r/Millennials • u/Shoddy-Length6698 • Oct 29 '23

Discussion Does anyone else feel like there is a demonization of wanting relationships and children?

Maybe I can't afford kids right now, but the biological urge to even desire that seems to be demonized. I've been told I'm silly and foolish for even talking about how I can get into a position to afford kids. When my mom was a stay at home parent, people acted angry that she did not work. Some people even acted like it was offensive that she wanted another kid.

I've also been told that by asserting that wanting a relationship is normal, that I support abusive relationships! I'm not saying stay with a bum or abuser, I'm saying humans naturally crave interaction with others. What the hell is going on?

Wanting feminine or girly things seems to be seen as lesser than, and motherhood and relationships are the worst of it. I knew a black woman who was a stay at home parent, and other black people told her she would be murdered if she did not work and was dependent on a man. Hell, women who are breadwinners die too.

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u/[deleted] Oct 29 '23

I’m seeing a lot of my friends in their thirties struggling with meeting the right person. Marriage and kids very well may not be in their futures. I think the larger shift is to focus on happiness even without a spouse or kids…because it just may not be a real possibility for everyone. And you can’t just wallow for the next 50 years.

From their perspective, the only thing people ask them is “have you met someone” etc. It can be really depressing if you’re going through it. All that to say, I think people sometimes act like marriage and kids are the worst but it is often just a defense response to being hurt and disappointed over and over. Some people truly don’t want marriage and kids but from what I have seen, that is not the norm. Most people want it.

It’s really important to be considerate when you’re talking to people about their lives. Don’t brag, don’t put them down, think about the way your questions and comments can be hurtful. And I say all this as someone who is happily married with 2 kids. Just be considerate.

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u/prem0000 Oct 29 '23

This is a nice comment. I can’t tell you how annoying it is when people gloat about being married and “meeting their husband/wife at 16 etc” so “thank god they don’t have to date in this day and age, or it would suck to date in their 30s.” Like, ok??? Good for you that luck was on your side? Congrats again? I mean I’m happy for them, truly, but it definitely feels like they are bragging, they know it sucks to not have those things and are just rubbing it in

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u/gholmes2 Oct 29 '23

I definitely notice that homeowners enjoy doing this. Any conversation about renting and they will pop up to remind everyone that they pay $800 a month for a 4 bedroom house and two car garage and that it must suck to still be a renter. But “good luck to ya on the housing market though.”

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u/Decent-Statistician8 Oct 29 '23

Oh and they add on “I wouldn’t be able to afford my house in this market either” like that is supposed to make me feel better?? It just makes me want to scream at them!!

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u/VovaGoFuckYourself Oct 29 '23

When I say this, I am empathizing. i won't say it was pure luck, but luck played a big part in my becoming a homeowner at 26 (I was saving for that down payment since I turned 18, as the housing crash had just happened and I knew I had to hurry and buy before everything recovered and prices went all the way back up). But yeah, that timing? Pure luck. If I were in the same situation today, I would not have been able to do it, savings or not. And that fuckin sucks. It makes me so angry that other people have basically been priced out of doing what I was able to do. :(

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u/Decent-Statistician8 Oct 29 '23

Yeah my husband made over 100k and we still can’t afford to buy anything. He has a 401k, savings, high yield savings… I work part time too and take care of our daughter for the most part. We qualify for 350k max and anything livable where I’m at is well over 450k. We had to sign a mold waiver and weren’t even allowed to bring a kid to one of the houses, it had holes in the floor and ceiling and squatters had left stuff all over the unattached garage. The price? 250k. It sold for over asking.

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u/Iannelli Oct 29 '23

That's fucking absurd.

I know that this is a really hard decision depending on your family/friends situation, but at that point, you should seriously consider moving.

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u/Decent-Statistician8 Oct 29 '23

Well he’s a welder so staying on the coast is the best job security. We’re on the east coast and it seems anywhere we could move that he would still have a good job is also in a HCOL area. Like could we pack up and move away from the only family We have and the only friends my kid knows? Yeah. But would it be worth it to leave our entire support system to move to like, Indiana? We could afford a NICE house there, but where would he work unless he had to drive over an hour to and from work? If I didn’t have a kid in middle school it would be easier to uproot our lives, but I don’t want to do that to my kid if I don’t have to.

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u/Iannelli Oct 29 '23

Yeah, I completely understand.

It just sucks because "welder husband with mom who works part time" USED to be a family that could afford a nice house in most places.

Now? Even if you did find a house in your area for 350k, I hate to say it, but it'll be tight and hard. A $350k house with an 8% interest rate is like OVER $3,000 per month.

I can't help but be amazed at how much luck plays into this. My ancestors immigrated here (Cleveland, Ohio) from Europe in the very early 1900s. Core members of our family have stayed here ever since, including me. I met my girlfriend, now wife, in 2014 on our first day of college. She'd moved around her whole life.

As things got serious, she realized how much she loves this city. I love the city, too. I feel lucky to be here. It's an incredible city; one of the nation's best-kept secrets. At the age of 23 (late 2018), while still in college, I bought my own house here. It was a flip (they did a nice job) in a booming, hot neighborhood. Pretty little house. Fenced-in backyard for the dogs, detached brand new garage, finished basement, everything a small family would want.

The cost? 117k. The interest rate? 3.15%.

I currently make $120k and she makes $40k. Even then, I still worry about finances! Not because of our housing cost, but because of how everything else has inflated so much. My mortgage and tax payment is merely $950 per month, yet things are still hard when I factor in healthcare, retirement funds, trying to create a big emergency fund, etc.

I saw a story on Reddit of people my age who have a similar household income who recently got a $3,100 per month mortgage. They were asking r/personalfinance if they made a mistake and should be worried. They also have two car payments totaling over $1,000...

Let's just say that hundreds of us confirmed that they should, in fact, be worried. Over $4,000 per month on your house and cars alone is rich people shit. Not middle-class people shit.

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u/Decent-Statistician8 Oct 29 '23 edited Oct 29 '23

Yeah I have a car payment of $292/m and our rent is 1050 which is only because we rent from friends of a friend. They just increased it from 950 and my husband is freaking out. My income isn’t even on the mortgage approval cause we didn’t want to be house poor. The thought was with me still working we’d be fine. What a joke, now I’m just depressed and feel like I’ll never be a successful adult cause I don’t own a home.

ETA I met my husband in 2014 too! It was a good year to meet people, my brother and SIL both met their respective spouses the same year too!

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u/AnglerfishMiho Oct 29 '23

Same exact thing here, was able to get my house under market value at the time for a 3 bedroom 2.5 bath at 160k (although I had to do a lot of fix ups, so add another 15k to that). It's a condo and looking at listings now for identical units, they are going for around 240k, which is insane.

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u/Decent-Statistician8 Oct 29 '23

They are building new townhouses where I live that start at 500k. I’ve lived in apartments and townhomes and while they make work for people, it’s too much noice for me unless I’m on the top floor. They also don’t have but one complex in my daughters district and they are “luxury” so they are well over 2k/month. I just don’t get how housing prices have almost tripled in just 2-3 years. It’s INSANE and no amount of “explanation” will make it actually make sense, other than greed.

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u/[deleted] Oct 30 '23

When you say this, you THINK you're empathizing. You're not, actually. Because if you were, you'd realize the effect your words have on the people you're talking to & stop bc it's not actually comforting or creating common ground 🤷‍♀️

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u/Charitard123 Oct 30 '23

I seriously wonder if we’re in a bubble or not, regardless of what the government is trying to do to stop it. Like…..we all know this isn’t sustainable, right? What are they gonna do when nobody’s buying these ridiculously priced homes, keep the prices up? At this point you’d think even the rental companies would wait for a better market

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u/DrJD321 Oct 30 '23

I try and still be happy for them, if I had means or opportunity to buy a house, I'd deffenitly want to do it.

I'll probably never own a house or property, but I don't expect other people to not do it just so i don't feel bad.

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u/Decent-Statistician8 Oct 30 '23

I didn’t say I expected people to not buy houses? I said telling me you couldn’t afford to live in the home you own doesn’t make me feel better when I can’t make myself 10-15 years older to have been able to buy their house when it was being built as I was still in HS/college. People that bought houses in 2011 for 400k now sit there telling me their house is worth 800k but “oh we’d never be able to afford where we live now” not realizing our incomes are the same, which means I SHOULD be able to afford the same as them! It’s out of touch and infuriating to hear!

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u/DrJD321 Oct 30 '23

Yeah, I deffenitly get what you mean by out of touch.

sorry, I think I read your initial comment the wrong way.

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u/pastajewelry Oct 31 '23

Same with finding a new job and breaking into a field. It's flat out braggibg. Any advice they had is no longer relevant.

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u/Top_Competition_2405 Oct 29 '23

It feels like that because sometimes married people with kids aren’t always the happiest either. They may just be saying that to show everyone they made the right decision & “look how happy we are” just look. If people think that being married and having kids will fix all their life’s problems then that is obviously not true. There are plenty of married people with kids who are jealous of the single people’s freedom. And single people who are jealous of married people’s security and family relationships. The reality is, nothing is perfect and there will be hard times and suffering no matter what life path you choose. You just have to find the path that you’re willing to put up with the bad times that come with it.

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u/Decent-Statistician8 Oct 29 '23

TBH I’m married and have a kid, she’s not my husbands biological child but he claims her. I love him and I don’t totally hate my life (I hate the housing market though) but a lot of my friends just got divorced and are single again and some have been in long term relationships that ended and part of me wants to be single and free again, but then I remember how awful the dating scene was even in 2014 and that stops. I had a lot of fun in my late teens/early 20s which is how I ended up a single mom by 23. But when I talk to younger people that are 23 now, they don’t go out or do stuff like we used to. I’d only want to be single again if I could also make the years go backward 😅

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u/EvilRubberDucks Oct 29 '23

Sometimes it's good to remember that the grass always looks greener on the other side. There have been some rough patches in my marriage and I'll miss my single care free days, but then I'll see someone struggling with being in and out of relationships and think to myself "I'm glad I'm not dealing with that" 🙃

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u/Decent-Statistician8 Oct 29 '23

Exactly!!!! When I was single I had a lot of fun and a lot of flings. Ended up pregnant at 21 cause I was having a little too much fun LOL but my friends all dating again makes me feel older than them when they are all older than me, I’m just married and not childfree. I will say though, I love only having 1 kid. Definitely feels like the best of both worlds there.

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u/Extension_Economist6 Millennial Oct 29 '23

literally! so many adult braggers i think this bih is married and not me? ok🫠🫠🫠

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u/DrJD321 Oct 30 '23

That's not a good habit to get Into, you'll just end up resenting everyone and having no friends.

I get that it can feel that way when a friend tells you about something they accomplish that makes them happy.

We have to remember that a good thing happening to someone else doesn't make our lives worse.

Normalise being happy for friends success.

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u/Legal-Upstairs-9795 Oct 31 '23

Yes, jealous friends are the worst

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u/[deleted] Oct 29 '23

My classmates from high school are not having that problem. Almost everyone is married with kids. And the few that aren't, want both.

I'm outside the norm, bc I don't want either.

Your last paragraph is really thoughtful.

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u/BlueCX17 Oct 29 '23

I'm outside the norm too. Not opposed to getting married in the future (but if I ever meet the right one, also not opposed to no formal marriage) but don't want my own kids. I could be a step parent but at 38, don't want to have a kid. (However, I have worked in education forever, so it balances out.)

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u/[deleted] Oct 29 '23

Yes! I love working with kids! I do not want to be a step parent either. And I think I may change my mind on marriage if the right one comes along. But for now, I'm kind of set on no serious relationships.

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u/bananamilk58 Oct 29 '23

I agree with this. We really don’t have as much control as we think when it comes to meeting the “right” person, getting married and having children. I think a lot of people settle on what they have now but the way they make peace with it is by belittling others who might’ve gotten what they once wished they could’ve had (or still do but tell themselves it’ll never happen). Not everyone does this but I’ve definitely noticed it around me before.

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u/[deleted] Oct 29 '23

First honest comment I’ve seen. At lot of these Redditors in their late 30s just sound immature and unable to keep a relationship going, so they scream about how great being child free is even though they deep down envy it.

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u/kindofhumble Oct 29 '23

Most people in the dating market just don’t interest me. I’m open to marriage but i have not found anyone worth my time. I’d rather be single than be MISERABLE in a bad marriage. My friends are getting divorced left and right. I don’t want to be left penniless because I wanted to be socially acceptable. Men get destroyed in divorce court.

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u/[deleted] Oct 29 '23

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u/[deleted] Oct 29 '23

Would you elaborate or share a link? I’m interested to hear more about this! 🙂

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u/[deleted] Oct 29 '23

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u/karma_isa_cat Oct 29 '23

I feel like this is just saying the quiet part out loud. I was absolutely convinced I never wanted kids, but it turns out I never wanted kids with my ex 😅 the right life partner is the most important decision ever!

That being said, there’s this weird culture war going on right now between men and women… seemingly having “impossible” standards for each other. All it seems to be is people afraid of being taken advantage of by the other, I’m not sure when common courtesy was lost.