Why parents regret having kids

From AskReddit. Over 5000 comments so far.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/4wfl4k/serious_parents_who_regret_having_kids_why/

The reasons are about what I expected: not having enough time for oneself, wasn't ready to have them, having to give up everything you enjoy for the kids, drifting away from or totally losing your significant other, pressured by family/partners/society into breeding, no sex life, no spontaneity, being broke, losing sight of who you are, not sleeping, having kids with an asshole, and raising tards who require lifelong care.

Quite a few "I never wanted kids, but had them anyway and I lurrrrve them" responses too. I never understood that logic. If you regret having something, how can you possibly love it? Love and regret don't go hand in hand like that because they're practically opposites. Regret implies dislike.

I like this comment a lot:

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What's that thing when you fall in love with your captor? Stockholm syndrome? That's what it sounds like when people say "oh you'll love it because it's your own!!!" No, I just don't think I should have kids. I've met my nieces, they are spawn.

Now that I think about it, being a parent does sound like Stockholm syndrome. So, so many parents "love" their kids out of circumstance than out of genuine emotion, and the parents are sort of held captive by their kids. That's kinda scary to think about.

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Also, somewhat unrelated, I read something recently on Facebook about how there's a law in Utah that lets people legally murder their kids as long as it's for religious purposes. Now that that law has received media attention, how long do you think it'll be before a tsunami of breeders flocks to Utah with their brats in tow, blow the kids' brains out and then claim that Gawd told them to send Kaait-lynn'e and Brahydhenne to heaven?

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Cambion
I like this comment a lot:

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What's that thing when you fall in love with your captor? Stockholm syndrome? That's what it sounds like when people say "oh you'll love it because it's your own!!!" No, I just don't think I should have kids. I've met my nieces, they are spawn.

Now that I think about it, being a parent does sound like Stockholm syndrome. So, so many parents "love" their kids out of circumstance than out of genuine emotion, and the parents are sort of held captive by their kids. That's kinda scary to think about.

Wow, that's frightening. And apt.

What's funny is having that thread and seeing how many people regret having kids and yet, Reddit views r/childfree as the worst of the worst subreddits. I guess it's clear that Reddit hates r/childfree because it's a subreddit full of people who were smarter than their biology and didn't fall into the baby trap.

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"Why children take so long to grow? They eat and drink like pig and give nothing back. Must find way to accelerate process..."
- Dr. Yi Suchong, Bioshock

"Society does not need more children; but it does need more loved children. Quite literally, we cannot afford unloved children - but we pay heavily for them every day. There should not be the slightest communal concern when a woman elects to destroy the life of her thousandth-of-an-ounce embryo. But all society should rise up in alarm when it hears that a baby that is not wanted is about to be born."
- Garrett Hardin

"I feel like there's a message involved here somehow, but then I couldn't stop laughing at all the plotholes, like the part when North Korea has food."
- Youtube commentor referring to a North Korean cartoon.

"Reality is a bitch when it slowly crawls out of your vagina and shits in your lap."
- Reddit comment

"Bitch wants a baby, so we're gonna fuck now. #bareback"
- Cambion

Oh whatever. Abortion doctors are crimestoppers."
- Miss Hannigan

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Cambion
I like this comment a lot:
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What's that thing when you fall in love with your captor? Stockholm syndrome? That's what it sounds like when people say "oh you'll love it because it's your own!!!" No, I just don't think I should have kids. I've met my nieces, they are spawn.

Now that I think about it, being a parent does sound like Stockholm syndrome. So, so many parents "love" their kids out of circumstance than out of genuine emotion, and the parents are sort of held captive by their kids. That's kinda scary to think about.

This is the only logical explanation. This and some hormonal high (but that cannot last 20+ years).

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What's funny is having that thread and seeing how many people regret having kids and yet, Reddit views r/childfree as the worst of the worst subreddits. I guess it's clear that Reddit hates r/childfree because it's a subreddit full of people who were smarter than their biology and didn't fall into the baby trap.

I know, it's weird. Having kids and regretting having them isn't as bad as choosing to just not have kids at all? Must be along the same lines as pro-life logic: abortion is the most evil thing to ever exist, but they sure don't seem to be too concerned when people hate or kill their unwanted born kids.

Seems like people kinda got it all ass-backwards.

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Cambion

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What's funny is having that thread and seeing how many people regret having kids and yet, Reddit views r/childfree as the worst of the worst subreddits. I guess it's clear that Reddit hates r/childfree because it's a subreddit full of people who were smarter than their biology and didn't fall into the baby trap.

I know, it's weird. Having kids and regretting having them isn't as bad as choosing to just not have kids at all? Must be along the same lines as pro-life logic: abortion is the most evil thing to ever exist, but they sure don't seem to be too concerned when people hate or kill their unwanted born kids.

Seems like people kinda got it all ass-backwards.

I agree and their kids would much rather they thought it through and did not have kids rather than spend their childhood sensing that regret.

many months ago someone found a study that had been done on a very small segment of people, small enough so it couldn't be 'taken seriously'. However, the guy repeated the experiment, same number of participants, and got the same results..
don't know how these psych people word these questions to elicit true feelings but the experiment was designed to show that the breeder bingos we get are real, that these parents are suffering something like stockholm syndrome and furthermore, bingo everyone else who refuse to join them in their shitpile.

two cents ¢¢

CERTIFIED HOSEHEAD!!!

people (especially women) do not give ONE DAMN about what they inflict on children and I defy anyone to prove me wrong

Dysfunctional relationships almost always have a child. The more dysfunctional, the more children.

The selfish wants of adults outweigh the needs of the child.

Some mistakes cannot be fixed, but some mistakes can be 'fixed'.

People who say they sleep like a baby usually don't have one. Leo J. Burke

Adoption agencies have strict criteria (usually). Breeders, whose combined IQ's would barely hit triple digits, have none.

It does make sense. Consider some of the things parents do:

• Dump their kids whenever they have the chance (in stores, at playground, in malls) so they can "escape" and have a nice, quiet kid-free errand run.
• A lot of parents struggle to bond with their kids, much like how an abductee would struggle to love their captor initially.
• Identifying with the captor is a defense mechanism. Could be when parents claim that their child has one parent's eyes or the other's hair when the kid looks fucking nothing like either of them.
• Parents scoffing at the idea of babysitters and/or not wanting to send their kids to school could be seen as the negative feelings victims feel toward rescuers.
• Supporting the captor's actions/behavior: "Ohhh, he's just a child!" It could also be why some parents refuse to spank their kids or feel guilty when they do.

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I'm reading more about Stockholm syndrome and seeing a lot of parallels between it and parenthood. For example, a victim might behave themselves to avoid being the target of some sort of abuse from their captor. Consider all the things mommies will do and all the money they will spend so their kids will never say "I HATE YOU!" Another example is when the captor shows the victim some small sort of kindness, which the victim interprets as proof that their captor isn't so bad after all. Y'know, like when a kid can be a rotten motherfucking piece of shit 24/7, but as long as he hugs Mommy and says "I wuv youuuuu!" (which he doesn't mean because kids don't know how to love - they only know how to depend), all is forgiven.

Taken directly from the site I'm looking at:

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The abused person becomes preoccupied with the needs, desires, and habits of the abusive, controlling person.

Kids keeping parents on their toes so they can't direct their attention anywhere other than toward the child. This begins in infancy when loaves scream and cry constantly, preventing their parents from sleeping or from having sex and potentially creating competition. Obviously a baby can't plan this shit, but you can't argue the similarities.

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Taking the abuser’s perspective as a survival technique can become so intense that the victim actually develops anger toward those trying to help them.

When bizzy mommies scream at their husbands for not caring for their kid "right." Moos are fucking control freaks. Also, mommies flying off the handle at school staff for daring to punish her widdle pweshus or tell him "no".

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Situation 4: Feeling Unable to Escape

Pretty much the definition of parenthood.

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Emotional Investment – We’ve invested so many emotions, cried so much, and worried so much that we feel we must see the relationship through to the finish.

You don't want the kid, but you gave birth to it and it's here, so you might as well hunker down and deal with it.

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Social Investment – We’ve got our pride! To avoid social embarrassment and uncomfortable social situations, we remain in the relationship.

People will think you're horrible parents if you come out and say you hate your kid or if you give it up for adoption. So just pretend like you're happier than pigs in shit!

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Financial Investment – In many cases, the controlling and abusive partner has created a complex financial situation. Many victims remain in a bad relationship, waiting for a better financial situation to develop that would make their departure and detachment easier.

You've already sunk (X) dollars into raising this little fucker, so you can't back out now. You'll lose your investment.

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Some things got left out, but the majority of the symptoms/descriptions of Stockholm syndrome sound scarily similar to parenting.

I grew up in the Intolerance Belt. If you have a bunch of parunts who became parunts solely because it is expected of them to do so and have never given it critical thought:

• Must compulsively follow the crowd: children, conspicuous consumption, etc.
• Parrot on and on about lifescript and unconditional love from kids (whom aren't capable of any kind of love in the first place)
• Will brag to other adults about how wonderful parenting in the midst of screaming, insulting and berating their kids
• Tremendously threatened by other adults who choose a different life path and don't follow the script
• Have zero to little tolerance for anyone on the fringes or any independent thought
• Oxytocin, oxytocin, oxytocin

They're also raising their kyds to not critically think and are heading right into symptoms eerily similar to Stockholm Syndrome as Cambion has astutely observed. Because fitting in is more important to them than quality of life and other people, including their kids. Parents who aren't mindless followers and can critically think can at least have a tolerance level which may let them bond with their kids.

Bet these news articles on accidental deaths are mostly parunts retaliating against Stockholm Syndrome who've lost the oxytocin blinders.

"If the doors of perception were cleansed (oxytocin) every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.”

Somewhere on that page is a link to someone who calls herself The Introverted Parent. She gripes about how she luuuuuvs her kids, BUT. And she also had FOUR KYDS IN FOUR YEARS!

The stupid, it hurts. Wouldn't it be easier to have no kids at all when you are introverted? Or maybe have ONE kid? Why have four kids, then complain? Bed. Made. Lie.

I will never understand people who have mental disorders (or personality quirks) that make being around others difficult, but then they go and breed. I recall something on Smothering from a long time ago about a Moo who bred with a guy who has both anxiety and autism and one of his big triggers is screaming children! WHY would you breed knowing that kids trigger you, or breed with someone knowing that kids drive them nuts?

Kids make sane people lose their minds all the time, so if you're schizophrenic, anxious, autistic, have anger issues, are depressed, introverted, bipolar or anti-social, why would you go and make your condition worse? And yes, having to take care of a kid when you're not mentally stable WILL worsen your life, and depending on what's wrong with you, it could also make the kid's life worse too.

"I will never understand people who have mental disorders (or personality quirks) that make being around others difficult, but then they go and breed"

I read a story about a guy with Asperger's who worked with computers and loved his alone time. His wife INSISTED on a baybee and he caved. When the kid was two he literally commit suicide. Moo thought that there is nothing better for an autistic guy to bring him out of his shell than a baybee and it cost him his life.

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Cambion
I will never understand people who have mental disorders (or personality quirks) that make being around others difficult, but then they go and breed. I recall something on Smothering from a long time ago about a Moo who bred with a guy who has both anxiety and autism and one of his big triggers is screaming children! WHY would you breed knowing that kids trigger you, or breed with someone knowing that kids drive them nuts?

Maybe it is a barrel of fun to pass those traits to their kidz! Yippee!~