“Parents today need to get over expecting to be intrinsically happy or rewarded doing what people have dutifully done for millennia under sometimes astonishingly adverse conditions: create and raise the next generation…Furthermore, if you count on your kids to make you happy, you will muck up not only your own life but theirs, too.”There is the issue of class. Is the whole act of contemplating (or complaining, as some see it) parenting an exercise for those who are privileged wonders writer Monica Potts. “On the scale of difficult child moments, I can think of many that rank higher, like being unable to get your hungry child food, for example; or watching your child die as the victim of violence,” she writes. Where do you stand? Are parents today expecting too much from parenting or are they justified in feeling unhappy?
Do Children Make Parents Unhappy?
There are fewer windows for getaways or late nights with the girls (or
the fellas), and your
social life is shrunken "to the size of a teacup." Here's something to consider: Raising children takes hard work, leaves you feeling isolated and
doesn't necessarily make you happier, but the rewards are greater. That
is the premise of the latest New York Magazine cover story with the
headline: "I Love My Children, I Hate My Life."
Here's what you had to say: Rachel commented: "Stop looking to children to bring you happiness. They can only add to your life, you need to already be happy with who you are and are looking to become." Anonymous wrote: "When you become a parent, you have to constantly think about someone other than yourself. Because we live in such a self-obsessed and self-absorbed society, some future parents can't make the connection."