Both of my great-grandmothers died by the time by 12 months old. A message to my children - hurry up, make my living parents great-grandparents!
The window for great-grandmothers is closing
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Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing
#232I attended my great-great-grandmother's 100th birthday party when I was 8 or 9.
Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing
#233Still think about this essay on the topic I saw on twitter a few years back: https://hmmdaily.com/2018/10/18/your-real-biological-clock-i... > If you intend to have children, but you don’t intend to have them just yet, you are not banking extra years as a person who is still too young to have children. You are subtracting years from the time you will share the world with your children.
I had kids older so I’m biased but imagining my kids grow up and move away how often am I going to see them and talk to them? Or rather how often are they going to want to see or talk to me. Hopefully a lot but so I have kids when I’m 18 for a type of life that may or may not exist.
If I could do it again we would have had kids maybe 8 years earlier but that still doesn’t make a huge difference. There’s such a strong sentiment in this thread that people who wait are selfish or fools or the only benefits are financial but I feel like there’s a disdain from people who had kids early .
My wife was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis, we were able to travel the world and do things she wouldn’t be able to do had we had kids right away and tried to do when we were 40. Is that worth having 15 years less with our kids? I guess time will tell but I know either way we enjoy them every day as a home maker and work from home dad they get to enjoy us as young kids and we take them on all kinds of adventures since I work in the late afternoon evening.
Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing
#234If you haven't read the article, it's about how people having kids later means you won't meet your great grandparents. My mom had me when she was 23, and her mom had her at 22. I'm in my forties and still have two living grandparents, and am very grateful for them. I remember a lot of days where my grandmother watched me and my sister, and she was able to do that because she was only in her late 40's herself and plen…
The upside is that I was a total basket case in my 20s, completely incompetent to be able to raise a child. I'll leave it to my children on how it turned out in my 30s. Generally I'd expect older adults to have done a lot more maturing and increased ability to emotionally regulate, which is a really critical ability when dealing with the 4th day of 3 hours of sleep and a colicky baby (for example). Also no point. But…
I think the optimal strategy depends partly on your genes. Challenging kids seem to run in families, and it’s probably easier to succeed as a very young parent if your kids are naturally the quiet & obedient sort.
It’s not politically correct, but we all know a few little hellions, and they are obviously difficult to parent.
Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing
#235Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The upside is that I was a total basket case in my 20s, completely incompetent to be able to raise a child. You see, in a proper early childrearing situation, you would be a) near your parents and inlaws ideally b) they would share in the burden of child-rearing. We had kids later in life (33-ish) and I think if I were to do it again, I'd have moved quicker to having kids earlier (waited 2 years to marry and 3 year…
A lot of this assumes so many things that I think people who were born and raised in stable UMC (like most on HN) take for granted. Even if I lived close to the family I was born into, I would never let them get near my children. The years of neglect and child abuse are reason enough that they should never see them - let alone be caregivers. Similarly, you’re assuming that your marriage would have gone smoothly still…
> A lot of this assumes so many things that I think people who were born and raised in stable UMC (like most on HN) take for granted.
You don’t have to be “UMC” to take those things for granted. All those things are normal in the third world village where my dad grew up.
Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing
#236If you haven't read the article, it's about how people having kids later means you won't meet your great grandparents. My mom had me when she was 23, and her mom had her at 22. I'm in my forties and still have two living grandparents, and am very grateful for them. I remember a lot of days where my grandmother watched me and my sister, and she was able to do that because she was only in her late 40's herself and plen…
The upside is that I was a total basket case in my 20s, completely incompetent to be able to raise a child. I'll leave it to my children on how it turned out in my 30s. Generally I'd expect older adults to have done a lot more maturing and increased ability to emotionally regulate, which is a really critical ability when dealing with the 4th day of 3 hours of sleep and a colicky baby (for example). Also no point. But…
> The upside is that I was a total basket case in my 20s, completely incompetent to be able to raise a child.
How common is it that people are incompetent to raise kids in their 20s, versus people who may not presently have everything together because nobody expects anything from or depends on them?
Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing
#237Earlier quoted context omitted.
> That doesn't mean we're doomed to live out the idiocracy future, but it explains this blog post. We're already living in the idiocracy future. Actually, the film needs a sequel something fierce, smartphones and now AI is fast making our reality post-idiocracy.
"Don't look up" is a sort of spiritual successor. Of course, as you said, there's room for more, now that half the population is TikTok'ed.
Satire is a cathartic tool that helps us reflect on the absurdities of daily life. Critically, satire challenges us to introspect beyond the facile projection of its themes and subjects. Cynical acceptance and refusal to engage with the source material is another exercise in anti-intellectualism.
That being said, Don't Look Up wasn't good satire for me. It was funny and well made, but negligently validates emotional ignorance.
Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing
#238We need more good examples of what “old parents” look like in modern society. Having a first child in your 40s is often painted as a pessimistic, undesirable situation to be in, where you will “lack energy” and patience to take care of a small child. But why? If we’re serious about extending lifespans the average age of parents should be going up. People should be using their younger years to establish themselves in…
Extending lifespan misses the point and is reasoned from the individual, and not the child. Lifespan extension adds to your maximum age but maximum age isn't the most pressing issue to begin with. When you're born and you have parents that are 20 versus 40, that is a dramatically different situation. Likewise if you have grandparents that are 50-60 versus 70 or already dead. Sure, more lifespan means you'll have more…
My motto is "live slow, die whenever."
Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing
#239Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not a parent, but I feel the same about myself. Having a kid at 22 would’ve been a mess to say the least. Looking back at that age halfway through my 30s, at that point I wasn’t much more than an overgrown 16 year old that could legally walk into a bar who wouldn’t get his head screwed on quite right for another 6 years or so at minimum.
As someone who had his first kid at 23, you grow up real quick once you become a parent. Moreover I doubt it’s even possible for a person to fully mature if they don’t have kids. Or to really understand their own parents for that matter.
I often see people settled into being more financially responsible, and it's good. But not in term of personality maturity.
Re: The window for great-grandmothers is closing
#240Earlier quoted context omitted.
This retort is true of literally everything involved in raising kids. Substitute "parents" "preschool teachers" "sports coach" &c. for "grandparents" in the sentence and it's still true for the domain for the children. It's true that with grandparents you have a maximum of 4 to choose from, but you might not have more than 4 preschools to choose from either.
The best part about being a mature parent is that you have much more control over how you raise your kids. No way in hell did I ever trust teachers, grandparents, coaches, etc. over my actual parents. My parents were in their 30s when I was born. Their skepticism not only decoupled them from depending on people they didn't trust, but their perspective rubbed off on me and set me up for success. Older parents have no…
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