Childfree by Choice #12 I care about my life, not my death.

[EyeLoveIcelands]

This one grinds my gears and has been a massive issue for me lately, why am I picking up the slack on evenings and weekends because they “can’t do that because they’ve got kids” - when both of us are contractually obliged to work out of hours if it’s necessary. But of course, management have kids and so will always see it the mothers way. Honestly it wouldn’t bug me as much … if they got paid less, no bonus, and were overlooked for promotion - because we’re not doing the same job here and that should be reflected in the rewards

I’m raging for you. If you can, speak up and say you’re happy to alternate weekends and evenings so you have a work/life balance too. Say this is important for your well-being. 9 times out of 10 they’re not even single mothers - they’re just too spineless to get the dads to be more hands on. God forbid Greg’s career is disrupted

 

[Popcornshovel]

I'm in a Facebook group for gardening tips, and every spring the silly questions from parents start up....

'How do I eliminate spiders from the garden because my child plays in the garden but the spiders scare her - need to know how to kill them all and stop them coming into the garden'
'How do I stop bees coming into the garden, I don't let the kids out in the summer because I'm terrified they'll get stung'
'Squirrels keep coming into the garden and I'm worried they might attack the children'.

They want to control the natural world to make it perfect for their little brats!

 

[whoareyouu]

I'm in a Facebook group for gardening tips, and every spring the silly questions from parents start up....

'How do I eliminate spiders from the garden because my child plays in the garden but the spiders scare her - need to know how to kill them all and stop them coming into the garden'
'How do I stop bees coming into the garden, I don't let the kids out in the summer because I'm terrified they'll get stung'
'Squirrels keep coming into the garden and I'm worried they might attack the children'.

They want to control the natural world to make it perfect for their little brats!

You are joking me!

 

[Blond3g1rl]

I'm in a Facebook group for gardening tips, and every spring the silly questions from parents start up....

'How do I eliminate spiders from the garden because my child plays in the garden but the spiders scare her - need to know how to kill them all and stop them coming into the garden'
'How do I stop bees coming into the garden, I don't let the kids out in the summer because I'm terrified they'll get stung'
'Squirrels keep coming into the garden and I'm worried they might attack the children'.

They want to control the natural world to make it perfect for their little brats!

I can just imagine their gardens. Fence to fence of fake grass with no plant life.

 

[Popcornshovel]

I knew someone who moved house and they have a toddler. I went round and said how nice the garden is. She said 'I've not let her out yet as I need to Google all the plants and check which ones are poisonous. There's loads of daffodils and I've heard they can kill a child so they all need ripping up'.

But surely a toddler wouldn't be out in the garden alone and also probably wouldn't munch on enough daffodils to be unwell.

It was sad that modern parenting has made her see danger everywhere and she can't just enjoy flowers in the garden.

 

[KeriRhys]

I knew someone who moved house and they have a toddler. I went round and said how nice the garden is. She said 'I've not let her out yet as I need to Google all the plants and check which ones are poisonous. There's loads of daffodils and I've heard they can kill a child so they all need ripping up'.

But surely a toddler wouldn't be out in the garden alone and also probably wouldn't munch on enough daffodils to be unwell.

It was sad that modern parenting has made her see danger everywhere and she can't just enjoy flowers in the garden.

Killer daffodils is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever heard...

 

[Princesst]

We always try and attract loads of animals into our garden in a sea of neighbours with astro and trampolines. But now after hearing that that I’d like to attract even more to the area… maybe start bee keeping too as our neighbours’ kids noise mean we can’t really use our garden anyways. Bring on the wildlife! All is welcome

 

[MagpieTree]

My middle-aged next door neighbour had a lovely garden, with a big lawn. A young couple with two toddlers bought the house and ripped it all up, replacing it with paving slabs and a small patch of fake grass. It's made me more determined to attract lots of wildlife to my garden, to make up for theirs.

 

[mdizzl3]

So I somehow got roped into walking to Sainsbury’s with a colleague every lunchtime. He’s nice enough but a TOTAL baby bore. I ask “how was your weekend” and get a 10 minute monologue about every single thing his son got up to (including sicking up his dinner), then the latest update on his wife’s pregnancy, then “we managed to get rid of our son for the evening at the in-laws, to have the night to ourselves” (boak). I literally want to stab my eyes out with boredom. I don’t care about your wife, son and unborn baby as I’ve never met any of them! I seem to know every minor detail about all of them now, even stuff I probably shouldn’t know (like his wife’s 2 miscarriages…..).

“How are you” means how are YOU. I’ve had to start being rude and just put my headphones on and walk off briskly
Capital Dance >>>> hearing about someone’s kid for half an hour.

 

[Beaversabout]

So I somehow got roped into walking to Sainsbury’s with a colleague every lunchtime. He’s nice enough but a TOTAL baby bore. I ask “how was your weekend” and get a 10 minute monologue about every single thing his son got up to (including sicking up his dinner), then the latest update on his wife’s pregnancy, then “we managed to get rid of our son for the evening at the in-laws, to have the night to ourselves” (boak). I literally want to stab my eyes out with boredom. I don’t care about your wife, son and unborn baby as I’ve never met any of them! I seem to know every minor detail about all of them now, even stuff I probably shouldn’t know (like his wife’s 2 miscarriages…..).

“How are you” means how are YOU. I’ve had to start being rude and just put my headphones on and walk off briskly
Capital Dance >>>> hearing about someone’s kid for half an hour.

Fs. I know how you feel as people at college do this all the time and also try to bring up their birth stories even though it has nothing to do with what we are actually talking about in class. One girl likes to remind us constantly about how lovely it was to give birth and didn't feel any pain at all. She just had wonderful experiences giving birth. duck OFF! Also mentions her miscarriage at least once a week too from a while back. She also shouted at the teacher in front of everyone in class because she thought the teacher was saying her life with her children wasn't busy or stressful. She wasn't saying that at all! Reminding us about how her mum is ill and baby sits for her so took it as a personal attack. Well, if she's so ill stop asking her to babysit!!!

 

[OatMatchaLatte]

Just popped into my Sainsbury's Local. There was a mother with a buggy and her toddler out of it in one aisle, along with a staffer stacking the shelves. He was chatting to the child and let her put a box of cereal on the shelf. All very nice. I then tried to get past, the child walked straight in front of me. I said, excuse me, please. Nothing. The child just started spinning around in front of me. I said EXCUSE ME much louder, and still the mother said nothing!! I was effectively trapped by the shelf stacker doing his job, the bloody child, and the mother and the massive buggy. The staffer got out of my way in the end. It sounds like such a minor incident, but WHY did I have to say excuse me to the child twice, and why did the mother not tell her to get out of the bloody way? Why did the staffer have to stop what he was doing to allow me to exit?

 

[pinkmug]

Just popped into my Sainsbury's Local. There was a mother with a buggy and her toddler out of it in one aisle, along with a staffer stacking the shelves. He was chatting to the child and let her put a box of cereal on the shelf. All very nice. I then tried to get past, the child walked straight in front of me. I said, excuse me, please. Nothing. The child just started spinning around in front of me. I said EXCUSE ME much louder, and still the mother said nothing!! I was effectively trapped by the shelf stacker doing his job, the bloody child, and the mother and the massive buggy. The staffer got out of my way in the end. It sounds like such a minor incident, but WHY did I have to say excuse me to the child twice, and why did the mother not tell her to get out of the bloody way? Why did the staffer have to stop what he was doing to allow me to exit?

At that point it should be accepted that the kid steps away or the kid gets yeeted away but sadly we'd be the ones in the wrong. The mummy is probably too busy teaching baby Priscilla that the world is her oyster. Hate parents who don't give a tit about the surroundings and let their kids act like the entire place is their bedroom.

 

[ElectricDreams]

I probably wouldn't expect a toddler to respond if I said excuse me but I would certainly expect the parent to, and either tell the child to move or physically move them themselves. Though I also wouldn't expect any normal parent to be letting a toddler loose in a supermarket! Sitting in a trolley seat or in a buggy is the safest place to be unless they want to end up under the wheels of a trolley or under a pile of tins of beans!

 

[AshMay]

We have quite a relaxed and flexible workplace which is nice, but one (very senior!) colleague is always declining or flaking on meetings for reasons like 'molly is upset and needs mummy' or 'I promised to take ben to xyz activity at this time'. Great for the kids I guess and the colleague does pull their weight overall, but it's just so tedious having to constantly rearrange meetings or be a mind reader that she's not actually free when her calendar says so because of some childcare issue.

 

[Popcornshovel]

We have quite a relaxed and flexible workplace which is nice, but one (very senior!) colleague is always declining or flaking on meetings for reasons like 'molly is upset and needs mummy' or 'I promised to take ben to xyz activity at this time'. Great for the kids I guess and the colleague does pull their weight overall, but it's just so tedious having to constantly rearrange meetings or be a mind reader that she's not actually free when her calendar says so because of some childcare issue.

Woah talk about TMI - crazy that she shares that info instead of telling little white lies like 'I've got another call then, can we rearrange'. Sounds like she thinks her sprogs are the center of the universe.

 

[orangehead]

We have quite a relaxed and flexible workplace which is nice, but one (very senior!) colleague is always declining or flaking on meetings for reasons like 'molly is upset and needs mummy' or 'I promised to take ben to xyz activity at this time'. Great for the kids I guess and the colleague does pull their weight overall, but it's just so tedious having to constantly rearrange meetings or be a mind reader that she's not actually free when her calendar says so because of some childcare issue.

Tell her you can’t make the meeting because you’re upset and need your mummy

 

[Millais]

Pick meeeee!!!!!

 

[pinkmug]

View attachment 2825835
Pick meeeee!!!!!

Cringe. These people acting like having children is mandatory, like hunger games. Meanwhile people with chronic illnesses are like

 

[Norfolking Good]

When my mum had a mastectomy and cancer treatment years ago all the time off I had to care for her and visit her in hospital had to be recovered through me working overtime to make it up. I should have said my invisible son Cuthbert had the sniffles and it would be fine. It really pissed me off because a lady in our team constantly had to go home early or WFH (suspiciously offline too) which her kid and it amounted to a lot more time that I took as a one off. Funny eh

 

[Lovegossip2020]

I feel so annoyed today, my manager has a child in school who always seems to be sick at home, she constantly cancels/moves scheduled meetings with everyone to accommodate at the last minute, blocks out hours in the morning and afternoon to do the school run and is barely on line, we all work remotely but this isn't the point and if we were in the office this would not be acceptable, she is in leadership too which baffles my brain!!!!