force us to come to work the next day we're not but but I think that's really the problem with this is the fact that career career success is defined by how high up the ladder you make it I
• 32:30 - 33:00 slightly disagree with that there are a lot of women of color in particular that have children and then they're back to work immediately um because they don't have a choice right and um I definitely want to highlight that because we're not all speaking from the same point of view and experiences um you know uh on a socioeconomic level women still make less than men in the workplace um um and so it's not always trying to climb the
• 33:00 - 33:30 ladder of you know the corporate ladder and just trying to be a CEO or trying to be a vice president and trying to outdo the next person some people just like work really really hard and still don't make enough I think Society is giving women the option of you can have one or the other and I think that's the real problem it's so interesting um my husband and I were like in the same we're in the same industry he's a rapper I'm a singer so we're in the music industry and when we go out or when I go to shows or events or or
• 33:30 - 34:00 anything and a lot of a lot of the time I don't share the fact that I have a child because it's like oh the people you know if I do share it they're like oh well where's your daughter but nobody's ever asking him that when he's outside performing on stage crowd surfing nobody's asking you that to to everybody else he's just this lit musician and he's doing the best but she's a singer but where is her daughter there's just all these assumptions that go out towards women that men don't have to to deal with so I think there is kind of like a like a ceiling there I
• 34:00 - 34:30 wouldn't want to have kids without a partner I'm from New York I'm from Harlem so I grew up like watching many single moms do it every single day uh no matter what the circumstance no matter how they got to it they did it and um I respect it so much uh you know you can't take anything away from my mama that she got all her kids together whether she's with someone or not um for me in my
• 34:30 - 35:00 experience I just you know I'm going to sit here and say that it just makes things so much harder well I would say for 18 years a kid is being raised and they're either being raised by you or they're being raised by somebody else but for 18 years the kid is being raised and when you have one person doing it by themsel they're going to give some amount of that time to somebody else to do it so if you've got two people then whether you're both working and you're doing shifts or you know you're kind of working it out there's more time that
• 35:00 - 35:30 you as the parents are spending developing that relationship with your kids and just from a you know financial and you know when me and my wife got married we were 22 years old she had just finished her college degree I hadn't finished mine yet and I went and got the first job I could which was I was a key carrier at Dollar General making $8.50 an hour we had our first kid renting an apartment that cost us $550 a month me making $8.50 an hour and she stayed at home we made it work but
• 35:30 - 36:00 we couldn't have made it work if I had to pay for daycare we couldn't have made it work and those are the kinds of things so I mean technically we had that kid in poverty right $8.50 an hour household income right but we made it work and over that time because there were two of us contributing this we had a much better chance for Success than somebody who's trying to do it on their own my mom was a single parent and we were left at a lot of different people's homes to baby it or to I don't know help help her out
• 36:00 - 36:30 essentially and someone took that opportunity to violate me in one of the worst ways possible if I had to become a parent because of that experience I would want to always be the one with my children and that's a personal decision I don't judge anyone else that chooses differently but um because of that set of experiences that I had um I would want to be with my children and I cannot do that without
• 36:30 - 37:00 someone else in the home my mom was a single parent I saw her struggle through everything I mean things that like I you know my cousins who had both of their parents didn't really struggle with and uh the difference in our households were so obvious I really believe it's a luxury to have both of your parents like I'll give an example my daughter was scared to go down the slide for maybe like the first two years of her life I'm like oh my God like why aren't you going down the slide girl it's just a slide come on her dad comes one one random day
• 37:00 - 37:30 takes her to the park boom now she can't stop going down the slide but in my brain I'm like this is crazy like I've been trying to nurture you you know it's to show you it's okay but maybe I took a step back and I I'm looking now I'm like maybe she feels more protected because her dad is there now you know it's a generational thing too it's like you know my generation it was like you know if you wanted to sleep with somebody you married them that's what you did back in the 50s or even the 60s and today I think what's what's much healthier is people your generation are taking more
• 37:30 - 38:00 time let's live together for a number of years then maybe let's get married but it it doesn't all have to happen quickly right and and the other sort of corollary to that just sort of to listen listening to all these stories is remember that I said when I was a single mom it's like out of the blue that I found this wonderful woman who was my student who wanted a family and I needed someone to help so I found someone to help wasn't the father he was off in graduate school but it was a person that lived with me who was very involved with
• 38:00 - 38:30 my kids we're still friends to this day so you know again I think it's about being open to the fact that there isn't just one answer to any of these issues it's about being looking for the right answer for you yeah but I can't I can't agree I I don't agree at all that that the solution is more time together in a non-committed way I that that's where because uh that kind of goes back to conversation we having about framework which is I I'm the the value of me finding somebody who looks at the world the same way I do and entering into a relationship with them is you get
• 38:30 - 39:00 through a lot of those assessments but that's not realistic people change I that there I I was not the same person but like even five years ago than I am today I didn't even want CH the idea of children literally you know what I mean I I didn't even think I didn't even want children I got married and then I started thinking about this is a possibility and I think that's fair right just like what you're saying is fair for you right but for me for other people I think taking more time sometimes is
• 39:00 - 39:30 the best thing to do for the child it's the most selfless thing you can do I instead of rushing and hoping that the other person never changes but I I just I just firmly believe that that is a that is a a consequence of changes that have happened in society over the last 50 years that's not a positive one it's it's what we're doing to make up for the fact that gone are the days where you understood that if you got married or that if you had a child you were going to be in a committed marriage now it's not to mean that people didn't get into marriages that they shouldn't have
• 39:30 - 40:00 because they had a child but there was this idea that the framework for having children was married and that's gone and so when I'm into a relationship I don't know if I'm going to drop a kid out and then the guy's going to run away okay I I disagree and the reason I disagree is because we've all well maybe not all of us but I've heard lots of stories I have a lot of friends that have grandparents from a whole different time than us they valued marriage they got married they had children right away and you know what happened a lot of those wives got
• 40:00 - 40:30 cheated on they have families across town they're making children all over the state they're populating all over the place some of the men are closeted closeted I mean hello but they in the relationship but you are supposed to stay in that relationship and stay committed do you think those wives were happy do you think that they felt fulfilled as mothers knowing that my children have siblings halfway across town the the the you if we're talking about framework the truth is the
• 40:30 - 41:00 framework only works if everybody actually like lives that right and not just like says it out loud but actually lives that and the truth is that's not true but statistically speaking divorce is higher now sure right cheating is higher now is that a good thing for marriage and family no it's not a good thing for marriage and family why are they more common now is it just I think they're more common now I think it's more exposed I think people
• 41:00 - 41:30 talk about it more I think women actually have a choice to leave if they're cheated on men have a choice to leave if they're cheated on I think there's more of just general conversations about what people actually want to be happy but the truth is like there are a lot of people that were like back in the 50s and 40s they were cheating and right they were they were had multiple partners the women couldn't have a job so they couldn't leave I I I don't think anything I think a lot of the stuff that that was hidden in the past has come to light and
• 41:30 - 42:00 I think the internet has helped with that because we're exposed to so much now so the reason I didn't step forward with this is because I'm so solidly and confidently child-free that having a partner or not having a partner is just not part of my decision or my equation and I feel that very strongly and I want to be an example for other people that are considering this lifestyle because I
• 42:00 - 42:30 run a global childree community and a program and something that people are constantly saying to me is well people tell me once you find the right one then you'll change your mind and I'm not saying that that can happen right you gave us an example of how that worked out beautifully but putting the pressure on someone to let them know once you have a partner then it's okay takes away their power of making their own choice the reason why I sat down was because if
• 42:30 - 43:00 I had to have a kid in whatever situation I don't know I was playing Sims or something and I had like I like I would I would like to have someone there to support me and the kid because I think that it takes two to tango and I think two people made that decision and I think that I mean I know there's a lot of discourse or there there's a lot of things that can go wrong whatever but like in a perfect situation I think you owe it to the kid to you know be a responsible parent and I think if
• 43:00 - 43:30 anything like you know two people who have the same goal can really contribute to the nurturing of a kid uh I've been with my guy for so long um I'm 26 now I've been with the man since I was like 15 so that's basically like my whole life right and you know like I'm sure we all know many many things can happen in a span of 11 years and you can choose to go through it or you get up and leave but we chose to deal with it head on and I think the reason why we're so strong in our relationship now stronger than
• 43:30 - 44:00 ever before is because we were able to grow with each other what makes it special now is that since we have our daughter the more we choose each other the more we see her blossoming and flourishing like uh out of from love you know I always tell her you were made from love okay like there's nothing in this world that's going to you know make us love you any less and we just try to let her know we're always going to be there for her so for me it's more ideal to have just someone by my side I'm real believer that friends are the family we choose and some of the most important
• 44:00 - 44:30 people in our lives we're not related to and when I was a single mom it's like you know I was married very young and the dad and I we just grew to be different people so you know it wasn't about bad news good we just grew to be different people and so I took the three kids and left and I moved to a small town in Wisconsin and there was um a couple who became family I wound up having the support group none of whom I wasn't related to any of them but I had a support group that's a privilege
• 44:30 - 45:00 that's you not everybody doesn't have access to that it's not just something you can turn over a couple rocks and find right and and that's where when we think about specifically you know the young black female Community having these children and and whether it's with Auntie or cousin or whatever taking care of the kids all day and bad and bad things happening like you said they're trying to do that and in theory they have that but but that's it's still not ideal there's a certain level
• 45:00 - 45:30 of you know you you can do bad by yourself you you don't need no man that's actually hurt a lot of black women more than it has has ever helped us um and I think when it comes to like being a mother and like entering into single motherhood that's why I don't want it and and it's because I've watched I literally have examples all around me right of like black women who they're doing an amazing job doing it on their own but it still it doesn't make it easier just because they can
• 45:30 - 46:00 specifically for like the black community I think we need to evolve past this whole like wanting to have children out of wedlock and I'm sorry that's just my opinion it has not benefited us any black people were we're we're in a different position in this country right my mom used to work as a um as a foster care mother for a private foster care agency um specifically for newborns so she would get new borns you know a day two days out of the hospital and she
• 46:00 - 46:30 would keep them for 2 weeks almost all of her babies were black specifically when the black community that mother would reach that point she'd have the baby she'd be considering adoption and within that first two weeks there would be so much cultural pressure for her to keep that child that almost that a huge percentage of them were taken back because that two weeks marks until you can't revoke the decision right so that so many of those babies would come back I say that just simply say that when you talk about the social pressure of these moms to start being moms without
• 46:30 - 47:00 thinking about their self-interest that was that was there like I don't feel like I get pressured to be a mom because I'm black right like I feel like I get pressured to be a mom because I'm a woman what a lot of people don't take into uh consideration is the intersectionality of being a black woman I'm both right like I don't get to exist as one or the other we sometimes are taught unfortunately by even other black women you don't need a man right like you can do it on your own and I think at
• 47:00 - 47:30 this point it's it's a mistake for us and that's all I'm saying I I I I'm I for the single moms out there that that are killing it that are doing the best that you can that are you know raising your children Kudos and good good good for you for doing that I just don't want that for myself I don't want to be another statistic I don't want anybody on this planet to ever refer to me as a baby mama too many times we are as as a society very harsh on black single mothers instead of looking at the
• 47:30 - 48:00 circumstances for how it happened and I refuse to raise children without somebody else being in in the home whether that was with a woman whether that was with a man um I just don't want to do it by myself because I see with my own two eyes not what the news told me not what Tik Tok told me I see with my own two eyes what that actually looks like and I don't want to be the glue that holds everything together the most meaningful way to leave a legacy is having
• 48:00 - 48:30 children actually I'm I'm I don't necessarily think it's the most meaningful way but I want to leave as much of myself here when I'm gone as I can whether it's my music my career Who I Am the memories I share with other people I want to leave as much of myself as I can when I'm gone and I think um
• 48:30 - 49:00 when I am gone and my daughter is still here I mean my experience everybody tells me oh my gosh you look just like your mom oh my gosh you remind me so so much of your mom you know I go a long time without seeing my family members and they're like oh you're so beautiful you're act you look just like your mom you act just like her you laugh your smile and that makes me feel so good because I think I mean I love my mom so much she's my best friend she she held my hand through everything and I hope to do the same
• 49:00 - 49:30 with my daughter I stepped forward because I'm one of those people who I never thought I was going to I never thought about getting married and I never thought about getting kids all I thought about was I wanted a theater career I went to a huge high school and and fact Charlton hon went to the same high school and and an Margaret went to the same high school they were all these famous people and I thought I'm going to have a career in theater and when my first son came along and it was a surpr surprise uh this is back in the day when again there was different kinds of birth
• 49:30 - 50:00 control but he was born it was like the birth control was 99% safe and he was the 1% I'm like oh I guess he really wanted to be born and I had no idea what I was getting into and I thought well the other things will follow but I wouldn't have missed him for the world and then his brother came along and his sister came along and all I know is we all learned so much from each other and we all still can make choices and we all have career choices and we're all doing the things that make us make us happy
• 50:00 - 50:30 but I wouldn't have missed them for the world and like you I just feel like I want my kids and my grandkids to know who I am and when I'm gone to they'll appreciate what I gave them and and doors I open for them yeah you live on through your kids a common Trope that you hear in parenting is you know oh I live vicariously through my children and I think that's the one piece of that prompt that I I when I think about
• 50:30 - 51:00 Legacy and and children being Legacy there's in that this kind of tone that I want them to take some piece of me through them it's wonderful when it happens in a positive way it's not wonderful when it happens in a negative way when I'm trying to make them a doctor I'm trying to hand over the family business or you know or maybe my kid did not have a good experience with me and I'm you know trying to force a relationship that that isn't there um so so that's that's the main reason that I I I hesitate I don't want my kids to
• 51:00 - 51:30 feel like they're living their life for me at some point they have to take it on and live it for themselves I think there's tons of people who never had children or we're also forgetting that there are people who are infertile so are you saying that they can't have a legacy because they don't they can't have children I think that there are tons of like uh doctors and Physicians and philanthropists who have things named after them and we all know I mean we don't know them but off the top of my head I can't think of them but we all know that they're there like the John's Hopkins all that kind of stuff so those
• 51:30 - 52:00 legacies are remembered by everyone so that's the kind of Legacy I would want to leave is like doing something that's so impactful in the world that I have something named after me I agree and I and I think it's really important to realize that you can you can leave a legacy without bringing someone into this world and I think that you can do that through different channels like that like what you're saying yeah I agree this is a question that we as shelf people get all the time well what about your legacy but to me I mean you said the exact word I was thinking of to
• 52:00 - 52:30 me Legacy is the impact that you have on the world while you're here that's your legacy and your impact can be your contribution to uh be kind to others to teach others to guide others anything um anything that is helping other people in any way but what I do find interesting about this conversation is that often times it's chree men that get the Legacy question over child-free women um for
• 52:30 - 53:00 example my partner obviously he's childree as well and he always gets the well what about your DNA what about your legacy what about your bloodline and it's very different for women cuz we don't get it as much uh it's it's very different and I find that really interesting that it's it's do yeah you I've never gotten that question about yeah because it comes from a time of you know kingdoms and passing down your blood so I think that if we could all just FP
• 53:00 - 53:30 the word legacy to impact especially as a childree community for childree people is uh we can understand how we're leaving a workan society right I'm Catholic and one of the most Legacy people of modern history within the Catholic church is Mother Teresa of Kolkata who was a child-free person right she made her whole life serving the poor in India I mean that is an amazing Legacy that had nothing to do with her having children now if you asked her she'd probably say the people she served for her children you get into that but it doesn't matter right the
• 53:30 - 54:00 point is that the Legacy that's remembered for her and will be institutionalized certainly within our religion forever is the work that she did for the people in Kolkata when you're talking about Legacy it's like you're you're having the child again for your own reasons like it it's because of you it's it's centered around you the child has to now live up to whatever you want and who you want them to be it's just a lot of pressure I've never been questioned about Legacy you know um I've been questioned about what what do I want to leave behind or who's going to get my assets which is interesting um oh
• 54:00 - 54:30 yeah definitely that question comes up all the time well who's going to who's going to who's going to take over your houses or like what are you going to do with that and it's always like uh I don't know I'm not dead yet what the like can I just like live first like um but I I I think I think again that's that's coming from a place of like self-centeredness I think it's a little selfish a little self-motivated from me like I think my mom just did she's literally my best friend you know like she I I literally told her when I lost
• 54:30 - 55:00 my virginity okay and it was not supposed to be having sex at that age okay so but she you know she was there to guide me through everything you know she guided me through everything in life and I want for when I'm gone for just my daughter to say my mom was the best she did everything she could do you know I lived a great one and hopefully I'm if I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing then it will show in the end and um it I don't want to say it's more for me I just the main thing is we want our children to be happy again Legacy is such a
• 55:00 - 55:30 strong word but for me that's the main thing is for her to be happy and if I leave that behind I'll be somewhere else extremely happy about it I just think it's been wonderful to hear all the different perspectives I have tears in my eyes right now because I think you're all so sharing and so real and I think the most important thing is not about do we have kids or not it's about do we have good people in our lives and that's the most important
• 55:30 - 56:00 [Music] thing mece to meet you nice to meet you [Music]