I definitely don’t judge people for not having kids, if that’s what they want for their lives. I just personally think having kids makes life so much fuller.

I have friends without kids and their days are all the same, years run into decades without
highlights for them. One told me she didn’t want to go home and would prefer to stay with us because of her longing for a child.

We have, of course, had to sacrifice things over the years. But, we have also been able to travel abroad many times as well as all over the states. We have a lovely home, and a stable marriage. My kids haven’t been in trouble and have a nice circle of friends as well as hopeful aspirations.

I do know everyone needs to figure out what is right for them, and not sit in judgement of anyone else with a different opinion.

Our household is DINK, and I’m strongly leaning on the childfree end of life. I can promise you we’re certainly not rolling in extra money and spending it on fun things. Our money goes towards savings for a new roof, trying to fix cars that break down, etc like everyone else with or without kids. And *occasionally* we take $100 or so and go camping for a weekend – no big fancy vacations in this household.

Because we’re DINK neither one of us feels the need to go get a better-paying job to support a family. We do what we love and the money isn’t important as long as bills get paid and we live within our means. Do we make loads of money every year? Not at all! We probably barely break ‘middle class’ if we do at all. But we’re content with what we have and are fortunate to not have to be constantly looking for better opportunities for the sake of paying for a kid.

My husband and I are both currently DINKs. But we desperately want to be SIKs (single income w/kids). We’ve racked up quite a bit of debt over the last two years (he was unemployed for a year and I was just unemployed for the last six months) and now that we are both working, our goal is to pay off all our debt, put money in the bank and start trying for a baby. We both were raised with stay-at-home moms and want to be able to do that for our kids. He came from a big family (he has 3 brothers… his mom is devout Catholic and doesn’t believe in birth control) and my parents always wanted a big family, but struggled to conceive me, miscarried another, and then didn’t have my younger sister until my mom was 34 and my dad was 36, so they stopped after that. We both came from parents who truly wanted a family and I think that plays a large role.

As I was unemployed for the last six months, I truly enjoyed staying at home with my dogs (our current babies) and making our house a home. I loved cooking dinner every night for my husband and babysitting for our friend who has an infant. We BOTH loved babysitting and truly can’t wait to have a child.

Now that I’m back working, I’ve had extreme guilt leaving my dogs home alone all day. I can’t cook dinner because I don’t get home until 5:30 or 6, then I have to feed my dogs, and I want to put on comfy clothes and unwind. I don’t see the point in having a baby when someone else is going to raise the child for you while you work all day. That is not the kind of mother I want to be. I want to be with my baby ALL the time, I don’t want to miss out on those precious moments that may only happen once (first step, first words, etc). I miss being at home to do those “wifely” duties that I really enjoy. That is MY favorite job, being a wife and a mommy to two big dogs and hopefully a baby one day. I don’t enjoy my career anymore.

That being said, we have good friends who absolutely don’t want children and we don’t begrudge them of it. The wife is clearly uncomfortable around children, especially misbehaved ones (she was an “oops” to her parents who didn’t want children) and her husband was adopted… I think he would be open to having kids if she really wanted them, but she has no desire. I don’t consider it selfish or selfless. To each their own, honestly.