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Having Kids

paulgraham.com

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Re: Having Kids

#691

Post by throwaway_40 »

Alright so I'm using a throwaway account for this as it's kind of personal but I really want to hear the HN community on this one.

I'm 40, I've suffered anxiety distorders and depression and I just never dated. I'd love to, but I just got stuck in this rut where I was kind of happy with my own company and just scared of change in my life in general. 30-40 is in some ways for me a lost decade. I spent lots of time working on my mental illness, had some fun experiences for sure, but just settled into this groove.

Now I'm reading stuff like this and, you know, I feel like I do want kids and I'd be really sad if I never ended up having them. Is it too late? Does anyone who was in my situation have some stories to share?

Really looking for some kind of encouragement I guess.

Re: Having Kids

#692

Post by ericd »

edanm wrote: post #399
paxys wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is funny because the average neighborhood is safer than ever before. What has gone way down is our tolerance for accidents (which I guess is a good thing, but certainly has its tradeoffs).

I'm not sure that's true, when comparing cities to towns (and parent specifically mentioned this was a city-centric view of kids.) While there is less crime, there is a lot less space for kids to just run around, mostly because there's cars everywhere, which are obviously extremely unsafe for kids.

Yeah, this has me looking for a city where cars are kept on the outskirts, so that most of the city is safe for kids to live and participate in without our watching them constantly. I know this is a thing in other parts of the world, especially Europe, but I haven't found a good one in the US yet.

Re: Having Kids

#693

Post by conductr »

triangleman wrote: post #131

Hey guys. Anyone else have the experience of having kids, getting a burst of energy, but of course all that energy goes directly back into the kids and house, and you have absolutely no life for 3-5 years or more? Because my kids are 2 and 4 and so far it's been 4 years of no life, no freelance clients, almost no learning/hobbies, just 35-40 hours a week of working as much as I can at the office and then everything i…

I have a 1 y/o and can see that this is the normal for a long while but it’s where I want my available time spent. I shifted my focus towards managing a remote team to build my ideas instead of building them myself. Truth is I quit giving a damn about knowing the lastest tech stacks long ago. I have more interest in building a business. Programming is not my profession, taught myself as a means to an end. So this shift is a good one that I needed to make. I just have a DIY approach when possible. The best thing is my time commitment is a daily review & feedback email and the other project management tasks. The down side is it comes with a cost; albeit quite affordable due to remote labor cost.

Re: Having Kids

#694

Post by samcodes »

RobertRoberts wrote: post #671
littlethrowaway wrote: post #668

We have a 15 month old. She is probably the easiest kid imaginable, sleeps really well, eats really well, great temperament. It's still ridiculously hard work. My partner still isn't recovered from the birthing process (some latent muscle imbalances came out). She wants another one, I'm happy to stick with one healthy one. So incredibly hard to know what to do when _most_ stories you hear are about how it's better to…

My oldest just graduated from college. Just like childhood, if feels long while you are in it, when it's over it feels like it went fast. But, now I have a young adult that is permanently attached to me in a close and wonderful way for the rest of my life. I wouldn't trade any extra hours of netflix or going out to eat for having my own people. Have as many kids as you are willing/able to have. I had 5. First one is…

I have a 4 year old and a two month old. We’re in a major metropolis, and most couples seem to choose between 0 and 1 kid, but my wife and I have both always said we wanted 3 or more. This was a nice perspective to hear. For the first 2 years of #1’s life, I couldn’t imagine having a second. But the feeling of “that was it, no more kids” only lasted like a month with #2.

One thing I’m noticing - I expected the joy to grow linearly with number of kids, but I think it actually grows linearly in number of relationships in the family. The interactions between them are so amazing to watch. I’ve always been really terrified to die, and now I definitely don’t want to, because I want to be there for my kids... but if I know that they will have each other’s back, I’m much more okay with not existing one day.

Re: Having Kids

#695

Post by originalbryan2 »

triangleman wrote: post #131

Hey guys. Anyone else have the experience of having kids, getting a burst of energy, but of course all that energy goes directly back into the kids and house, and you have absolutely no life for 3-5 years or more? Because my kids are 2 and 4 and so far it's been 4 years of no life, no freelance clients, almost no learning/hobbies, just 35-40 hours a week of working as much as I can at the office and then everything i…

I have twins, they are 4, I do almost nothing other than work and be a dad. I struggled with that fact for a little while, but accepted it over time. It takes 100% of my effort to do my job, be a dad, take care of the house/cars/meals/etc, and fit in workouts and sleep. I typically go to bed immediately after them. My workouts are “dad workouts”, finely tuned brief basement fitness routine to try and stay fit enough to be a dad and somewhat mitigate the effects of a desk job.

Re: Having Kids

#696

Post by ericd »

throwaway_40 wrote: post #691

Alright so I'm using a throwaway account for this as it's kind of personal but I really want to hear the HN community on this one. I'm 40, I've suffered anxiety distorders and depression and I just never dated. I'd love to, but I just got stuck in this rut where I was kind of happy with my own company and just scared of change in my life in general. 30-40 is in some ways for me a lost decade. I spent lots of time wor…

Not too late, though if you're a woman, it gets harder to have a natural pregnancy the longer you wait. But we have some technology for that! My dad was nearly 40 when they had me, I know there are many new dads that are older than that.

Re: Having Kids

#697

Post by mirimir »

This is so beautiful and honest. Also most all of the comments.

But I'm still glad that I never flipped the switch. As I see it, I get to be a kid until I die.

Re: Having Kids

#698

Post by ericd »

abalashov wrote: post #651
asdff wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't conflate it to a western view, but a suburban one. Most suburbs lack the density to make neighborhood friends. None of my friends from school lived near me; my little neck of the suburbs was occupied by retirees or kids over a decade apart from me. Visiting friends meant parents organizing a play date and a 15 minute one way car ride. There are rare cases where you do have a little neighborhood gang to pla…

Amen! I wrote about this (and other) aspect(s) of suburbia in an article that gathered some controversy on HN a while back: https://likewise.am/2016/05/08/why-suburbia-sucks/

Do you know of any places in the US that buck this trend?

Re: Having Kids

#699

Post by kevindeasis »

Nowadays, I have a hard time reading, im not sure why. I used to love reading anything in the past few years, now I find it easier only to read documentation from programming frameworks.

Thank you for writing this great piece that made me need to finish the essay

Re: Having Kids

#700

Post by ARandomerDude »

nitwit005 wrote: post #418
ARandomerDude wrote: post #379

Paradoxically, I think the hard part about having kid is having too few of them. My wife and I have 7 kids. People stare at us like we're crazy all the time. But it's way easier to have 7 kids than 2. Older kids help with the younger kids. When the 2 or 3 playing together get bored, they mix it up. They have daily big games that would ordinarily take a lot of effort arranging playdates. Many hands make light work, so…

This sometimes badly backfires on people. You're essentially betting that your first kids will be willing to do this, and will be responsible enough to do a decent job of it. When kids get older it seems fairly common to start fighting over having to look after siblings, as it's a barrier to having friends and studying.

I don't disagree that this is a possibility. I'm sure it happens. In our house, we have a zero-tolerance policy for fighting or rudeness, and we strongly encourage polite problem solving, even with the toddlers. It works well.

As for academics, we homeschool and vastly outpace the public school curriculum. For example, my 8 and 10 year olds are using a college Latin textbook. My oldest knows Clojure. It can be done, and, as I said previously, it's easier with more kids. I've been a father of 1, 2, 3, etc. and there's no comparison in the joy and ease that come with a large family.

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