Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not to Have Kids

by Meghan Daum

Try this on. What if I didn’t want to have babies because I loved

my job too much to compromise it, or because serious travel makes me feel in relation to the world in an utterly essential way? What if I’ve always liked the looks of my own life much better than those of the

ones I saw around me? What if, given the option, I would prefer to accept an assignment to go trekking for a month in the kingdom of Bhutan than spend that same ...

dogs a whole lot better than babies? What if I have become sure that personal freedom is ...

It led me to a stance I call the “Affirmative No.” I

define this stance as the refusal to pursue a course of action that, on serious reflection, you discover is not right for you.

Asserting an Affirmative No means rejecting attitudes and cou...

example, always forgiving wrongs, or reflexively following doctors’ orders) that most people treat as gospel. It also often means saying yes to points of view that may...

line with your own thoughts and feelings. Such conclusions are reached only through r...

It is true, and should be recognized, that women can be fulfilled with or without children, that you can most definitely have enough without having everything.

Parenthood, far from enlarging one’s worldview, results in an appalling form of myopia.