GOING INTO THE HOLIDAYS as a NMNK : ARE YOU DEPRESSED?

For those of you who, like me, are NMNK, there's a chance that the holidays will feel a bit more lonely than alone. There's nothing wrong with feeling lonely sometimes.  Everyone does feel that once in a while if not a lot, as part of the human condition.  It's a mystery, why we are here!

If you've been reading NMNK then you know that I don't think being NEVER MARRIED NO KIDS is always or should be lonely, but everyone's circumstances are different. For some those circumstances are brief, and for others it goes on.

I was recently reading about suicide, about mental and emotional conditions that require intervention or what is called "professional help."  Apparently suicide has been the way out of an unhappy experience in life, especially for teens, YouTube "influencers," veterans, and so very many other people who just can't take their lives anymore, in increasing rates. Holidays, with the emphasis on family, friends - relationships, and merriment that can be and feel forced, makes it all more unbearable.

(In the past I wrote about what it was to show up at a relatives house for a Thanksgiving dinner only to find out that without my knowledge or permission a man who needed a wife had been asked to attend to meet me.)

Although this blog has always had the intent to share and tell others who are NMNK "You Are Not Alone," and although I know the statistics of those who are in the NMNK Lifestyle, are going up steadily,and so I feel there is overall more support for NMNK as a lifestyle CHOICE, I worry that a reader might be tackling loneliness all alone.

You see, I can only offer you the insight coming from experience, but I'm not posing as a professional when it comes to depression or any other mental state that might result in a person feeling so not understood, so discriminated against, so very alone in this life that that person also feels it's a life not worth living. (As well, I realize some people are at the end of their lives, in medical crisis, or do not want to go on in pain.) 

Also, I do think that the whole psychology profession has become overblown and there are a whole lot of people in it seeking clients. 

I was walking down the street to do some shopping a few months ago when I passed a homeless services building and encountered people outside it who were soliciting people to enter into a program they had government funding for. I said I was not interested and damn it, one of the men started with "We know there's a STIGMA attached to mental illness but all you have to do is go to therapy..."  And I was thinking "I'm just walking by this place!" (Maybe they were not even attached to the nonprofit housed inside that building?) I kept walking.  (I don't think every homeless person is mentally ill.  I think the extreme cost of living has done a lot of people in.)

Three times in my life I've encouraged friends who were clearly moving into mental illness (or had been for a while) to give therapy a try, and in each case the person was insulted enough, or not good with being found out - even by someone who had stuck by them for years, that I was ghosted. (Did that hurt. Yes, though in two cases my accepting that they were ill gradually also helped me accept that they would not have me in their lives if I wasn't an enabler.)

Frankly, sometimes what a person needs is not a paid professional to listen to them rant their problems, but a good friend or two. Sometimes just having some places to go and things to do is enough to change the mood.  Participation!

Being worthy of the NMNK label is a Choice for many, like me, but it is also by Fate. Some people really want to be married and/or have children and just cannot find a partner. For those of us who are perhaps "Old Fashioned" enough to think that relationships should happen "organically" rather than turn into desperate hunts, there is an acceptance of one's natural self being one that is not partnered.

There is plenty of advice out there about how to get partnered and it's not the topic of this blog but I just want to say I do understand what it is to not have life turn out as you might have planned.  But then, plans change, don't they?  (An old quote goes something like "We plan, God Laughs.") I recall years ago a friend who married and apparently found it was not to her liking within a year, but stayed in there, mocking me because the things I apparently said I wanted as a girl, things I had long forgotten, had changed.

As for having children, you know I strongly advocate that a person must understand the fact that children have many needs and deserve many things and it is up to the parents - not the government - to provide.

I've seen what happens when people who are not qualified to have and raise children have them and lived long enough to see what happens to that child as an adult. 

Being able to self-examine and determine your life can be a difficult thing especially when you know in your deepest self that your choices go against the traditions. (I once had a friend who was near menopause, had not had a relationship in years, and who was just barely getting by financially who was still talking wanting to have a child some day. I had to think she was not facing reality.) If seeing your family during the holidays includes meeting up with people who clearly do not respect your choices, you might select to not go.

If you are prone to depression consider that Covid-19 restrictions and conditions in the world that you are part of but not in charge of are certainly a reason. So many activities we used to do or had options to participate in were closed down or gone into the "virtual" which is not at all the same as personal interactions. This past summer some of these places and events attempted to restart with very little attendance. I believe that getting out of the house and sometimes out of town for a couple days can be all it takes to move past a gloomy outlook.

However, I've also been forced to rethink some of the relationships I'd put time and energy as well as heart into, in the past. I realized that I'd kept relationships that were no longer worth that time, energy, and heart. And that some friends probably thought I was also not worth keeping. And also that I was not easily making new friends. 

Did these relationships end in a confrontation or blow up?  No, nothing that dramatic.  In actuality, both political and religious incompatibility were impactful. Never have I found it more difficult to encounter people who are tolerant or moderate, able to have friendships with people who are not exactly birds of a feather. In friendship one seeks commonality.

It also has to do with having things in common and how much time a person has to spend. No doubt about it, those who are partnered seem to have less time for those who are not. Those who have children feel they have more in common with those who do also do. Having and raising children seems to take every bit of their time and energy so NMNK can be sidelined by them. (Or you may be invited into or kept into their lives to help them with childcare.)

This may surprise you, but I've been devoted to keeping friends who, I realized, had me in their lives only for a purpose.  And sometimes the assumption that because a person is NMNK leads others to think that we have lots of time available to do things for them as part of that friendship.

If you find yourself alone and feeling down during the holidays consider this:

There is usually a lot of "pop up" volunteer work to do, that does not require testing, applications, interviews, or education. Sometimes their usual volunteers get busy elsewhere during the holidays so maybe it's time to roll up your sleeves at a food bank or help set up for an event at a senior living place or help pick citrus from neighborhood trees to be donated.

Consider attending public concerts and events.

Try a new coffee house and have a lively chat.

Take a walk in nature.

Don't forget to invite friends. Make that recipe you're known for!

Dine out alone! 

Sister

ARE YOU SOMEONE WHO DISCOVERED YOU CANNOT HAVE CHILDREN ? ARE YOU HAPPILY INFERTILE?

 Are you a person who has learned that for some biological reason you cannot have children and are PERFECTLY FINE WITH THAT?

The media is full of stories of people who heroically go through medical intervention so they can conceive or carry their "OWN" children.  But what of those who learned they could not have children and thought "That's fine with me!"

I would love to hear from those of you who accepted your body or your fate, rather than fight being childless.  I know this is bit different than being CHILDLESS BY CHOICE...

I know you may have options such as adopting, becoming a step-parent, fostering or in some other way you can create a parenting experience for yourself, but what if you DON'T WANT TO?

And as we NMNK's know, there are many ways to love others and to be a nurturer or a teacher.

Sister

THE JEALOUSY OF THOSE BURDENED BY CHILDREN - IT TAKES STRENGTH TO REMAIN NMNK WITH SO MUCH PRESSURE TO MARRY

Although sometimes being NMNK is portrayed as selfishness - or complete freedom - that fact is anyone human has connections to other humans and some sort of duty or obligation. 

For instance, it is my observation that it is often the child who has no children or the child who is the only child or the oldest or the youngest who may have delayed or given up having a partner who takes on the care of aging parents. It's true that those with children, if they are responsible human beings, will do their best to raise those children to become honorable adults.  Sometimes the siblings who have marriages and children are the ones who expect the NMNK to take on the parents.

This morning when I thought about writing on this subject - the jealousy I've experienced because I'm NMNK - I thought of a particular relative of mine who in a traditional way seems to have, if not all, a whole lot more than me.

Her parents paid for her college education, she became a teacher, and while teaching met a much older and wealthy man who was divorced.  Not saying they didn't both work hard or were not deserving, but soon enough they bought property and started building a dream home.  The husband was responsible to his ex wife and children by her, and proceeded to have three children with my relative.  Their children were raised knowing their half-siblings and consider them family.  She wanted land, a dream home, and children.  In fact, she seemed to think that this was only natural.  Her children are healthy, smart, and also have had the advantage of education.  They all seem to be doing quite well.  After they were well raised, she went back to college and earned an advanced degree.  She lives on horse property and her much older husband is still alive.  I'm sure many people envy her.  She can sometimes come off as princessy or snobby.  She once said, "I got everything I wanted."

Yet, one time when I admitted I was having a difficult time, she sent me a one liner in the mail.

It said, "YOU'RE SINGLE! YOU CAN GO ANYWHERE!" I felt the sting that was intended.

Did she not know that I did not have her advantages?

Actually I could not go anywhere, not even on vacation.  I could not have afforded to up and move just anywhere, or even to the closest city. I did not have sponsorship or contacts.  I was stuck financially.  It's not true that being NMNK means you will have a career or earn enough money.  However, I was determined to not marry if it meant being significantly compromised and the men when I was still interested in dating, were not for me - nor me for them.

In fact, I think - still think - that society is set up to force women into relationships with men for their own survival. Anything as exploitative as prostitution and being sex trafficked to staying married to an abuser to simply being not paid as well as men in the same employment and not able to make it on one's own.  This is reflected in also being poor or poorer and not being able to retire.

Over time I've seen how people who want to get married and have children seem to think that at about  age 26 one should take whatever or whomever they can get, just to partner and get started.  I think this attitude is one of the reasons there is so much divorce.  Really, if you cannot afford to raise children on your own, you might consider not having any because so many of you will end up being the sole support. 

I know that more of you are being responsible about having children with partners because so very many people who want children but see the need to afford them reportedly delayed having children during the uncertainty of Covid.  I know that no-one is perfect.  I also know people can grow and change.

However, I can testify that every one of the men I had as platonic friends or dated briefly, who illustrated some serious flaw, including being horribly sexist, opportunistic or a user, or who had personality disorders or some form of mental illness that went unaddressed or untreated, every one of them has married someone.  I don't know anything about these relationships.  However, if these men did not change their thinking or their ways or get help, what of these women?

One time a woman friend told me it was better socially to be divorced than to be NMNK and I think that's sad.  

The pressure to be married is strong.

But it takes a person who is strong to remain NMNK as the best choice as well.

UGLY PORTRAYAL OF A SPINSTER

This came up when I put the word SPINSTER

into the search engine... 

She is unsmiling and therefore portrayed as unhappy.  The term comes from one of the earliest opportunities women had who were "skilled labor." Spinning yarn and thread to be woven into clothing, pre Industrial Age machinery.  Now a fine and rare art. The term indicated that the poor woman would have to earn her own living.  Though the clothing is from the pre 1920's age of beginning liberation, today the term SPINSTER is still used to describe women who remain unmarried - with a negative judgement of them for their lack of conformity to the norms. Bachlorette is an improvement. Never Married No Kids - NMNK - is the best term for women and men who remain unmarried and childless.

Things have changed though.  

It used to be that a woman who showed her intelligence was an undesirable partner.  As a result education opportunities were limited or nonexistent. The term "BLUESTOCKING" was used for women who showed their intelligence. Women were raised to be dependent and go into marriages they could not escape.  What a horrible way to be forced into 'faithfulness' and 'loyalty.

Even elite women went to school only to be turned into wives and mothers.  A little needlepoint.  A little French.  But not math or science.

Now so many are depending on themselves and so many are the sole earners supporting and raising children. More men are looking to be stay at home dads and be supported by their wives who have education and careers. 

C 2023  Never Married No Kids - BlogSpot

MOTHERS REPORT THEIR REGRET OVER HAVING CHILDREN

DAILY MAIL (UK) ONLINE : FEMALE : WOMEN REPORT REGRET AT HAVING CHILDREN 

The reluctant parents, from around the world, have shared their stories anonymously in a Facebook group called I REGRET HAVING CHILDREN...

Loss of freedom, difficult decisions, feeling trapped, having children they didn't want...

I feel for them, but not having children, if you want them, is probably worse,

IT USED TO BE NEAR IMPOSSIBLE TO CONTROL YOUR FERTILITY

Many women died in childbirth or after giving birth. While no contraception is 100% reliable, especially because human beings aren't reliable, THE FIRST THING WE SHOULD BE DOING IS PRACTICING SAFER SEX. But even if you are sure of your sex partner, and they of you, unless you are ready, willing, and able to bring a child into this world, raise it and support that child to maturity, using CONTRACEPTION is the way to go. DOUBLING UP ON METHODS can increase your chances of successfully preventing pregnancy and abortion. This means using condoms along with another method.  It requires the cooperation of both partners.

ABORTION IS NASTY BUSINESS - SO IS CHILD BIRTH! BIOLOGY SHOULD NOT BE DESTINY : SISTER SPEAKS

It's funny, but when I was a teen, a teacher who was educating her students about debate had us pick a topic and take a side. It didn't have to be the side we were on, but a side.  My best friend in the class took pro-abortion and I went against. She was a genius and more sophisticated about women's liberation - feminism - at that point in our lives.She had the voice of authority while I simply said Abortion is wrong because it is wrong and it is gross.

Now, we are in the complete opposite corners.

She used to say she hated babies, but then maybe that was because after school she had to take care of her little sister who had come as a surprise in her parent's dying marriage.  She also made more money per hour taking care of children for a single mother who had to work than I did working as a cashier and seemed to be upset that the father of these children provided no support even though he had been married to the woman. As an adult, my old friend has been married and the mother of four for some time and rarely has a moment for our friendship. She's become a religious person and no doubt thinks women like me are sinners. You could say that she is no longer a feminist.

I remember as a teen going against abortion because it was and is nasty. At the time there was no abortion pill and young women in my high school seemed to be getting pregnant with ease also because they had no contraception and the young men were also as foolish.  Some had their babies and quit school, with some promise that they could go on living with parents who helped them. Some parents demanded the baby be born and be put up for adoption elsewhere or sent their daughter out of state to do the same. Some parents took their daughter to another state where she could get an abortion that was beyond the three month point.  One pitiful girl took herself to New York for the same reason, the waiting time about her having to earn the money to pay for it and to travel.  I can only think of how lonely and frightened she must have been.

My classmates were without parents who told them about sex or contraception and some of them seemed to use abortion instead of contraception. All of this scared the hell out of me and I was determined to avoid sex.

I saw pictures of aborted fetus including cut up ones in a pan.  Still grosses me out.  I could never ever work in nursing or any profession that requires gross. I could barely dissect a worm in biology class. I would not be able to eat meat if I had to hunt or slaughter. I admit it. 

What I was NOT well educated on was how dangerous, painful, life-threatening, and otherwise icky childbirth is. During the teenage debate my friend said "All surgeries are gross." She was right.

Nothing unites us with the animal mammal kingdom than the realities of childbirth. It's an experience I never wanted to have, an experience I feared, even if just about every woman I knew growing up had gone through it.  I wasn't sure I'd become an NM but I was sure I wasn't interested in having children.  This has been interpreted as my hating children but I do not hate children.  It's just that I'm not gooey about children.  I don't think they are all cute. I also think they deserve and need a whole lot more than most get.  (Although encounters with the spoiled brats leaves me thinking that some are demanding and unappreciative and too precious.)

I read on a blog recently a young mother complaining about how painful and damaged her nipples were from  breast-feeding and the frustration of having a baby who was not gaining weight despite all her trials of attempting to feed it.  Further she'd had a traumatic birth and was becoming an advocate for other women. She said the birth was so traumatic (she meant horrible) that it changed her consciousness. 

Nature designed women to bear this trauma and all else until we die.  A very small percentage of women made it to ever go through a menopause. I had sympathy for young woman but I also hoped she would realize she is no 'natural mother' and make sure she had ended the possibility that she would put herself through this again.

The great number of women leaving their children orphaned; that was an initial reason why some contraception advocates were active a century ago.  Even spacing children so that a woman could potentially recover from a birth and feed her latest infant became controversial.  All of it - including death - were supposed to be 'natural' meaning fateful.  Biology was to be our destiny. I knew I didn't want it to be mine.

Though much of European history, women who were without a husband trying to have a child on their own or because they were widowed were almost forced to marry someone else quickly or become prostitutes or sometimes went to a "work house." In other cultures a man could have more than one wife, so long as he could afford them all.

Contraception, including sterilization and legal abortion changed that. If a person is willing to use these.  If a person is able to get health services.  If a person is able to get a legal abortion, which is the safer alternative to other methods.  If only...

What Anti-Abortion advocates do not care about is the MOTHER. Quite possibly the MOTHER OF OTHER CHILDREN ALREADY. Quite possibly someone who cannot have a relationship without being sexually active but who cannot herself or with a partner afford to raise a child. What about women who are abused but stay in relationships because they can't afford to raise their children alone?

Why is our government making CHILDBEARING regardless of a woman's self determination MANDITORY?  Aren't there already enough people on earth?

This is why I became PRO-CHOICE and still am.

C 2022 Never Married No Kids - BlogSpot

 

DID AN EARLY HEARTBREAK STOP YOU FROM DATING EVER AGAIN?

Sister has this question for you.  

Did an early heartbreak stop you from dating ever again?

I had a friend who had an engagement broken while she was in college.  She has never dated again.  To be honest, she also overate and became obese.  Still, she is an educated and beautiful woman and many people who are obese date and marry.

SOLOGAMY! KSAMA BINDU - INDIAN BLOGGER - MARRIES SELF

DAILY MAIL - INDIAN BLOGGER MARRIES SELF - SOLOGAMY! 

Excerpt: The 24 year old says the marriage will be 'a deep act of self-acceptance' and she will dedicate herself to a life of 'self love,' before taking herself for a two-week honeymoon around the southern state of Goa.

THE SINGLE KILLER - A TRAGIC COMEDY

SINGLE?  Then you must be SUSPECT!

ANOTHER ATTACK ON ME FOR BEING AN NMNK : SISTER SPEAKS

You haven't heard from me for a while.  

The reason is that I took a part time job in August, which for about a month in December turned into a full-time job. I went into it with hope, as I, like many of you, have been negatively affected by the Covid shut down experience.  For all the news that there are plenty of jobs, well, I think there are certain kinds of jobs that are available in some places, but the good jobs, people clung to.  So, I took this job in part because I needed to earn money and in part because they made certain 'promises' about the future that to me sounded good.

My immediate boss was a woman who upon meeting me started bragging about one of her children. I didn't realize she was baiting me to talk about my personal life. I wasn't ready to get into a 'tell all' chat with her.  It was soon clear that she had no respect for me or appreciation of my very hard work.  I soon knew I was doing the job of 2 people, sometimes 3, but I held onto their promise that soon I would be working full time and at a livable wage.  I knew from the way they were set up that probably that meant I would work in other departments with other people.  From others I learned that she was from a family of five children and the only daughter, and that she had married a high school sweetheart and had four sons. She wanted for nothing. Her husband had a successful business, she did not 'have' to work, but she wanted to. She was a volunteer who had taken on a big project.

For a few months I came home exhausted every day and my hope dwindled.  I kept my behavior professional, ignoring her taunts, but one day I felt myself shaking.  Two other women showed up to work, I thought for the holidays.  One was intimidated by her and the other, the mother of seven who had lost custody of her children because of her drug addiction, was aggressively trying to prove she was worthy of the job. Actually, having any job at all was important to both these women, but their labor was being paid for by an outside source since they were both from a sober living situation.  I and my friends by November thought that there was now no incentive for this employer to keep their word to me.  They didn't want to pay.

However, when a Covid economic relief program paid me to work there full time for the last few weeks of the year, I could not say no.  The boss was supposed to go on a vacation the last week of the year, and I looked forward to working without her being there. Though she had said and done much to demean and diminish me, and I knew it was abuse, and the two women who came out of the sober living decided they did not want to work that last week of the year, I persisted. I came home every night and pretty much went straight to bed to be ready for the next day.

It was then announced that a member of her immediate family, living with her, had a positive Covid test and if I wanted to, I could get tested.  I had been told everyone who worked there was supposed to be vaccinated but I knew she claimed she had already had Covid so there was no need...Just before she left, she and the mother of seven were talking together about a program for Christmas in which poor children were given presents from Santa.  The boss said how she had "made' her single childless brothers fork over money for this program.  Looking directly at me she sneered and said, "These people with no children."

That was not the beginning of the end. I knew this job would not sustain me.

When the new year began, the program that was paying me that last month was over.  The employer had not asked me to meet with them to discuss my future in the new year, and I did not go back. The company has not provided me the forms to do my taxes.

I have been a long time advocate for us NMNK who are used up and spit out in the workplace. I can't say this experience is typical, but I have noticed in other situations that it's assumed that the NMNK will be happy to cover for and compensate for other employees who have children.  Once in a while that is appropriate, but NMNK have things going on in their lives besides work, including caring for parents and other family members or the friends in their family of choice. 

C 2022  Never Married No Kids - BlogSpot

 

BIRTHRATE TUMBLES

 MSN : MORE PEOPLE WANT TO REMAIN CHILDLESS THAN PREVIOUSLY THOUGHT

So few people can actually afford to have a child or children,