Seven Questions with Millie Lemmon
Welcome to Seven Questions — the Zero Kids Zero Regrets Interview Series!
In this edition, our business manager, Nicolette Landry, interviews our editor-in-chief, Millie Lemmon, about her life and experiences as a childfree woman. Millie is a 50-year-old cisgender woman who lives with her partner and a very fuzzy labradoodle.
Nicolette: Hey, Millie! Thanks for taking the time to answer our Seven Questions!
Millie: Thanks for having me!
Nicolette: Shall we jump right in?
Millie: Let's go!
1. Did you decide to be childfree or was it a decision made for you? Tell us about that: Why, when, how?
I have never wanted children. When I was very little, I figured I would be a mother, because that’s “what women did,” which is a message I of course received from pop culture and at church every week, but I didn’t have a desire to be a mother. Fortunately, I come from a large extended family that included several extremely terrific aunts who were not mothers, who chose not to be parents, and modeled that example for me. I was very lucky to see up close at a young age that being childfree was an option — and lucky, too, that the rest of the family never criticized or questioned their decision (at least not within earshot of me).
I was also raised by a mother who definitely blamed me and my younger sibling for not having accomplished the things she wanted to achieve. “If I hadn’t had you, I could have been an artist” sort of stuff. Before I was old enough to understand that was ultimately just an excuse to not examine her own limitations (she would never have been an artist for multiple reasons), I definitely took the message that mothers don’t get to do everything they want if they have kids, and so pretty early on I didn’t like that idea. As I became an adult, and as friends and my sibling started having kids, I saw how hard it was to balance parenthood and personal ambition.
Then there’s the fact of who I am: I’m naturally a bit contrarian and independent, a bit of a punk to tell you the truth, and having received the message from every quarter my whole life — family, religion, education, politics, society in general — that I was supposed to become a mother, that it was my biological purpose, really rankled me. We can’t truly choose that which we’re told we must do, and I bucked off those expectation like an unhappy bronco.
Maybe I wouldn’t have been so rebellious about it if I’d had a biological urge to parent, but fortunately I never had the proverbial baby fever.
And as much as I am motivated by defiance, I’m also driven by compassion. I could never get past the idea that no one consents to be born, nor wrap my head around plunging a person into this world without their having any say in the matter. Especially not when I might be dooming them to a life on a burning planet wrecked by climate change. I love my hypothetical kids so fiercely that I don’t want to subject them to a future that is uncertain, at best.
2. Do you have a partner? If not, is that also by choice? If you do, how did you get on the same page? When do you think is the time to have that conversation with a partner?
I do have a partner. We’ve been together for 23 years. When we first met, they wanted kids and thought they’d change my mind. Instead, I changed theirs.
That might be giving myself a little too much credit! Circumstances changed their mind. Seeing how much friends struggled financially after having kids, thinking about how they would have to limit their hobbies and free time — we’re both people who like a lot of alone time and quiet and opportunities to explore our individual hobbies — and looking at the state of the world all made them reconsider.
For me, I think the time to have that conversation is as early as possible. I was always super clear about that with any potential partners right away, so if kids was a dealbreaker for them, they wouldn’t waste their time (and I wouldn’t waste mine).
It wasn’t a dealbreaker for my partner, obviously. Although I was always aware that they might reach a point where it became one, and I was prepared for that, just in case.
3. How does your family feel about your being childfree? Do you get any pushback?
I started saying I didn’t want kids at such a young age, with such conviction, that I think it would have been more surprising if I’d suddenly said I wanted kids. When I was very young, there was some “you’ll change your mind” stuff, but that fell away pretty quickly.
I was divorced after a brief marriage when I was young, and my mother told my sibling that she thought it was because I “refused to give him children.” But she didn’t say it to me! (It also wasn’t true.)
It also probably helped that my sibling had a child, so I never got any stick about not giving my parents any grandchildren.
4. How does being childfree affect your friendships?
It’s hard. Friends tend to disappear after they have kids. A dynamic I’ve experienced multiple times is inviting friends to do things once they have kids and having them turn me down over and over because their schedule is understandably tighter and takes more coordination, so I leave the ball in their court — always offering to do things with them and the kids, too! I love a zoo day! My schedule is more flexible, so it makes sense to let them tell me when they’re available, especially after lots of rebuffed invites. And then I never hear from them. It’s okay; I understand prioritizing one’s family; but it’s sad.
It's also harder to make new friends. My partner and I moved to a different state several years ago, and meeting people was — and still is — really difficult. We don’t have kids in school or community activities where we’d meet other families. And there’s still definitely some prejudice and suspicion around couples who don’t have children.
I once had a conversation with one of my partner’s coworkers, who had also moved to the same area. She was a mother of two kids and was telling me about meeting the other parents in their subdivision. I mentioned that I was finding it hard to meet people since we don’t have a similar community inroad, and she told me that, if we didn’t already know each other, she wouldn’t be friends with me, either — because she wants to be friends with other moms who can help with carpooling and school scheduling and so forth, and I didn’t have anything to offer.
That was quite a thing to hear!
In any case, most of my active friendships are with people I’ve known for at least 15 years, and who are also childfree.
5. What role, if any, do children play in your life? Would you like them to play a bigger or smaller role?
I really like being around kids, and enjoyed very much being an auntie when my nephew was young. I especially loved being a confidant when he was a teenager. He has two kids himself now, but they live across the country. Unfortunately, I don’t have any kids in my life right now. Which is too bad, because I am an awesome babysitter and a big-time cool aunt!
6. Is there anything you feel like you’re missing out on by choosing not to have children, even though you don’t regret your decision?
I have no idea what anyone is talking about when they talk about things that kids are into, so there’s an entire section of pop culture on which I’m missing out. But I’m okay with that!
7. What are the benefits to your decision to remain childfree?
How long do you have?
In all seriousness, there are a ton of benefits, from greater financial security to more flexibility to sleeping in, but the biggest benefit to me personally is the psychological freedom afforded by being childfree. I’m constitutionally a very anxious person, and I’m exhausted by even the thought of how much I’d worry about a child’s safety and emotional health.
I never have to know things like vaccine schedules or when do we sign up for soccer or what’s the last day of school. I don’t have to budget for new shoes because of growing feet. I don’t lie awake at night because some kid is bullying my kid, or because my kid was unkind to another kid.
That’s an enormous about of open space in my psyche, and it’s precious to me.
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