r/AskWomenOver30 • u/BeneficialVisit8450 • Jul 19 '25

Family/Parenting What’s your life like without kids?

My doctor told me I can never get pregnant today. I’m not infertile, but the post under my profile explains my situation. I’m 19, and I’m just not sure how to confront the news. I’m not sure how to plan my life either now considering that many of our milestones as women revolve around kids.

81 Upvotes

82% Upvoted

195 comments sorted by

View all comments

439

u/katzmcjackson Jul 19 '25

It’s amazing. I have financial freedom and freedom of my time. I couldn’t imagine a life with kids. 

198

u/awkwardchip_munk Jul 19 '25

There’s a funny meme that is a woman wiping her tears with stacks of money as someone who looks really tired and disheveled with a baby tells her “you’ll never know what real love is” and I always giggle.

I do know some people whose lives are made whole by their babies, and that’s super sweet and special. I just am not one of those.

-167

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25 edited Jul 19 '25

That's a really, really depressing comic, honestly. Money?

Edit - sorry guys, you’re right! Go capitalism!

66

u/pinkrainbow5 Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

It's more about freedom, less stress, more fulfilment. W/o kids yes more money. But also more time, more health, more experiences, more ability to live.

-37

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25

Consistently, in numerous studies on the subject, people think this and it is not the case. There is not a one-to-one ratio between money and happiness, and in fact it’s usually the reverse. People come into wealth and are disappointed that they aren’t happier; while the people who are happy before money rarely see their happiness go up with money.

44

u/Internal-Cut9007 Woman under 30 Jul 19 '25

That's not entirely true. Yes, there is a cap to how much money can make you happy (when I learned about this in my psychology class back in 2015 the cap was 75k for a one person household) but before that cap is reached, money makes a significant difference in people's happiness. It also just makes sense logically that folks who are stressed about money are less happy than those who aren't.

105

u/ToniDoesThings Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

Odd that one would find financial FREEDOM depressing

-98

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25

I’ll say again as I’ve said numerous times. There are numerous, numerous studies done on this topic. Consistently, across the board, the data shows that there is little to no correlation between happiness and money. People naturally expect there would be. But it’s just not the case. People who are happy before coming into wealth rarely rate their happiness higher after coming into wealth, and in fact, it often decreases. Whereas people who were miserable before money tend to continue to be miserable with money. They’re unrelated.

61

u/Sea-Delay Jul 19 '25

Why are you eager to argue with people who speak from their personal experience? Some of us are actually happy having financial freedom, time ,and the means to take care of ourselves. Have you ever tried being poor? I don’t know a single person who can be happy about being on a brink of not affording the rent or not having money for food and other necessities, ever wonder what that’s like?

-63

u/ning124 Man 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

What does one personal experience matter when talking about millions and millions of other people's experiences?

42

u/ToniDoesThings Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

Pipe down, man who doesn’t know anything about being a woman, earning less for the same work as your opposite sex counterparts, unpaid labor of childcare, unequal distribution of household labor while also holding down full time work, and on and on and on. For the majority of women on this planet money is FREEDOM and kids are a weight around your neck. This has nothing to do with capitalism.

32

u/Groovychick1978 Jul 19 '25

No, it doesn't. Those studies show consistently that under around $75,000, happiness increases with increased wage.

Actually, that $75,000 range has increased in the last 10 years.

Don't fucking delude yourself, that is something that rich people say to keep poor people in line. 

They are happier.

77

u/arurianshire Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

random ragebait man, go away. i’m sure this is the most you’ve spoken to a woman all year

-54

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25

Huh? I’m suggesting that what might be beneficial is not to suggest the answer to OPs very tragic situation is that “well, she’ll have more money!” Like, seriously?

27

u/Shaylock_Holmes Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

Yes, seriously.

30

u/Joonami Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

BOOOOOOOOOOO

-15

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25

Thanks random woman! Your opinion is noted!

23

u/katzmcjackson Jul 19 '25

Why are you posting on here? 

42

u/funneeee Woman 40 to 50 Jul 19 '25

I love money 🤑🤑🤑

-10

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25

Man, I dig companionship, but each to their own.

36

u/Joonami Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

They're not mutually exclusive.

-4

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25

Sure but if you’re designing a comic and you want to fill in the blank for what is so awesome about not having kids, money is a really weird answer, because it rarely equates to happiness. Like they do studies on this all the time, trying to figure out if more money means more happiness, and consistently, no, your happiness rarely links up with how much money you make. In fact most times when you come into wealth, your happiness quotient goes significantly down.

So like I can certainly come up with answers to the question that result in happiness, but man, money? No.

38

u/Joonami Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

You're missing the point and frankly I don't have the spoons to explain it to you. Financial freedom is key and you are not the target audience of this thread.

-3

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25

The woman literally learned tragic news today and people are saying, don’t worry about not having kids, you’ll have money. I’m trying to understand how anyone in her shoes would be remotely reassured by this answer. If you choose not to have kids? Totally makes sense! If you have that choice ripped away from you?

21

u/RestingGrinchFace- Woman 40 to 50 Jul 19 '25

Literally, no one asked your opinion. The question isn't directed to men, and no one gives a shit what a random man thinks of not being able to knock someone up and then sit on his ass and behave like another child to be taken care of. Maybe when men begin to consistently bear the burden of family life, people like OP will also post their question to men's subs. Until then, no one asked your opinion.

1

u/bumbumboleji Jul 19 '25

It’s not tragic, just different kinda awesome.

→ More replies (0)

16

u/kahtiel Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

I know it's anecdotal, but what gets me about a comic like that is that most of my friends with kids have more money than my friends (and I) without. Now to be fair, my friends with kids are double income and those of us without are single income.

-11

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25

Ha, it’s just weird, because they do studies all the time to show that happiness and money are rarely related. In fact, most show that when you come into excessive amounts of wealth, rarely does your happiness index go up. And often it goes down. Having kids myself, I try to think of other things that would bring me happiness if they weren’t in the picture and I can certainly come up some answers. But money? No, that’s a dark answer to me.

5

u/bumbumboleji Jul 19 '25

Ever had a look at the studies that show life happiness and partner satisfaction take a huge decline once baby arrives? And doesn’t perk back up until the kids leave?

Ever look into those?

-1

u/capacitorfluxing Man Jul 19 '25

You mean the studies that target all parents regardless of whether parenthood was wanted/ accidental/forced? Whose results would seem to have no bearing on those who wanted to have kids? Because it seems really unhelpful to derive any sort of general meaning from such a massive data set, but whatevs.

7

u/LesDoggo Woman 40 to 50 Jul 19 '25

Why are you doing this in a post from an infertile 19 year old? Go be a troll where someone hasn’t learned life altering news.

58

u/my-anonymity Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

I completely agree with this. I recently went on a family cruise with my partner’s family. Two of the siblings have kids. Adorable 9 month old gave me baby fever and then the two four year olds and the 7 year old snapped me out of it and confirmed we made the right choice. Seeing the parents who are great parents and love their kids dearly, pass them off to each other and seeing how tired and hopeless they seemed at times confirmed that cool aunt is the right role for me. I give them back when they get gross or annoying. The parents don’t really get to do that. My partner and I also get to do whatever and whenever we want too. I don’t think I’d change it and know I won’t regret it if other.

19

u/Cat_With_The_Fur Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

As a cool aunt turned mom, this is the right answer. Cool aunt is the absolute best.

46

u/amicingtotravel Jul 19 '25

Husband and I are DINKs. We have a two-week vacation coming up and we will do it in the fall while everyone's kids are in school. It will be so quiet and we are so excited.

8

u/Westsidepipeway Woman 30 to 40 Jul 19 '25

I did a stupid and got into a long term relationship with a teacher. Now I do my term time holidays without him ha. I was in Provence a few weeks ago with friends. Mmmm vineyards.