Women’s friendships occupy significance due to choice, shared history and having things in common – a particular commonality being motherhood. There has been an increase in the number of individuals who do not have children for many reasons, whether health, choice or simply circumstance. People also spend a lengthy proportion of their life without children because of having them later in life.
Despite this, those who have children and those who do not are continually pitted against one another, and having children is a societal ‘norm’. We were interested in understanding this experience alongside women’s friendships. We analysed posts on several boards on the popular parenting forum Mumsnet.
Ordinary childfree and childless lives
Posts on Mumsnet by those who had children and those who did not provoke debate, and were used to make sense of their own choices and speculate about other people. For example, one poster asked: ‘Do you ever wonder why people don’t have children?’ Despite the social trends that suggest more people are choosing not to have children, motherhood continues to be presented as the norm. Posters resisted this: ‘Why does no one ever ask why a woman DID have children? Or why a man did/didn’t have children? Why is it automatically assumed that the default for women is children and any woman who deviates from this must be some tragic figure?’
We observed that decisions about whether to have children were paralleled with mundane, everyday choices and that this framing was used to reduce the stigma of being childless by choice: ‘I don’t want children in the same way I didn’t want the fish cakes when I went out for dinner last week. I don’t like fish so I simply skipped past that menu option and had a nice bit of belly pork instead. I just don’t want children. No angst, no handwringing, no biological clock. Just wanted not to have them.’ ‘All the childfree women who have careers, travel, or have amazing hobbies. Nope. Some of us just sit around eating biscuits.’
Friendships
The posts we analysed reveal the significant impact of having children (or not) on friendships. Posters sought advice on managing specific friendships and expressed sadness over losing friendships and loneliness when friends have children at different points, or not at all. The posts highlighted the challenges encountered, for example, the dilemma of whether or not to have children, how women are placed in opposition to one another, and the attendant loneliness for both groups: ‘I don’t want kids but it’s still a lonely place to be, and there’s a feeling of being ‘left behind’. I have a few childfree friends left and I have to admit that I’m keeping my fingers crossed that they stay childfree… ‘ ‘I’m 23 with a 3 year old and I have absolutely zero friends. I’m lonelier now than I’ve ever been, just let those life stage friends go.’
Online support
Online spaces such as Mumsnet provide important support, particularly for ‘taboo’ feelings which can be difficult to discuss in real life, for example, jealousy of a friend whose IVF treatment has worked. It provides a useful resource for making choices and for giving posters the freedom to express feelings about those who have children and those who do not, and for users to get a window into others’ experiences. As one poster remarked: ‘Having one child turned me into a “secondary childfree” person. I want to experience being a mum but I’m also really looking forward to having my old life back once she grows up’.
However, it is also important to be mindful that having or not having children is not always a result of a choice and can simply be one of circumstances. Even the need to highlight one’s identity as childfree or childless is problematic. Doing so suggests that having children is the ‘norm’ and it is usually more expected of women than it is of men. While we acknowledge that Mumsnet was initially targeted at mothers, it has broadened out to a general discussion forum with a diverse range of users and the posts we analysed included those who did not have children – including those childfree by choice. Why should individuals define themselves by an absence if they do not want to?
For women, motherhood (or not) has one of the most significant impacts on friendships. Increased awareness of the different ways to live lives could enhance social support for both those who do and those who do not have children. It is also worth remembering that even individuals who may end up being parents spend a large portion of their lives without children, and elements of childfree/less lives are likely to return. It is important not to frame those who do not have children as a problem. The grief of infertility is real, and an already hard experience is arguably made more painful by cultural ideals which suggest a successful woman is one who has children. Marking childfreeness or childlessness as ordinary has the potential to reduce the stigma that is sometimes experienced and draw attention to shared common ground. Placing emphasis on the difference between those who have children and those who do not risk reducing individuals to a single identity, ignoring commonalities and putting women’s relationships with each other at risk.
Mel Hall is a Senior Lecturer in Childhood Studies at Manchester Metropolitan University. Jenny van Hooff is Reader of Sociology at Manchester Metropolitan University. She is Co-Director of the Contemporary Intimacies, Sexualities and Genders Research Group (CISG), and Department Research Lead.
Otherland: accounts of ordinary childless/freeness on Mumsnet by Mel Hall and Jenny van Hooff is available on Bristol University Press Digital here.
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