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It's likely quite individual but personally I feel like I am less satisfied with life now that I have young children due to them dominating the agenda and life
by bberrry 7y ago
It's likely quite individual but personally I feel like I am less satisfied with life now that I have young children due to them dominating the agenda and life in general. I am however expecting kids to "pay off" in the happiness department in old age. I would imagine having no family at that stage in life would be quite bleak.
- sokoloff 7y agoThe first few years are indeed fairly taxing and energy/happiness sapping overall. Once they can have a conversation and you can experience (and guide) them learning things, it gets way, way better!
- asark 7y agoI think one kid improved my life quite a bit. At three of them, it's hard to really enjoy time with any of 'em—not impossible, but much, much harder—yet the amount of time, effort, and money they take is way higher. Probably worse than no kids from a pure how-happy-am-I-on-average perspective. I'd think the relationships between the personal happiness and life-satisfaction at various states looks something like: three kids < no kids or two kids < one kid But they're all youngish, so we'll see how things change as they get older. Reckon there'll be a couple years in the middle where things are pretty good, then, odds are at least one or two of them will make life a living hell during their teenage years. But when they're grown up and I'm old probably that'll be OK. [EDIT] though we'll see how I feel at 55 when I make the mistake of running the numbers and realize I could have already retired if we'd had zero :-/