I dont have kids and this post is really making me think about the future, wether i want kids or not, reading the comments i see people that say "i wish i had started having kids earlier"... Is it really that impactfull? Are parents really linked that hard towards their childrens? Im sincerely very courious about this...
Being ambitious and being a dad
381–390 of 802 posts
Re: Being ambitious and being a dad
#382Re: Being ambitious and being a dad
#383I have a good friend who has a special needs kid and we've discussed his struggles at length - suffice it to say that it takes an order of magnitude more time and attention than what's described here. The thing is, you of course don't get tipped off that you've been selected for that particular curse (and yes, I'd say it's a curse. It's not some inspiring after-school special thing, it's unfair as f*k to all involved…
> And I say this as someone who is very in favor of having kids and who worries about the looming population collapse in all developed countries. Complete aside, I hope that this happens via the demographic collapse and not due to resource/environmental blow back. It would be the smoothest path down. In the same way that inflation is a smoother way to grow a pool of poverty.
Demographic collapse is happening due to resource/environmental blowback, but many of the resources in question are artificial ones like money and jobs.
Re: Being ambitious and being a dad
#384I have a good friend who has a special needs kid and we've discussed his struggles at length - suffice it to say that it takes an order of magnitude more time and attention than what's described here. The thing is, you of course don't get tipped off that you've been selected for that particular curse (and yes, I'd say it's a curse. It's not some inspiring after-school special thing, it's unfair as f*k to all involved…
For that particular issue you can improve your "gambling" odds by having kids at a younger age, rather than waiting until you've optimized your career and environment.
I wonder how much of that is because people who are autistic (for example) find love later, and then pass down their autism.
Re: Being ambitious and being a dad
#385I dont have kids and this post is really making me think about the future, wether i want kids or not, reading the comments i see people that say "i wish i had started having kids earlier"... Is it really that impactfull? Are parents really linked that hard towards their childrens? Im sincerely very courious about this...
Depends on each parent. Some are pretty distant or absent.
To me, my daughter is my world. But children are work too, however doesn't tell you this is lying.
Re: Being ambitious and being a dad
#386Earlier quoted context omitted.
For that particular issue you can improve your "gambling" odds by having kids at a younger age, rather than waiting until you've optimized your career and environment.
Perhaps, but that often means selecting a partner more quickly, which is another gamble with potentially terrible consequences.
Life is full of such gambles and it's inevitable.
Anyone who drives risks their life more than they risk having a special needs child at reasonably non-late age.
We just brush off most such gambles because:
1. People have a terrible intuition for probabilities.
2. If it were better, they would go insane.
Re: Being ambitious and being a dad
#387I dont have kids and this post is really making me think about the future, wether i want kids or not, reading the comments i see people that say "i wish i had started having kids earlier"... Is it really that impactfull? Are parents really linked that hard towards their childrens? Im sincerely very courious about this...
There are two things that jump out at me being a parent of two children.
Until kids get to about 10 years old they need 24x7 supervision. Which means your time and energy is spent there. Your schedule completely revolves around them.
It’s hard to be 100% committed to anything else because you could get a call to attend to them regardless of your situation.
So yes, kids need their parents most of the time in early childhood.
However it also depends upon how much of community, relatives & governmental support you have. So take my words with a grain of salt.
Re: Being ambitious and being a dad
#388Earlier quoted context omitted.
The gamble is basically only a gamble if you wait longer. The graph for pre-35 parents is practically nonexistent. I could live with the 2% chance at 42, but not with the 15% at 45. Where the chance is of random abnormalities. Who knows what exciting variant you get.
15% at 45? You better have a source for that number.
It's widely known that maternal age causes more genetic defects and it's especially significant later on. The term "hitting the wall" came from the charts.
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.05.21254264v...
Re: Being ambitious and being a dad
#389First, I respect anyone’s choice not to be a parent. It’s constant, demanding work, far more intense than any job I’ve ever had as a baseline.
Second, this is the third time in two days I’ve seen some variation on “I dreamed of doing something significant and never wanted kids.” That’s a wild construction. Having kids is incredibly significant, and more world-changing than most of us will ever do. Having kids didn’t give my life meaning, but I’m certainly able to pour life’s meaning into my kid and family more than into anything else before it.
Re: Being ambitious and being a dad
#390Right now you have a window. AI can do a huge chunk of the work you were doing last year, and outside of programming, nobody seems to know about it yet. I've cut 10 hours a week out of my schedule in the last several months just in time to have my first kid, at the ripe old age of 46.
They'll figure it out and we will be right back to the same pressure we had before, but for a short time at least, if your field is competitive, you have a huge edge.