9 reasons why I'm never having kids ( And you shouldn't either)
by Anne Gus
Okay so last week I celebrated St Paddys day with the fam, because apparently I'm like a quarter-Irish, and before you ask, yes I love Haggis and Leper-corn, I eat it, like, all the time. Anyway, Grand Auntie Phyllis, who's like 150 years old was there and was like totally rude to me.
I was minding my own business, having a Guinness World Record beer and a Banger (without mash), when she comes up to me all like:
" Congratulations Annie, what a blessing, I was beginning to wonder when it'd be your turn, how far are you along dear? Your tummy is looking pudgy"
Then she proceeds to rub my belly with a wide, nigh-toothless grin.
Needless to say I, was positively aghast.
"Exsqueeeze me?
I fiercely blurted out (I was gonna say 'excuse me' but my mouth was full), before I gave her a long and scathing lesson about fat-shaming, the Patriarchy and sexism. After I was done, she was all immature about it and almost started to cry, and then my mom comes in and is all like mad, at ME? WTF old people , what’s wrong with y’all, did someone piss in your cereal in the, like, 80’s or something? Go listen to some calming music why don’t you? Oh wait, I forgot , you don’t even know what Spotify is. Suck it.
Sure, I mean I know shes born in like 1877, but she’s been through two World Wars against women and she is still spouting these Victorian sentiments?
Newsflash Phyllis, this isn’t one of your old Jane Fonda novels when like all women were maids and were like “thee” and “thy” and “thou”. The modern narrative is “Gay-Pride vs Prejudice, nothing else ‘thoe’. OK!?
And besides, my cousin Nathan “Shawty”, (he’s only 5'11 ), was laughing all throughout this spectacle. Why didn’t Auntie Phyllis ask him if he was pregnant? He’s twenty-six and at least 20 pounds overweight, the fat, red headed bastard. This is only one of many double-standards facing modern women, especially twenty-something women of color and lesbian persuasion. This is deeply problematic. In fact, it is so problematic that I am getting so tired of it the problems it’s causing.
This whole episode got me thinking about stuff, such as this witty line: “you can take a hike, if you’re not comfortable with me not ever pushing out a grubby tyke”, along with these 9 reasons why I’m never gonna have kids. Never Ever.
1. They're for old people
First of all, I am twenty-three. I am not some mossy twenty-seven year old who’s working a 9 to 5 job and paying bills and stuff. I am young and free and I have far too much fun in my daily life to even consider creating a little mini-Anne at the moment. I am still in college for chrissake, my Women’s Studies Major is still the little baby in my tummy that I’m going to give birth to pretty soon, is it so hard to comprehend that I don’t want some little brat trying to compete with my degree for my attention?
It seems like only boring old people who don’t party have children. I don’t plan to be old anytime soon.
After college I want to devote my time to crushing the Patriarchy full time, not have a product of it crying from a cot up in my crib, like the Patriarchal and Mexican-shaming symbol, Jesus of the Christ. This would make me very unstable. I can just imagine, lighting a few scented candles, mixing a couple of Bloody Marys, getting ready to have a foursome with three totally cute Phil Major star students at my apartment, only to have the kid barge in, thinking it is a Golden moment to make me look like a giant Ass. Everyone goes on about kids being such angels, but I know, first hand that it is their primary goal(iath) to suck all myrrth from your soul. Trust me, I Noah.
God I’m clever.
2., The patriarchy expects you to
It’s all over TV and the Internet. Women. having. babies. You can’t even escape it IRL. Every day, in the streets, at the mall, at the bar, I see all these women milling about with big preggo-bellies and I just can’t help but to cringe. Do you not realize that this is exactly what the Patriarchy wants you to do? Do you realize that you’re contributing to society's beliefs that women are only good for having buns in their ovens, (in both respects). All you’re doing is following a road-map of what your life should be like laid out by old, white cis men from like the 11th century Before Jesus of the Christ was born, I literally have to hold myself back from confronting these women about their choices in life when I see them in the street.
I get the maddest when I see young women holding their own personal Chucky dolls. WTF? You’re in your twenties, you’re supposed to have fun, mess around and get down and dirty with a new hot guy every weekend, not be tied down by a bawling, boring little toddler. Save that for when you’re like thirty-five, if you must. Feminists didn’t fight long and hard so that could just give in to Patriarchy and have a baby at twenty-four without having fulfilled your career aspirations yet. Ever since the suffragettes, the Women’s rights movement has fought tooth and nail to give you the opportunity to choose the right thing. So, for shame young moms, you’re letting down women everywhere and you make me hurl. (I’m calling you out Mullen).
3. They're smelly & messy
Have you ever been near one of these critters? If your answer is yes, then you know that they smell like a trash can full of used diapers, like all the time. Some of them don’t even know how to go to the toilet, so they just dookie and piss wherever they feel comfortable. Seriously? I know they’re like little and not very bright and all that, but can you be more selfish? Am I supposed to take care of that now? Do you really think I have no respect for myself? Do you think I’ll degrade myself to the degree of cleaning up someone elses shit? Because you sure don’t seem to be willing to lift a lazy little finger about it? Over. My. Dead. Body.
My cousin Laura asked me to watch her kid Benedict (stupid name, I know, but she named him after some True Detective actor) a few months ago. She offered me good money for the trouble, so I made the mistake of doing it.
You should have been there. OMG, this kid, could like, hardly get the baby food into his mouth, and he needed a bib because food was falling everywhere. I totally didn’t know what to do, he got stuff all over his hands and face and totally looked like something out of the “The Crawling Dead” at the end of it. I was sending snapchatting with Liz and Brenda all throughout this and they thought it was hysterical. I guess It was like, bearable and even kinda funny, until I started smelling pee from his diaper. I was like, nu-uh, I’m not changing that, I am not a fucking butler, so I pretended that I hadn’t smelt it when Laura came home and complained about Benedick sitting in his own wee-wee.
It wasn’t all bad though. I got a great Instagram selfie with Benedict, where I look like really sweet, motherly and totally goodie-to-choose, I got like 74 likes in an hour, and Tony texted me all like , “wanna come over and watch a movie?”
Let’s just say we got a bit smelly & messy too. In a good way though.
4. They're dumb
Benedict didn’t seem like the sharpest tool in the shed and that’s a pattern I’ve noticed among two year olds. His speech was slurred and incoherent, kinda like Tony’s, when he is drunk, but more like high-pitched, childish and less cute. Like, of course, he’s a kid, but I’m pretty sure that I was reading Harry Potter and the Goblin of Fire when I was two. I can’t really remember, cuz this was in the 1900’s, (OMG, now I feel old), but yeah I remember being one of the smartest kids around.
Benedict wanted me to read a kids book about a Lion named Leo, but after flicking through it, I realized that there were only two female characters in the book as opposed to 5 males, so I downloaded a more tolerant E-book called “ The SCUM manifesto” and read it to him instead. He didn’t seem to follow the story at all and got really occupied with trying to touch my breasts instead. This is evidence that socially constructed gender roles start affecting kids very young, I wouldn't be surprised if this kid is already a budding men’s rights activist, only hindered by his inability to speak.
I don’t know, Benedict was just a total dummy. They all seem to be.
5. Because pregnancy
Gosh. This one is a no-brainer. Who wants to go around feeling fat and bloated for 9 months? Pregnancy seems like, so dull. Apparently, you’re not allowed to drink, do drugs or ride rides in amusement parks? It’s like the Patriarchy decided that pregnancy was to be the ultimate killer of fun for women, just to make our lives even more miserable. What are you supposed to do during weekends if you can’t go out with the girls, have a few drinks and a few lines in the bathroom stall? Sit at home and rub your belly and watch boring documentaries about Animals and whatnot on Discovery Planet for nine months? Your youth is about having fun, it’s all about you, you’re on the road on your own, why on Earth would you attach a side car and put a crying little thing in it? It just doesn’t make sense. Can you even do it when you're pregnant, doesn’t the baby like, get all knocked in the head by the dong? If I was preggers the kid would come out like totally retarded if Tony or Jamal got in there, that’s for sure.
Also, what would even happen if you did have a few drinks when you’re preggers? Wouldn't it be funner for the baby in the stomach? It must be so dark and boring in there, why not share some joy through the placenta or whatever? I don’t think the baby is gonna be all retarded from a few drinks, maybe it’ll have a hangover when it comes out for a day or two, but that’s nothing an Advil and sunglasses can’t fix.
Pregnancy sucks.
6. Because it could be a boy
OK so I don’t know if you can like see if its a boy or girl in the Ulterior sound, but there’s always a risk that you’re gonna have a boy. Me and my Women’s studies friends and teachers have this running gag, whenever someone is pregnant we ask “Is it a girl or an abortion?”. Yeah, okay, maybe that’s a bit mean, but I somewhat agree. Do you really want to raise a boy? You know what boys eventually become, right? That’s it, Men.
For the first years you’ll have this wild little thing that you constantly have to keep away from gender-targeted toys that the patriarchy is telling them to play with, such as Star Wars Lego and cars and try to get them to play with Barbies and kitchen stoves instead.
Then it’ll grow up, it’s voice will break , making it sound like a donkey and it will start to smell of sweat from its armpits. Before long it will start objectifying women by ogling at them in Bikinis and finally it’ll become a full-fledged Patriarchy-partisan who is a part of the growing rape-culture. I don’t want to endorse any of this, so I would never even consider raising a boy.
If you are unlucky enough to get a boy though, remember to steer it away from masculinity and raise him to respect and love women of all shapes, colors and sizes.
7. Because I wanna be free
This one is simple. I don’t want to have to prioritize anyone else ahead of myself. I am not a soccer mom. Period.
8. Because I wanna have a career
After I graduate from college, the world is going to be even more of a fragrant oyster than it is today. Equipped with my Women’s studies major, nothing is going to stop me from getting my dream job in some high-paying, prestigious field of employment. Apart. From. One. Thing. Can you guess what? Unless, you’re as dumb as Benedict, you guessed it, a kid. Is there anything more disempowering to an empowered woman in her twenties, than having to sacrifice your own pleasure and time to care for some problematic little bundle of “joy” that you’re not even sure is your own? I am gonna say NO.
If you feel so fucking compelled to pass on your genes that you can’t keep your own ovaries in check, at least have the decency do it when you’re happy with your career, when you’re rich enough to buy all the cute shoes you want and when you’re on the board of a fortune 5000 company.
Somewhere between 40-45 is the ideal age to have a kid if you abso-fucking-lutely must have one. This is the age men will find you the most attractive according to hit-shows such as ‘Cougar Town’ and ‘The New Adventures of Old Christine’. This is the window wherein they will want to make the most babies with you. Some pseudo-scientific reports try to tell us women that we have a biological clock on us somewhere that is ticking somehow inside us that make it impossible to wait too long to have a baby. This is obviously bullshit. Have they even studied human anatomy? I have never heard as a much as a tick, and as far as I can tell there are no numbers anywhere on my body, (I’ve checked countless times). I believe this is hoax spread by the Patriarchy to try to get women to have babies early and be Man's eternal housewives. I see through your lies Patriarchy. Try a-fucking-gain.
9. Because I wanna travel
As a woman in her 20’s traveling is supremely important to me. If I could choose between a 20 billion dollars and 20 travels, I would choose the 20 travels. Without. A. Doubt.
Being a 20-something woman, I love to travel because traveling can really open up your eyes, especially if you’re a woman who has lived for between 20 and 29 years on this Earth, like myself. But, traveling as a woman in her 20’s can however, be problematic, to say the least, especially if you have a child.
I have witnessed this firsthand. Last spring break, on the plane to Cancun, I was chillin' with a glass of white whine watching Pretty Little Liars season 3 on the little screen on the chair in front of me, when , suddenly, I heard an ear-shattering shriek. I turned around to see a woman, who looked to be in her 20s, cradling a screaming little baby. The sight disgusted me to say the least, I actually think this is the moment when I decided to never have baby. When I told her to get it to stop crying, she looked all offended and started arguing with me. It got kinda heated, and eventually some other jackasses started defending, not me, but her. Even Gemma, a fellow woman in her 20’s, tried to tell me that what I was doing was wrong and that I was causing a scene, but I was adamant and fierce in my arguments. Eventually, a stewardess who was not in her 20s and obviously not an ally of women everywhere, told me to shut up or they would land the plane in the ocean and literally throw me off. Bitch.
That’s just one example of having a kid when traveling can cause big problems.
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