Losing the Happiness Wars
Years ago, the New York Times featured an essay by a professional abortion advocate who said she killed two of her three unborn children because she didn't want to "have to start shopping only at Costco and buying big jars of mayonnaise." It was a pretty horrifying read, needless to say. I thought of it when reading this very well-written Elle feature about a woman "selectively reducing" one of her twins -- after using fertility treatments. Neither she nor her husband, who already had a toddler, come off terribly well:
My husband was convinced that twins would radically change our lives for the worse. We’d have to leave our beloved neighborhood for a place with cheaper rents and better public schools—there was no way we could afford private education for three kids. We’d kiss goodbye any hope of career advancement, at least for the foreseeable future. To his list, I added the loss of my income, necessary to meet our expenses. I couldn’t see how I’d be able to resume working after the birth since we could never afford full-time help, and—no matter how well they napped—two infants wouldn’t leave much time for anything else.
Now if you support the unlimited right of women to end the life of her unborn child, I don't suppose it should depend on the reason. But you can't help but wonder who isn't upset by stories such as these.
It also brings to mind this wonderful essay by Mary Eberstadt about the silly trend of obsessing over parental happiness studies. She points out how parental happiness should not be gauged, for instance, while a nursing mother hasn't slept properly in months. (Today taught me that neither should it be measured during potty training!). But, she adds, ask someone battling Stage IV cancer if their children make them miserable:
So the real answer to that question about parental misery would seem to depend partly upon how the definition of happiness itself is rigged, and partly on where, exactly, the parents are located in the greater scheme of life.
And yet to leave the happiness wars with just those observations, true though they are, would be a mistake. For today’s fashionable misery over childrearing also has deeper roots in the long-running Western rebellion against the command to be fruitful and multiply.
Living under the terms of that rebellion, as most modern people have since the invention of the Pill fifty years ago, is incurring costs that are now only beginning to be understood. Parents today are older – and older parents, while richer, are also less energetic than younger ones, less patient, and more likely to get sick themselves. They are more likely than the parents before them to live away from extended family – nature’s original and still best answer to the eternal babysitting problem. They are also far more likely to have small families rather than large ones – thus also missing out on nature’s original and still best answer to the household drudgery problem, too.
I'm an older parent, who is less energetic, less patient, more prone to sickness, and who lives far away from my extended family. But, on the other hand, I am completely mystified when I read studies about parental happiness. I have enjoyed my entire life, but becoming a parent made everything better, more beautiful, more deeply enjoyed.
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Comments :
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
Lovely post, Mollie.
A few years ago, just after my paternal grandfather passed away, my father said that the one thing he has come to regret most is not having had more children (there are three of us kids in the family). He reasoned that for the last third or so of your life, your children come to represent the only thing that matters in life -- they fill your days with joy, they provide friendship, company, and care, and they represent a living legacy that will remain even when you, yourself no longer inhabit the earth. So the more, the merrier.
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
One excellent point made in this book, which I finished not long ago, is a reminder that women are born with all the eggs they'll ever have, so old mothers rely on old eggs. Older eggs are not only less likely to become fertilized but also more likely to contain defects. Thus, the cultural shift in late motherhood is at least partially to blame for a rise in genetic maladies.
Sadly, such maladies provide a strong rationalization for many mothers to kill their children.
Jun '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
If one class of human being is just a disposable blob, maybe too expensive to keep, or not perfect enough to keep, will any of us really be safe to be unproductive...or just unattractive? History says no, we're not safe. History says when it comes to the loss of human dignity, in for a pfennig, in for a mark.
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
Diane, a few years ago, I spent one holiday night at a bar with my four siblings and two sisters-in-law. One of the sisters-in-law was struck by the experience and said she was now intent on having a lot of kids "so they can walk into a bar with a crowd." Some motives are better than others, I suppose.
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
I am 63. I spent a good part of the day today with my father, 87, who is in pretty good health. Mom died a year ago. Dad's biggest challenge is that, never a smoker, he nonetheless lost his vocal chords to cancer. I spend Tuesdays with Dad. I make phone calls that are hard for him. I help him with some of his computer issues -- he's pretty literate for his age. We have lunch at one of several favorite places. I talk a lot; he very little. But we cherish the time together. We talk about my siblings living in other parts of the country. We talk about books he's reading. We talk about the political scene.
My Dad has told me more times than I can count (and my siblings) that we, and his grandchildren and great-grandchildren, are his greatest source of joy now.
I know young people who are choosing, unapologetically, not to have children in order to satisfy their own selfish, short-term desires. I expect that they will find in time that the seeds of selfishness sown in their youth will yield a bitter and unpalatable harvest in due season.
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
I don't think I've laughed more in my laugh than the last five years that I've been a parent. I don't classify myself as an older mom, since I have friends in their 40's who are first-time moms. But I appreciate that I'd would've had more energy to chase my boys at 24 than 34. But in my 20's, I bought into the idea that children would limit my career opportunities, hold me back and that that motherhood was drudgery. But I love being a mom. I get to rediscover the world every day with my kids and that is an immeasurable blessing. Mollie, I hear you on the potty training thing. I used this potty training method for my first born, and now using it on my second. Good luck and remember that they'll figure it out... eventually.
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
Just back from the mountains with my wife and kids. And what should greet me on Ricochet? This lovely but powerful post from Mollie--and comments, perhaps especially the account by Tom--as authentic and moving as anything I've read.
Thanks.
And Mary Eberstadt's right about the drudgery problem. Our three boys packed the cars before we left, unpacked them when we got there, and then repacked them when it came time to leave, sparing me a job I've always--let's be honest; who hasn't?--loathed.
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
If a bitter and unpalatable harvest is my due, so be it, it was my choice, but perhaps when this issue comes up we could spare a thought for men and women for whom childlessness isn't a choice? Statistically, there are probably more than a few among Ricochet members. Not all of them are women reaping a condign harvest for their selfish professional ambition. I'm hardly the sensitivity police, as you know, but would it not be a kindness to men and women who cannot have children to remember them when writing these things and give passing nod to the idea that not every childless life is barren of joy and meaning? Not only would this be kinder, it seems to me thus far true--although it's perfectly possible that I will revise this view in time.
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
Claire,
Thank you for your comments. We do tend to neglect the feelings of those for whom children -- or additional children -- are not a possibility. And we also can make it seem like the only right path in life involves a spouse and children -- when, of course, that's not true at all. Not for achieving a life with meaningful and healthy relationships or rich experiences or far-reaching importance.
Usually I think about this issue in terms of how brutal some parents can be about asserting the primacy of their particular approach (nursing over formula, private school over public, etc.) but it's also true that we do this about most all of our choices or stations in life.
In any case, thank you for the useful corrective.
Jul '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
You can always adopt.
Jun '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
Then you get a divorce, and you’re lucky if you see your kids once a year (and not for lack of trying on my part by the way). The point being that we are all responsible for our own happiness, children or no. One particularly bad night I set a time limit on my anger, self-pity, and general discontentedness by pledging to myself never to allow my ex, who had spoiled that day for me, to spoil another day of my life. Since then she has never done that despite her actively working to ruin my relationship with my children. So the moral of this story is that there are all kinds of happiness in the world, but only one of these is your own, and it has nothing to do with who or what surrounds you and everything to do with what is inside you. By any worldly standard my ex looks like the big winner, yet long years after our divorce she is still working at destroying my relationship with my kids, all, I presume, to ruin my life; and that, folks, will never happen.
Jun '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
I pass no judgment on those who choose not to have children, though I find the level of self-absorption horrifying when I hear that a person chose to abort one of two fetuses for lifestyle reasons.
I have five children, all grown, and seven grandchildren. There have been many times that the children were a complete pain in the posterior, but far more times when they brought me great joy. Sometimes we forget that one of the joys of parenting is that the children eventually turn into adults with whom you can have an adult conversation, which happens to coincide with the time they may begin to provide grandchildren--with grandchildren you get all of the fun of parenting with few of the responsibilities. You also get the joy of watching your own children have to play the role of parent. Revenge may be too strong a word, but "payback" describes it quite well.
There is also a certain existential joy that comes from the knowledge that when I die there are going to be some people who care (and whom I will miss).
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
I can't think in terms of a "happiness war". We seem more like a thirsty people in a desert, not "at war" for water but in a desperate search. And some are running off toward a mirage. There is nothing that we can say to dissuade them. It's terribly sad, really. I can't feel angry about it, just terribly sad.
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
I like that point, G.A.
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
Claire, the operative word is "choose". But lest you think me unsympathetic, my brother and his wife struggled mightily with a variety of medical interventions in their quest to have children. And so did a cherished niece and her husband. But it remains a choice: as Michael notes, there is always adoption. And for those with love to give, who needs it more?
And, Cas, I am very sympathetic, having been divorced myself and having lost, in the process, virtually all contact save formalities, with my own son. (However, I was later blessed in re-marriage with two beautiful daughters ... from whom all my six grandchildren.) I, too, went through an ugly period of time due to an ex. I can tell you now, 30+ years into a wonderful second marriage, that your determination not to give your ex (or anyone else) the ability to ruin your life is a very wise choice. Never let anyone live your life who cannot die your death.
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
It is absolutely not true that children are a choice. If you are unable to find a spouse, is it a "choice" to have children? Really? Beyond the fact that adoption may not be a legitimate choice for any number of other reasons.
I'd argue that looking at the blessing of children as a "choice" is part of the problem.
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
Mollie, you miss my point. Certainly there are people who CANNOT have children. I understand that. I tried to show that, at least second hand, I understand it within my own family experience. I am not, I have never been, talking about those people. Those people are deserving of our compassion.
Let me repeat what I originally said, for a clarifying reminder, "I know young people who are choosing, unapologetically, not to have children in order to satisfy their own selfish, short-term desires."
For the people I am talking about, it is most definitely a choice. It is a choice of short-term satisfaction over long-term satisfaction....whether those young people understand it, or can anticipate their future as an old person, or not.
1/2
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
It is certainly their choice. But has it not always been the responsibility of the older and more experienced in society to pass along to the younger in society the lessons they will need to know? Would the parents of an 8-year old allow them to choose whether or not they should attend school? Of course, not. An 8-year old cannot appreciate what it would be like to have to move through adult life without being able to read or do basic math.
Might it not be that a person who has lived into their 80s might have a perspective on the older years that is not immediately apparent to someone with but 2 or 3 decades under their belt?
Everyone gets to "pay their money and take their choice." But the consequences of choice are not always apparent at the time of choosing.
2/2
Jun '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
A very thoughtful post and many great responses. South Korea just had it's economy put on notice by the government that because of falling birth rates the market will simply start shrinking. Same rational of not buying real estate in Japan.
I am a short term bear on the US, but long term our immigration and christian base that does have kids, make us winners.
Although to be sad is to read about that horrible woman in Elle.
May '10
Re: Losing the Happiness Wars
Great thread at a very appropriate time for me. I lost my beloved grandmother on the 12th and am adjusting my life to care for my grandfather now that he has lost his wife of 70 years. I can't even imagine what it's like for the elderly who don't have children and grandchildren.
I'm also extremely sympathetic to those dealing with the nasty efforts of an ex-spouse to damage their relationship with their kids. As wonderful and special as it was to become a father and start to grow into the role, as good as it felt, it hurts that much and more to be removed from the same darling child's life. Parents alienated from their kids suffer a more cruel fate than those who lose their kids to tragedies, as it's a loss that can never be laid to rest or offer any closure. It's basically a living bereavement, and Cas's story is one that I'm more than familiar with.
I certainly never shied away from the move into adulthood, but I've ended up in the same situation as those my age who did.