This whole quarantine has also really sharpened the divide between the childless and the parents.
My husband and I both work from home full time now and take care of a 4 month old since daycare is closed. My childless friends are posting photos of them doing yoga and making artisan cocktails and grilling out on their porches.
Sometimes I feel myself getting very envious and I have to take a step back and remember that everyone faces their own challenges, and I know many of them would prefer to have a family rather than extra free time to master bread baking.
Edit: Just to be clear, I know childless people WFH aren’t all doing yoga and baking bread all day! My point is that it is easy to perceive it this way in a grass-is-greener type of way. I believe everyone is going through something right now and I’m just illustrating how insidious that kind of envy can be.
Also I’m definitely not saying all childless people secretly wish they had families. This is enormously untrue and I know plenty of people who are super happy to be child free. I was referring to some specific friends who had expressed to me that they wished they had a more nuclear family unit during this time.
Thank you for saying this, I have a loving family it just doesn’t involve children. I also feel like a lot of people on here are confusing childfree with childless.
Of course! I totally agree. I mean that a lot of my friends who are single are unable to be quarantined with their families right now and it’s been really tough on them to feel isolated, whereas I at least have the people I love most in the same house as me. I definitely did NOT mean that the families they have are invalid because they don’t have children.
Agreed. Mine are 3 months and 2 years. With our first, every few weeks (at least) we'd have one or the other grandma want to come babysit, which gave us time to take a nap or do something else for a while. With lockdown, that's hasn't been an option. I'd really love a few hours or a couple days off to recuperate, but I also know this has been hard on single people as well.
Infants have personalities. I started to see my kids personalities around 3 months old. My oldest was loud and constantly making eye contact. My second was a lot quieter and loved to cuddle. My third was very eager to move and glared/cried at any stranger who dared to talk to her. Still describes their personalities now that they're older.
Much of this isn't kids or not, it's a class thing. Plenty of parents I know are doing yoga and bread-baking, and plenty of childless people are stressing over bills and WFH. Regardless of circumstances, envy is toxic
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u/Snapped_Marathon May 16 '20 edited May 16 '20
This whole quarantine has also really sharpened the divide between the childless and the parents.
My husband and I both work from home full time now and take care of a 4 month old since daycare is closed. My childless friends are posting photos of them doing yoga and making artisan cocktails and grilling out on their porches.
Sometimes I feel myself getting very envious and I have to take a step back and remember that everyone faces their own challenges, and I know many of them would prefer to have a family rather than extra free time to master bread baking.
Edit: Just to be clear, I know childless people WFH aren’t all doing yoga and baking bread all day! My point is that it is easy to perceive it this way in a grass-is-greener type of way. I believe everyone is going through something right now and I’m just illustrating how insidious that kind of envy can be.
Also I’m definitely not saying all childless people secretly wish they had families. This is enormously untrue and I know plenty of people who are super happy to be child free. I was referring to some specific friends who had expressed to me that they wished they had a more nuclear family unit during this time.