I’m childfree and breakup with mates when they’re pregnant – mums need to realise the world doesn’t revolve around them
ONE of my friends is a mum.
But every time we get together we will spend the first hour or so of our lunch date dissecting the lives of her three kids.
Every spit and cough is obsessed over.
We’re both in our early fifties — and this has been going on for years.
Is it any wonder, nowadays, that I put off seeing her to once or twice a year?
The child chatter is at its peak during the summer holidays.
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Mums suddenly remember they’ve got their little darlings for a six-week break.
Why this comes as a surprise to them is beyond me, but the moaning continues.
As for me, I’m at my happiest next to the pool with my child-free girlfriends.
We’re usually those women laughing with a glass of something deliciously cold, and definitely not those endlessly praising our kids or bitching about the trials of being a mother.
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I’ve realised my friend and I should have had “the conversation” ages ago.
The one that goes like this: “For the love of God, please stop talking about your kids.”
Which is why I want to give a clap to TikTok influencer Amy Chan.
She recently uploaded a video nicely, yet nervously, explaining why she doesn’t want to hear her friends endlessly wang on about their kids.
We all know the type. They’re the ones who harp on about their children’s unique brilliance.
Cult fuelled by social media
And day in, day out, Mum and Dad take a back seat because their kids are firmly their priority.
It’s mindblowing that the family schedule is dictated by the whims of human beings who are usually under ten.
I understand the importance of raising emotionally healthy human beings but we’re supposed to integrate them into our lives — not make them the focal point.
I’m older and maybe a bit more clued up than Chan and can call this behaviour out for what it is — mums losing the plot along with their identity.
Chan was “scared” revealing her feelings on this subject. But she was perfectly reasonable.
She underlined how she doesn’t want to be seen as “insensitive”.
But when it comes to mothers in 2023, their kids can do no wrong.
Among the many to reply, a fellow child-free woman named Roxana posted: “I have cut ties with most of my friends with kids, and that’s OK.”
And another, Jenna Abdelhadi, wrote: “Amen. Some people make it their entire personality and it’s exhausting.”
If so many of us feel this way, why are women who are childless not by choice (me) or child-free (Chan) still included in the mum gang world?
I’ll tell you why. We’re free babysitters, we’re their motivational coaches when frazzled mothers are having a wobble, we’re generous PANKS (professional aunts no kids) when it comes to spoiling their kids.
We even foot the bill when Mum gets a free pass to socialise with us.
And we always smile through gritted teeth when it dawns on us we’ve given up a free night just to listen to you honk on about your little one’s bowel movements.
You probably think women like us should just suck it up. After all, children are the future.
And yes, that’s something I cannot argue with.
But more and more women are choosing not to have children.
A 2021 Pew Research Centre survey revealed 44 per cent of non-parents aged 18 to 49 say it’s “not too likely” or “not likely at all” they will have children some day, up seven per cent from 2018’s survey.
The hashtag #Childfreetiktok has more than 109.3million views on the app and on Instagram.
Then there are women like me with unexplained fertility issues who underwent treatment and didn’t get their warm bundle at the end.
In the UK it’s estimated 18 per cent of women won’t have kids.
Who do I blame for the endless waffle about children?
The burgeoning cult of mumhood has been massively fuelled by social media.
Thousands have become minted mums, thanks to everything from Mumsnet to mummy bloggers and influencers.
The endless online comparisons mean everyone has to press home their point about their status as a mum or the never-ending brilliance of their offspring.
And it’s doing women no favours.
I see so many girlfriends lose their identity when they become mothers and only want to mither or (worse) gush about their kids.
It’s a shame — for them.
Because women like me drop them down our list of priority friends.
Do we really scroll through your posts on World Book Day, when you’re on holiday with your sprogs or when you’re impatiently counting down to when your kids go back to school?
No, we don’t.
In my twenties and thirties, I worked in TV.
Every time one of my fabulously funny friends became pregnant I knew the introduction of another human into their world would call time on our friendship.
It was laughably predictable.
They would go on maternity leave, and pop back to the office a year later only to have morphed into this person who only wanted to talk about themselves and their kids.
What was worse was when their offspring started talking. Adult conversations went out the window, as we’d spend a good half hour trying to work out what their little one was saying.
Was he hungry or did he just need to break wind?
That’s why I got tired of meeting for catch-ups in child-friendly, buggy-nightmare cafes or tagging along on playdates to those awful (surely unhygienic) soft-play centres.
The brutal truth was my mum friends had absolutely no interest in my life, so I became increasingly uninterested in theirs.
This happened with three different friends.
By the time I hit 30 I adopted the brutal approach with any work friends who said they were preggers, I simply broke up with them.
I usually ghosted them and, in fairness to them, they didn’t even notice.
As for me, I did want to become a mum. I got married in my early thirties and my husband dithered over parenthood.
I didn’t want to trap him by falling accidentally pregnant so we split up after two years.
When I said “I do” for a second time, in my mid-thirties, we tried the natural way and then went down the fertility route.
I spent a good four years undergoing tests. Mum friends were shockingly awful to be around.
One told me: “You can look after mine if you want them that bad.”
Another said: “At least you’ve given it a good go.” As if I was playing hook-a-duck at the funfair.
I do have a few sane mum mates — many are relatives and in-laws — who haven’t forgotten they’re also work colleagues, besties, wives, sisters and gym partners.
They’re the ones you treasure.
They never forget your birthday. They’re sensitive to the fact that you tried and failed to have kids.
They’re better mothers for it — but sadly few and far between.
I live in a picture-postcard village in the south of France.
But the place I call home is transformed into a giant activity centre in summer.
The pavements are full of tourists with their kids.
In our restaurants, otherwise rational parents allow their children to dictate how they behave during the family meal.
Mums: Your kids need to be integrated into society, not become its focal point.
Otherwise, you risk raising Little Emperors.
Entitled kids who think, like their mum, the world should drop everything for them.
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News flash: Life doesn’t work like that.
Mums: Talking about your kids all the time means you’re likely moulding your wee ones into narcissists who will use you as a doormat and emotional dumping ground for the rest of your life.
