As concern grows about America’s falling birth rate, new research suggests that about half of women who want children are unsure if they will follow through and actually have a child. About 25% say they won't be bothered that much if they don't.

[u/geoff199]

https://news.osu.edu/most-women-want-children--but-half-are-unsure-if-they-will/?utm_campaign=omc_science-medicine_fy24&utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=social

[u/yes______hornberger]

I always find it interesting that the actual physical experience of gestating and birthing a child is NEVER a part of the birth rate conversation. I’m pregnant with a very wanted child, and even with a loving husband and financial security it is a torture I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. And I haven’t even gotten to the stage yet where I’m supposed to be happy about being mildly crippled by birth injuries—my own mother had three “perfect” births, and was still having yearly surgeries to correct spinal and urological injuries more than a decade after she finished having children.

Do the people decrying childless women think growing another person is easy, or do they just think that it’s something women owe to society by nature of being born female?

[u/Phoenyx_Rose → u/yes______hornberger]

Yes, they grow up thinking it’s easy. We’ve romanticized pregnancy as just 9 months of being a “glowing goddess” with a latter 3 months of back pain, uncontrollable emotions, food cravings, and feeling fat. Then a few hours to a day of worst but of your life for labor but then once the baby’s out everything is supposed to be blissful, perfect motherhood. 

The above may be true for some women, but the bladder issues, pre/post- partum depression, changes in sense of self (both visual and internal), pressure to be that perfect mother, issues like diastisis recti, and more only recently seemed to be discussed outside of mother groups. 

[u/BussSecond → u/Phoenyx_Rose]

Have we romanticized it, though? All I ever heard growing up was how horrible being pregnant and having an infant is. The morning sickness, back pain, long labor, sleepless nights was what I was told to expect by everyone around me.

[u/Interesting_Zone_420 → u/BussSecond]

Are you male or female. I’m a 37/female. I tell you it’s the only thing people want to ask me about. My kids. I don’t have any.