75% of the time we spend with our kids in our lifetime will be spent by age 12

I remember one summer making plans to go camping with three different groups of friends three weekends in a row and realizing at the end of it that all three weekends were exactly the same. Nothing new happens. You're not missing anything if you just stay home.

Happiness is extremely overrated. I had a lot of laughs in my 30s, but my life was a disaster. Now I'm tired and busy and I don't go out and do "fun" stuff very often, but I'm much more satisfied. My biggest regret is that I waited so long to start my life. Brunch isn't life.

When kids get older, they get a lot more "fun" and a lot less immediate work. I can take my eldest two out pretty much anywhere without a ton of effort, they are fun to hang out with, they can be trusted to be kind and respectful in adult spaces, and they'll invite me into kids spaces, etc.

But also, anything can happen. Anything can happen. Your kids could be born with lifelong conditions or issues. They could be healthy at young ages, but develop special conditions as they hit early childhood or late adolescence. They could struggle with lifestyle issues (violence, drugs, alcohol, crime, etc). You may just end up not liking them very much (you may end up wishing they were more like you, when they aren't), they may have hobbies that differ from you, they may choose careers you'd prefer not, they may choose religious views you disagree with, they may end up being LGBTQIA+ even if you aren't, and so on. We have one child who is at high risk of never developing cognitively enough to safely live on their own as an adult -- anything can happen.

Having a child is a literal forever commitment -- even more so than any marriage is -- to love and care for a person that might not even exist yet, no matter who they end up being. Be absolutely ready to make a literal lifetime commitment to love and care for this child as a fellow human, before deciding to have one.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with opting out of all of that, and spending your 20's, 30's or lifetime doing something else -- having a child is a huge responsibility, and not something anyone should ever get pressured into, or jump into capriciously.

Exactly this. I have 2 under six, and outside the odd night were my wife bathes both kids, from 6am to 9pm I’m either working or hanging out with my kids. Maybe 2-3 times a month I’ll get 4 hours to myself to go watch a baseball/hockey game.

At the end of the day though, I look back and I’m grateful. I tell myself “where did my hobbies go” but deep down I know I probably would have spent that time watching a 3 hour super smash brothers documentary or re-reading LOTR or something stupid like that.

Kids have made me more focused. Their unconditional needs force me to weed out the time wasting, unimportant things in my life. I honestly sometimes wonder how it ever felt like I was busy before.

Every time I look at pictures of my kids when they were younger I feel a tinge of regret for not being more in the moment.

Yours sleep at 7:30?! How do you not consider that to be literally oceans of free time?

That said, yeah, you give up the whole evenings spent trying to solve some problem, but honestly, I don’t think that, on my deathbed, I’ll ever regret that I didn’t get to solve problem x 30 years ago.

What I’m almost positive I’ll look back on very fondly though is every evening spent going in the bath with my kid, then taking him to bed, watching some youtube and reading books.

My biggest regret is that (barring a miracle) I won’t have any more than one (for his sake as much as mine).

> when I see the child free people around me, and how they're spending their 30s

On the flip side, I wonder if you might enjoy your 70's and 80's a lot more with kids (and possibly grandkids).

It is normal that kids take up all your time, but "just chaos" doesn't sound right.

Without knowing your situation, maybe this helps: As you probably know first there was authoritarian parenting (rule the kids), then permissive parenting (let them do whatever they want), both of which create problems for the children.

The parenting-style agreed upon today by psychologists is "authoritative parenting", which basically means telling the kids what you want them to do, but giving them a lenient timeframe and freedom to chose how and when they do it. It raises their self-esteem and encourages them to work together with you.

https://www.healthline.com/health/parenting/types-of-parenti...

When they were younger, I tried to find some longer focal point and figure out what my role and goals were as a parent. I found that, and it helped relieve some of the repetitive stress of parenting young kids.

I don't know the source for the "75% of the time we spent with our kids happens before age 12" but I hope it isn't true. Kids are inexperienced people, and experience cultivates interesting people. I also believe an hour spent with a glassy eyed baby barely counts compared to a thoughtful, focused 15 minute discussion with a teenager.

I hope you find your groove. It took me a while.

Source: I have a 12yo at home.

That's one perspective. I wasn't ready for kids but had one anyway. It's worked out fairly well. My kid rocks and we have a lot of fun.

> have 2 kids under 6 and I feel like I just don't have any time for any of my hobbies any more. I leave for work first thing, come home in the afternoon, and haven't had any time for myself until the kids are down at 7.30, and I'm utterly wasted.

I have one and I started to get back into hobbies around their age 7. So I would imagine having two slows that process down a bit. I'm pretty sure you'll get some time back, but you might need to stick it out a couple more years. If you can, tweak your hobbies to include them a bit (obviously it depends on the hobby) - mine really liked synths for a couple of years: that was great fun :-D.

Something that hit me hard recently was that when I do my hobbies & socialising, I do them away from my family. This now looks like a mistake. I think I should have worked harder to have kid-compatible friends and hobbies over the last couple of years. I'm aiming to do more more activity stuff (camping, surfing etc) with mine over the next couple of years. Deeper into their teens, they wont want to hang out with me much so I need to get it done now.

> As for enjoying hanging around with kids

It's really hard. You've got to get into undirected play yourself. I didn't do this enough.

I have three kids (3, 6, 9) and we don't get to sit down without kids until around 22:00 on average. Sometimes it's quiet at 20:00 (the youngest two asleep), sometimes at 00:30.

We have no life outside of work and kids. It should eventually get better though, as soon as the youngest two start being able to sleep themselves.

There's nothing that can really prepare you to know what parenthood will be like with you're particular children, and by the time you know what it's like to regret it it's too late -- at the very least you're in it for child support. I recommend anyone who enjoys their life as it as and don't see it as a "must have" to fulfill their sense of purpose to strongly STRONGLY consider before they have kids.

I'm finding the teenage years to be much more pleasant. Getting some payback for all the time invested. I know it's still a long way away for you.

Still, I think it is very hard for anyone to predict what some one else’s experience will be having kids. It depends on the kids temperament, yours, your spouses, how your relationship works, What the expectations are in your community, and so much more.

The older I get, especially now that I see my parents really aging, the more I see life is just complicated. Kids or not, you have to find happiness where you can, and accept that sometimes things are imperfect.

I remember feeling like this when I had 2 kids under 6. Now they are both slightly past 6 and I feel everything the parent comment said about how brief that time was - they are in school most of the day, when they are home they spend at least some time playing Legos, watching shows, playing Minecraft, reading books. I have more time for hobbies than I've had in years. They are even starting to be old enough to accompany me on some of my hobbies. The reversal is so stark it's hard for me to comprehend how long it felt at the time and how short it looks now.

> I don't know what age that starts, but I'm 5 years and counting.

I hope it kicks in soon. I love spending time with my kids. They are 8 & 11 now. Sure they can be annoying and as they get older more viscous arguing...

But still I look forward to go for walks with them or have a little minecraft session together, or just some simple lego. Or just fixing/building things together around the house, inside or out. Sometimes not or just for short periods. But I look forward to the next time.

I have taken a lot of time off on purpose to spend as much time with them as possible whilst they are young. And working from home before we all had to.

Still they get super excited to spend time with me on anything. But my oldest is now 11 and I can feel she soon will prefer hanging out with her friends and not her embarrassing dad.

But I agree, weekdays when I am working full time it is still knackering. I dream of them all being in bed at 7.30. And spending time with and looking after my kids means I have no time for friends or most of my hobbies at weekends.

Though as the older one may soon want to spend less time with her dad that also means she require less of my supervision as she goes to clubs and sports after school, and organises her time herself more independently.

So I may soon have time for hobbies again. Mid-life crisis here I come.

My kids are 6 and 8 and I have enjoyed spending time with them since they were little. I do get tired and want to be alone after a while tho.

I think we should just accept the fact that some people enjoy children and some don't.

It makes sense, some people like ballet some outdoor activities some videogames, there's no reason to expect kids would be different.

One hobby I picked up when my kid was about three was crochet (men can do it just fine), so we spent afternoons at the playground, she playing with other children while I did crochet e.g. a hobby horse.

I can relate as this is exactly how I felt the first 6 months of the first child we had - they are between 4 and 7 now. I was and still am a pretty selfish person with lots of hobbies, but most of them had to go to the backburner for the time being. Once I was able to get over myself things started going a lot smoother.

Of course there are times I wish I could be mountain biking, fishing, etc., instead of one of the many tasks that involve children, but I find myself looking forward to spending time with them these days. They are getting to the age where I'm starting to take them with me to enjoy the things I love as well. I imagine this will get higher in frequency as they get older.

From one selfish person to another, hang in there.

That period of enjoyment really varies between individuals, and I think in the aggregate men tend to enjoy hanging out with older kids compared to women. There was also a moment when I shifted my own personal attitude towards spending time with them that made it more enjoyable. Instead of seeing time with them as a time-suck where I could be doing something else, I saw it as fleeting moments that I could never get back when they're older. I became more grateful for the time I had with them.

When they are 6 they become much more self contained, they don't need constant entertaining. They will leave you alone, without being asked, for hours at a time to do what they want to.

You have 2 so you will have a bit of a longer spell, but after 6 you enter into the high summer of their childhood. They are small enough not to have any real problems (apart from, god forbid, medical ones) but they are big enough to give you time and space to breath.

I hear your pain. But it will be worth it, and it will improve.

It's hard to have empathy, because my weeks are 70-80 hours every week and I honestly still feel like I have plenty of down time.

In terms of time you have the time based on your profile. Plenty of time spent on HN. You're also gaining the equivalent of work+commute every Saturday & Sunday.

There was an interesting quote by Frank Zappa, along the lines of: treat your kids like adults, not property.

Here we are:

“The first thing you have to do if you want to raise nice kids, is you have to talk to them like they are people instead of talking to them like they’re property.”

Explain your reasons to them, even when you think the concepts are above them, and they will understand the effort, attention, and the body language if not the exact meaning of the words.

If they can understand the world you live in, the more likely they are to be compatible with it as they grow up.

But... I am older and I retired early (tech was very good to me) so I have full time to spend with him. That doesn't work for people early in their careers.

It's not as if your decision is going to have much impact on anybody except yourself or the potential grandparents who may feel that they are missing out, but that is very much their problem.

All this talk of "perpetuating the species" is so much crap... The species will get along quite well without everybody contributing their genetic material.

At least those who decide not to have kids are making a thoughtful decision, many unfortunately can't or dont.

That's quite well-said. I've heard it expressed many different ways but this one I think I'll appropriate :)

Quite true, I'm almost 40 and still have a bunch of things that interest me way more than changing diapers and worrying myself to death.

It's ignorant to think that your experience with kids is how it is for everyone. Kids can be hard - very hard.

The truth is that taking kids to the park can feel like even MORE of a chore when it's your own kids, because you've had to do it every week, it has no novelty, and you would love just a few hours to yourself instead because you're a parent and you don't get much of that.

The reason it's still better when it's your kids, though, is that it's an investment. Kids are a lifelong relationship. They outlive you. All that time you spend with them starts paying interest and dividends, the same as it does when you spend time with other people you love and spend time with.

My oldest is 12 now and she's funny, insightful, and one of my favorite people to be with. The years I invested in reading and parks with her in the early years are being paid back with hours spent talking about our favorite books and going outdoors together. It's worth it.

Yes, of course. It’s not likely magic, more millions of years of evolutionary biology.

But boy it feels like magic.

(FWIW, I’m also someone who enjoys long stretches of alone time. Still get to do it, if somewhat less frequently. Still enjoy it.)

I have four kids under eight years old. I often feel like I'm just trying to kill the hours until they nap or go to bed, when I can finally have some quiet time alone. I feel very guilty about this whenever I'm reminded that this should be the best chapter of life with my kids, and it'll fly by, and I'll miss it when it's gone. I'm not saying that I don't have moments when I gaze at my kids in awe and feel full of love (which does seem to be different when they're _your_ kids)... I'm just usually exhausted and need more alone time, as an introvert, to recharge.

The article is right that "When kids are outside for lengthy periods of time they become engaged, contemplative, calm and happy. In other words, they don't drive you bonkers!" If we're inside our house, they fight and scream and cry and make a mess and break things and never leave me alone. If I take them outside, they can spread out and explore and the house stays intact (so I don't have to clean / fix it later). Sometimes at the park I can even read something or listen to a podcast / audiobook while they play.

However, the older they get the less boring they are and I assume at some point I will get more out of the relationship.

But I had the children so I gotta deal with what that entails and I'm comfortable with that. I went into this very willingly.

But I absolutely have no judgement against people who don't want to have children... It might not be for you, I don't have any magical emotion that makes it less work, and there are many, many things I'd rather be doing.

I'm someone who needs alone time, and it's really hard for me at times, but their wellbeing impacts my wellbeing more than my wellbeing does, they sorta naturally became my #1 priority in life, so anything but taking care of them to the best of my ability simply doesn't make sense to me.

I definitely like having my own space and at least with one kid, I'm still getting plenty of it. But the time I spend with her is incredibly rewarding (most of the time ;)

It’s not a chore it’s a necessity. They are such a joy sometimes it’s unbelievable so you just grind it out. The lack of sleep is my least favorite part with the babies but it’s not so bad.

:P

It wasn't enjoyable from the get go. But with time we started forming a bond and having our own little habits.

Bottom line is initially you don't know this person so it's hard to expect from you to automatically have a great time. But as a child develops they become more interesting overall.

It’s night and day difference between looking after someone else’s kid and my own.

I guess it’s the sense of responsibility that you are the main caregiver and how your kid turns out is pretty much up to you and your partner.

My experience as a parent and talking to other parents in my social circle couldn't be more different.

It's possible that your "openly childfree" status is biasing your conversations with others toward viewpoints that support your childfree identity. Personally, I learned long ago to avoid discussing anything about parenting with people who make childfree part of their outward identity, because it seems they only want to argue that my experience as a parent is somehow wrong or invalid.

To somebody who's just Wrong on the Internet, though, I would happily say that it's not the most important thing. It's the only thing.

Good luck!

The thing we need to do is to stay healthy and try to be energetic.

I assumed I'd hate having kids until they were like 11/12 but to have the adults would make it worthwhile --- even just the chance of a close relationship with them as adults. But I'm actually shocked to find I even enjoy the baby/potato stage.

It's not as much the excitement of my alternate life, or the reservation of more resources for myself (money, time, etc.) though that, selfishly, sounds nice. It's mostly the stress and ever-present burden of being a parent. I could do without it sometimes.

The audacity, unbelievable. So I guess I'll stop having fun now go back to my boring life?

5 years of diaper changes? Or sleepless nights?

Diaper changes can end by mid-year 2. Sleepless nights can be mostly eased well within a year.

Of course, there's always random suck. I had a crisis that I was receiving texts up till 3AM... and then my 8 year old showed up with a stomachache at 3:30AM.

And it is not the same at all. So many things I do for my dog I do out of obligation. I do not often want to walk her. Once I'm walking her or going to the dog park or whatever, I have a nice time but I don't naturally WANT to do it.

In contrast, I want, like actively WANT, to do all sorts of absurdly unpleasant things for my eight month old. And society is set up to bring kids to all sorts of activities my dog can't go to --- despite my pup being sig more pleasant to have out and about than my baby.

I will say I think a sig portion is hormonal. I would say having a kid was a genuine metamorphosis for me. In contrast, I think my husband had more of a dog-like sense of obligation and is only recently enjoying the kid.

As sexist as it may sound, I'd suggest most women who are financially stable with good partners to have at least one kid because I am shocked, utterly shocked, by the fundamental shift in self I've experienced and, frankly, it's cool. Life is short. It's a cool, unique experience worth having.

But men? Unless they actively want kids, I'd suggest staying away from it --- the sacrifice to their relationships, lives, etc. seems sig harder to bear since they don't seem to have quite the same hit to their hormones. As my husband says, I take care of baby and he takes care of me. Who takes care of him? I try but baby comes first. That's a hard hit for a man not excited for kids (thankfully my husband is and remains so).

Because the people who don't give a shit ain't going to stop having them.

If you could have a dog for some significant length of time, a kid will be no problem by comparison.

In some ways they're always more independent of a child. In some ways they never will be.

The problems get more complicated, but further and further apart. The need for minute by minute management evaporates.

It's not that sort of rational choice. Choice can be an enemy of joy.

For most of human history you just woke up one day and found you were a parent (no immaculate miracles necessary). Birth control and career centred lifestyles have changed that. And that's mostly good, at least for child welfare.

But what if life were more arbitrary? I remember that strange study on happiness that followed the fortunes of one group of people who won a lottery, and another who had life-changing serious injuries. Fortune or misfortune could not account for their long-term happiness, because people are complex and adaptable.

I think it's similar with parenting. Having children is both the worst and the best thing that can happen to you. Some days you wake up and think "You ruined my life. WTF am I doing?". Other days are filled with sublime ecstasy, feeling literally blessed with something you know is missing from other people's lives, and feeling eternally grateful. And those two feelings are not incompatible.

I didn't have the best experience with my parents either. Not that I hated them but they never felt like friends to me. My kids will decide how they feel about me when they get older but I'll do everything in my power to let them know that I'm genuinely interested in being friends with them.

I'm sorry you didn't have good memories with your parents but I came here to say that this should not be an excuse to not having kids if that's something that you're considering.

Why is it so hard for people to believe that someone might just love their family and wish to spend a significant portion of their adult life enjoying and nurturing those relationships?

More like, fail to achieve cultural expectations, "you won't amount to anything."

The average guy living at home at 30 in USA is probably not as geared towards success as the average person living at home at 30 in a country where something else is the measure of success. There are exceptions but people who meet their own countries standards tends to correlate with overall life success.

Clearly you can buck the cultural expectations and succeed, so it's not a hard and fast rule. Of course, some cultural expectations are more difficult to overcome than others: if you piss publicly next to the highway it could earn you a felony charge and torpedo your career, even though there's no practical reason why pissing by the side of the road should make you a lifelong failure.

OTOH it's very far from being common.

“But I contradict myself”

I'm neither American nor Anglo-Saxon, but yes, there is such thing as living hell.

And we spend HOURS per day with our parents when living at home, even when teens. Evenings were hanging out as a family usually, whether that meant reading in the same room, watching movies, playing board games, whatever. All during the evening when they got home from work.

Heck, family dinner alone is an hour a day.

We don't use many such strong words ourselves, but like with many things she learned on her own in the cultural melting pot that is public school.

Maybe people who curse poetically are even better at English than non-cursers, but that probably comes with age and isn't relevant to advice about children.

We’re worried they’ll get sick and we won’t be able to help. We’ve tried getting them to come with us but so far no luck.

We sang this in 6th grade, and even then I understood the devastating lyrics (I didn't see my dad much, b/c he had to work long hours and weekends+nights as a young resident->doctor). I knew even then that this song would be my truth.

Over three decades later, I love my dad but I only see him a few times a year for a few days each, and we don't talk much on the phone much.

"But we'll get together then, son."

If I'm being honest, my parents had an enormous house, so we all got our own rooms and there was still an office space available. They sold it after we all moved out again.

We all made a tremendous effort to stay adults regarding keeping the place in order and cooking. We'd cycle dinner prep through all of us based on work schedules. It was interesting, and since all of our collective friends took lockdown extra seriously, there really was no one to go see.

My parents are in their early 50s, so they're definitely not young anymore, but they're still some time away from something I'd consider "actually old", but my definition may be a bit skewed because 3 of 4 of my grandparents are still with us and 2 of them have a clean bill of outside of being in their late 70s.

My heart goes out to the people who had to do it out of necessity rather than choice.

My best two pieces of memories: 1) Parents took me to a geology museum and I got awed by the huge dinosaur skeleton; 2) In some Saturday nights I'd sleep between parents and we all watched paleontology programs on TV

I'll probably do similar things with my son.

Because a lot of stuff you read online is made up, misleading, wrong, or even all three. Either on purpose or not. The most insidious stuff is what "seems plausible" but isn't, it's how you get stuff like common myths and misconceptions[0]. Shouting "source?" at every article is not pleasant and may sound annoying, but I think we should respect people who question things (or simply want to dig more) rather than pushing back asking for "why". The pursuit of (true) knowledge in and on itself is something that shouldn't be questioned, especially in this technological age.

[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_common_misconceptions

Recall that you wrote this in a comment recently, and then reconsider what you wrote above, regardless of how you might feel about what the parent wrote.