Posted on 06/25/2010 3:16:32 PM PDT by rabscuttle385
Nearly one in five American women in her early 40s is childless, according to a report that shows a striking increase in women who don't have biological children.
The trend was much less common in the 1970s, when one in 10 women did not have children by 40 to 44, the age bracket researchers use to designate the end of childbearing years.
The report, released Friday by the Pew Research Center, cites social and cultural shifts behind the change, including less pressure to have children, better contraceptive measures and expanded job opportunities for women.
(snip)
Overall, the report found that white women are more likely to be childless, as are women with more education. The analysis, based largely on census data, comes amid changing attitudes about women who do not have children.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Mrs. Jobu & I tried for many years, but not only did I have, ahem, slow swimmers, but she had ovarian cyst problems...then she had to have a semi-emergency hysterectomy 3 years ago. Cue The Stork Nazi: “NO KIDS FOR YOU!”
To echo other childless Freepers’ sentiments, we have a full life even though we have no kids...we both work full time, also a side catering biz, she has a big family, and we are blessed with many wonderful friends...and of course our two lovable dogs (a Bernese and a Golden). Life is good...even with ObaMao in office.
I have a grown son now and was 22 when he was born and it was not planned...I really never wanted children, not out of being selfish, I just never felt a need to be a mother.
I am happily married and have been for the last 13 years and enjoy and am very content with my life. I know that comes from my faith in GOD first, then my spouse, and family.
I always enjoyed being around older people even when I was a child! My mother use to say to me all the time..Don’t you want to go play with the other kids, rather than being with the *Big People*? I never did...
cat farmers... tooo damn funny
For some of us, the organ of fulfillment is in the skull, not the pelvis.
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Wow! A little prejudice there on your part toward child bearing women.
“You really think the only way a woman can be “fulfilled” is to pop out some babies?”
No. But children are part of it. That’s what we were made, in part, to do. Is that all of why we’re here? Of course not. But to deny the importance of children is folly.
As I noted earlier, some of the worst lies people tell are the ones they tell themselves.
Seems to me women can do both. I do. Sarah Palin does. A childless woman has not lived life to the fullest.
“Sorry to disappoint but if you need kids to fulfill yourself then that was a very selfish thing to do to a child.”
I was perfectly happy before children. And am so much more so with them. To deny that children are an important part of our personal fulfillment, our mental health, and destiny is simply denial of the truth.
Why have kids when you can party into your 50s an die alone?
With out a doubt.
I thought the cat farmer reference was funny.
MEOW!
Why can’t the lonely women who love cats get together with the lonely guys who love cats and live catfully ever after?
I think the fulfillment references was familial bonds, not the pelvis.
If you’re happy and fulfilled and not among the “many of them,” why become so bothered with an internet post?
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You are so right.
BTW, “cat farmers” is too dang clever.
What excatly do you mean by “fulfill yourself?” You say it like it’s a terrible thing. Because when you really stop and think about it isn’t one of the reasons that after a man and a woman get married they start a family is because it’s a fulfilling thing to do? Geez, are people who have kids really being “selfish” to the child because they started with a though of “Hey wouldn’t it be a wonderful and fulfilling thing to have a baby?” Yes they are thinking what love they could give a child but ALSO how it would make their lives complete.
Those of you getting offended yes it is your choice not to have kids and you’re responsible not to if they aren’t your cup of tea, but it is sad that the caucasian race in general seems like it’s becoming more about ME and My fulfillment and freedom than it is about family and reproducing is kind of important if we are not to become a dying race lol.
Its a quandary.
All I can say is the feeling of having a child has been far more fulfilling than anything I have done in mylife.
And I have done a lot of things in mylife.
Children are a miracle. why shun it?
I well remember being pregnant during this era and feeling heat from liberal work colleagues.
http://markdowe.wordpress.com/2007/11/23/the-concept-of-overpopulation/
The over-population scare campaigns of the 1960s and 70s nevertheless generated a great deal of interest in population control, and most countries now have more or less effective birth control programmes in place. Some countries, such as Singapore, have found that their attempts to reduce the birth rate were too effective and they now need to encourage people to have more children...
Sadly, that is generally correct. The more educated a culture becomes, the fewer offspring it generates. It kind of flies in the face of some of Darwin's Laws. But, it is what it is.
Incidentally, I have a graduate degree and my wife is a PhD, but we still have 5 kids.
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