>>This 37 yo male couldn't have said it any better. The reasons listed are the reasons I choose to have my life in complete order and control. I can't imagine why anyone with half a brain would choose to deal with all that crap! Well, yeah I do: < Duh > "My friends have a baby, so we have to have one too!" (Shaking my head)<<
I can actually see why people choose to have children after their friends start having them. It's very easy to feel like you have nothing in common with formerly childless friends once they have a baby and their world becomes increasingly child-centered, so you have a child to connect with your friends again. (A very bad reason to have a child, IMO!)
DH's roommate from college and his wife are good friends of ours. We've kept their friendship even though they live in another state. Both were in our wedding, and DH even chose his the husband to be his best man. This couple had been married for 11 years without having children and, like us, had reached their late 30s, so we were sure they were CF.
Wrong - when they visited us in March 2005, they announced that the wife was pregnant with their first child. She was almost 38 at the time. We congratulated them, of course, and we sent them a gift when the baby was born. Howver, they have not stayed in touch with us as much as they did before the baby was born, so I can only assume they're too busy with the baby to make much time for their CF friends.
I also now have little in common with my younger sister, who will have her fourth child next month. Before she and our hubby started having children seven years ago, they often went out with DH and me whenever we could get together.
We had a lot of fun going out as four adults to nice restaurants, bars, performing arts, etc. That changed when they started having children. Now we can't go out with them at all unless we bring the children along, since they refuse to hire babysitters. I love my niece and nephews, and I'll probably love the new baby, too, but I wish we could have our adult evenings out again. If we go out with them, it's to places that are obviously child-friendly since they bring the kids along.
And my sister hasn't worked at all since having children. It's hard for her to me as a working professional, and it's hard for me to relate to her as a SAHM. We have to both make an effort to find topics of conversation that interest both of us. I don't mind hearing about her children, but that gets old after a while.
DH and I also have friends from church whose children are teenagers or grown, but even they sometimes talk about their kids too much. We can't chime in with our own stories about our children, so we feel left out of the conversations. I don't think these people are deliberately trying to leave us out - talking about their children is probably natural for them. But too much of it is boring to us.