KLO

I am sick and tired of being told that I have ‘time to change my mind’ about wanting a baby. I do not want children. I could not be any clearer on that. I have made that decision and it is the right one for me, and yet I am constantly told by men, women, medical professionals, even strangers, that one day I will change my mind, I’m only young, I’ll wake up one day and suddenly want one, my body clock will take over.

Funnily enough male friends who have taken the same life decision aren’t faced with the same dismissal of their choices. They aren’t subjected to the same labels of ‘unnatural’ or ‘weird’ for deciding that children aren’t for them.

I once challenged a doctor who took this tack with me. I asked if she would ask ‘are you sure?’ three times of someone who told her that they wanted a baby. Or if in that situation she would begin to offer advice and hand out leaflets, joining in the excitement. I then pointed out that someone who had a baby and later decided they didn’t want it was going to have regrets with far wider reaching consequences that someone like myself who might get to 80 and look back on my life with a wistful ‘what if….?’