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> "Who will take care of you when you're old?" Well, myself, presumably. I'm sure nearly every person who ended up needed their kids to take care of them proba
by fatnoah 2y ago
> "Who will take care of you when you're old?" Well, myself, presumably.
I'm sure nearly every person who ended up needed their kids to take care of them probably felt the same way right up until they needed help.
Regardless, "future help" is definitely a terrible reason to have kids. As you noted, it's a complete change in life, lifestyle, and priorities. One needs to be ready for this (or as ready as one can be, anyway) before taking it on, and be willing to commit 100% to a journey that will be unpredictable and that has no guarantees of success or happiness.
As a parent that was previously in a "no way am I having kids" state, yet wouldn't trade in being a parent for anything else in the world, I have 100% respect for those who do and those who don't want to have kids.
- jfengel 2y agoI think the flip side to that feeling is that people are young and healthy, and that when they're no longer self-supporting, they'd rather be gone. Here I'm overgeneralizing from the N=1 case of myself. But I had always been young-and-healthy, and even at middle-aged-and-healthy, I have a hard time visualizing the impending disabilities. I've also got the bias of being comfortably middle-class. I will be able to afford the help I need for basic disabilities. It's easy to imagine that by the time I run out of money for that, I'll also have run out of interest in limping (literally) along. There is a very strong chance that I will have a change of mind once actually faced with them, but it's really hard for me to have an emotional understanding of that now. So I need to point out that there is a very dark aspect hanging over that belief that you will take care of yourself in your age, just to take that out and consider it, even though I can't resolve it.