“SO, WHEN ARE YOU HAVING KIDS?”

Oh yeah. That fucking question every woman will get asked - with no exception if you are single!

Apparently it’s still 2020. So to continue with the bullshit of 2020 and the ridiculousness of the year that we should leave behind: stop asking women when they are having kids. I’m 23 yet I’ve been asked this…for far too long and far too many times. 

“So when are you having kids?” How many answers would you like? Why do you feel the need to ask this question? How are you openly asking this question when the woman you are talking to could be struggling with fertility? Or…now hear me out here…they just do not want kids? Okay, I do not want kids, that’s my business and my mind has not changed slightly my whole life. If someone wants or does not want kids, that is their business and theirs alone. If someone wants to talk to you about it all, then they will but please stop asking when someone is having kids. I have a pretty long list for all the reasons why to the point I get tired when listing said reasons but, to the majority of people who ask me, those reasons are not good enough. HOWEVER if I tell them I’ve already been told of the very small percentage likelihood of having a blob of my genetics (and half the genetics of whatever poor sod gives), people then say: “oh I’m so sorry!” Okay so why are my other answers not good enough for you to accept? 

DOCTORS, NURSES, HEALTHCARE ASSISTANTS, RADIOGRAPHERS ETC.

Let’s not exclude you guys! Oh no no no. Imagine turning to a woman in her 20’s, screaming in your consultation room because of the pain she’s in, begging you to just give her a hysterectomy and you turn around and say “but what if you want children? So having children is more important than a woman’s health? Got you. I guess we don’t actually have a say in our own bodies yet. Or, I love this one, after my first laparoscopy last year, I was stuck in hospital because my bladder didn’t want to function so I had to have a catheter put in (a full bag dropped off the end of my bed whilst still attached to the tube and I swear my life flashed before my eyes because of a bag of my fucking urine dropped and a tube being yanked). Anyway, I had to have a scan every time I went to empty my bladder once the catheter was removed and, even though it was the same radiographer in the gynaecology ward, doing the scan she kept saying: “oh, your bladder is still really high for someone who hasn’t had kids yet.” Really, you are saying that to a woman on the gynaecology ward? Seriously?

I’ve now been conditioned into approaching intimate relationships with “I do not want kids, ever” so I don’t end up wasting my time or being guilt tripped into my own decision, which has now grown even stronger the past 4 years of being ill. It’s also a good way to scare people off if you say that when you’e met them more than once. But there’s still a need (for unknown reasons) where people still feel they can ask you this. Just don’t. You don’t know what people are going through. It really can be a sore subject to people (and it really is for a lot of people), and it’s none of your business. If someone feels that they can talk to you about it all, then that’s amazing but stop with the invasive questions and respect peoples’ responses.  So let’s just agree to leave this fucking question behind this year.

Subwait areas in gynaecology are pretty much overwhelming information overload.