I never wanted kids I was scared of them.

[sunshine702]

I never wanted kids minus a few months of wanting something to love me unconditionally.  I got a cat.

I now realize that I never was comfortable from 4 on.  My GC baby brother came home and it was all about him.  I remember the day.  Something in me realized something wasn't right.  Very little interaction with him besides endless hockey trips where I could cheer.  Most people have interactions with babies with siblings. I never really had that.

And I as a non GC always had the sense  that something was wrong with me.  There wasn't I just had a mother who didn't really love me
Wow. Uhug

[xredshoesx]

i never was into dolls or house myself.  i knew the decision about not having kids was right for me bc i resented having to caretake my mother as a teen, i hated babysitting family for free, and i did do well emotionally with caretaking my grandmother either.  it's like i resented having to be responsible for someone else's responsibilities.

[justducky]

I also never wanted kids. I've joked that I was born without a biological clock. All of my maternal instinct goes to pets.

To be serious, it's a combination of not wanting the responsibility and being afraid that I'll pass down the family dysfunction.

The fact that uPD father called enSis and I "damn-ass kids" hundreds of times surely factors in. He wouldn't call us that to our faces, but he made zero effort for us to not hear it. He indirectly blamed all of the problems in his life on enMom, enSis, and me.

I learned that having kids was a sure-fire way to ruin one's life. Since I was effectively on my own, I was careful to never get pregnant.

[Cat of the Canals]

I've always been on the fence. On the one hand, I love kids. I think I'd like one. On the other, there are parts of it that terrify me. I used to say it was pregnancy itself that scared me (which makes sense because PDmom specifically denied me a lot of bodily autonomy as I hit puberty, and I think that's all knotted up in the fear), but I think it's bigger than that, and yet couldn't put my finger on it. Something about this thread just knocked it loose, I think.

PDmom did a lot of parentification with me. Not just in regards to my younger brother, whom I was expected to be a sort of best friend/nanny to. Always reminded to "keep an eye on him," to "include him" when I was playing with my friends, etc. (And never vice versa.) She did it with any kids that were around, too. She often invited her friends to stay for days on end in the summer, and I was expected to keep their kids entertained the entire time. If anything bad happened, I was to blame. If they threw a tantrum, I wasn't doing a good enough job as a hostess.

So I think there's part of me that dreads being put back in that position of being responsible for another human being, because I was always scolded for it before, no matter how hard I tried. And what if my child struggled or had behavior problems? Wouldn't it be my fault?

Of course, my absolute deepest fear is that motherhood would magically transform me into PDmom. I'm still unlearning so many dysfunctional things she taught me, and I know there are still more lurking.

[NarcKiddo]

Wow! All of these posts resonate with me in some way or another.

It was made abundantly clear to my by my uNPD mother that having children is a most unspeakable burden. It was also made clear that she expected us to produce grandchildren for her. I am nearly 6 years older than my sister and I was firmly put in charge of looking after her as much as possible.

Until I hit 30 I had no desire whatsoever to have children. In the front of my mind was the "fact" that children are vile. In the middle of my mind was the fear mother would interfere and impose her will on their upbringing. In the back of my mind was the fear that I would turn into her.

When I hit 30 the biological clock went CLANG and I developed an almost insatiable urge to have children. I spent ages of time planning how I would make sure that mother could not interfere when I had them. My husband did not want children as he had his own, but had always agreed that if I really wanted children of my own he would go along with it. Just as we were negotiating the issue a family crisis meant his kids had to come and live with us. Having a baby simply had to be left aside for the moment and after a couple of years I lost the desire.

Then I got dogs. Part way through their lives I twigged that my mother is a narc and started to examine myself. I realised just how controlling and over-protective I was with the dogs. Talk about micro-management.  I like to think that I may have been less controlling with human kids, but I'm not so sure. At any rate the human race has not lost anything by having my family genes curtailed!

[Cat of the Canals]

I spent ages of time planning how I would make sure that mother could not interfere when I had them.

Oh yes. That old chestnut. One of the reasons we left our home state a few years ago was because neither one of us could stomach the idea of our mothers having easy/frequent access to any potential children we might have. Even with a great distance between us, I know if I get pregnant I will have to fend off both PDmom and PDmil from meddling at every stage.

[sunshine702]

I think a part of it was knowing that I would be trapped there in that state with her if I were to have a baby.  So I think some of my Childfree mindset was nature but now so realize a lot was nurture - I was reacting to the awful upbringing.   The day I discovered there was a name for our family distinction was so ground breaking!!  Yeah I poured my kid feelings into my dogs.  I was scared for years that I didn't have any motherly feelings but then I watched my new puppy sleep and wham.

[puddlediver]

Me neither, cannot relate to them at all. Would have been totally unable to deal with them. Would have been a disaster