[up_and_up]

PROTIP:

1. Have a longterm vision/goal for your life that is achievable regardless of financial resources/location etc.

2. Find a partner in crime who shares that vision and is willing to join you on what will surely be a great adventure known as your life. Life will surely be no bed of roses.

3. Stress Test your relationship in some way to ensure the vision/goal is aligned.

I decided I should marry my wife following 6 months of hard travel through South America. I figured if we passed that test, we could handle pretty much anything.

EDIT: Appreciate all the comments. I have actually been married now for 10 years and have 3 kids. So while its true that the "Test" I am describing cannot mimic the tough slog of real-life, how exactly do you propose to mimic the difficulty of raising kids? If I were to speak to my 20 something self I would still recommend a difficult trip is an easy way to see how easily your relationship will come apart under stress, mainly because you are coming up against unknown/uncomfortable situations and factors.

[sgdread]

There're random factors you can't control. Good example is post-partum depression. Every child birth is 20% chance; once happening, it can significantly change both partners.

[Aelinsaar]

So don't have kids, we're not running out of people after all.

[fizzbatter]

Not sure why you're downvoted. I suppose you're not contributing too much to the conversation, and it seems a little sarcastic (or something), but i often feel not having kids is a forgotten option. My SO and I chose long ago not to have kids (independently, fwiw), and people often look at us like we have two heads (.. each, heh).

[gtaylor]

It's not at all a forgotten option, it's just not one that the majority choose to take. There's nothing wrong with deciding to have kids. We're not running out of people, but we're not over-crowded and population growth is slowing in many places. There are certain geographic areas with more dire situations, but the whole isn't looking bad.

As far as their comment in particular:

> So don't have kids, we're not running out of people after all.

This adds zero to the conversation. It's like saying "You might get hit by a bus if you try to cross the street, so don't do it at all".

In truth, deciding whether to have kids is a much more complicated process than that. There's no "So just do X" or "So don't do X" advice that is helpful or constructive.

[Aelinsaar]

I'm sorry that my comment didn't meet your standards of excellence, but in fact a few billion less people would certainly make it possible to raise the standard of living for the rest. Given that a few billion people live in squalor now, it seems like overage, don't you think?

[Aelinsaar]

People don't like to question the basic assumptions they live with, such as, "Having children is a necessary part of a good and fulfilled life."

[Mz]

I didn't downvote, but if I had, it wouldn't be for that reason. It would be because having kids or not having kids is something many people speak of cavalierly as if it is totally in our control and this is often not true. If birth control fails, there are places where abortion is hard to come by (including large parts of the U.S., from what I gather). These attitudes disproportionately negatively impact women.

Much of human sexual morality is rooted in the thorny issue that mother nature makes sex pleasurable in large part to get you to reproduce and efforts to enjoy sex without it leading to babies are often unsuccessful. So, we have a long human tradition of things like shotgun weddings.

[Aelinsaar]

If every comment you come across accounts for the full spectrum of human and geopolitical variability, they would stop being comments and start being novellas.

[DanielStraight]

No, people don't like solutions which ignore the problem.

Yes, by completely changing your plan for your life you can prevent certain problems, but that doesn't necessitate that you should make the change.

[Aelinsaar]

It doesn't, but it suggests that people should consider it far more than they do. Given how often marriages end as a direct or indirect result of children, you'd think it would come up more.

[rayiner]

Not having kids is an extremely common option that's growing in popularity. It's also incompatible with the modern welfare state as currently structured.

[dctoedt]

> Not having kids is an extremely common option that's growing in popularity. It's also incompatible with the modern welfare state as currently structured.

I've wondered whether we might be seeing a new division of labor emerging: An increasing number of educated professionals elect to have few or none of the kids needed for the next generation of workers, while some lower-income people take up the slack by having lots of kids. This might actually be a sustainable social model, but it would require two things: (1) "Talent," however you choose to define that, needs to appear in sufficient numbers of children born to low-income parents and not just in children born to educated professionals --- my guess is that this is indeed the case; (2) crucially, society must be able to provide the infrastructure needed to raise children to productive citizenship, especially when some of these children are being raised by parents who don't personally have access to the necessary financial- and other resources --- and that's very much only a partially-solved problem.

[Aelinsaar]

That's less "new", and more a re-emergence of feudal dynamics in child-rearing that probably never left as much as we'd like to pretend.

[Razengan]

Or adopt already born ones that don't have much of a chance otherwise.

[nostrebored]

The myth of unadopted babies/kids is pervasive and pretty inaccurate. Most babies and small children who are up for adoption have multiple families vying to bring them home already...

If you want to talk about adopting preteens/teens/special needs children then it's a different ball game, but that's not what people try to do.

[Razengan]

Yes, I wasn't implying an age limit on adoption. However, I think there's almost always some amount of self-interest in having kids:

Me and my girlfriend despise babies (for now) and simply don't see ourselves as being responsible/mature enough to raise kids yet. We do entertain the idea though, now and then, and for us the main attractions of having kids seem to be: Something we made together, a "substitute" of each other to live for after one of us dies, and something to carry on our legacy, such as it is.

With adoption, these things can be fulfilled if the child is young enough, to be molded into our image, as it were.

That's not to say that love for an orphan, no matter how old, cannot happen. Of course there can be selfless adoptions, where you just want to make someone's life better without regard to yourselves.

[nostrebored]

I hope there is some self-interest in having kids! One thing that I hope to impart on my child is that martyrdom is a terrible go-to practice.

The goal I have with raising my child isn't to create a miniature version of myself, it's to raise an autonomous individual with a robust moral framework. As far as self-interest goes, sharing this experience with my partner is one of the things I look forward to most over the next few years.

[ArtDev]

Depending on your race.

https://ourworldindata.org/future-world-population-growth/#w...

[mooseburger]

Much of the developed world is indeed running out of people though.

[andrewfromx]

such a valid choice! We should have irreversible sterilization ceremonies for couples that want to decide at age 30 they wish to remain married without kids for the rest of their lives. The trouble with the choice now without sterilization is the option to have kids is always there and available. i.e. if u have a kid the domino falls in one direction. But if you choose not to have a kid the domino never falls. People will say "irreversible sterilization" sounds so permanment! But so is your first kid.

[andrewfromx]

why all the down votes? This would be optional! Just like a couple decides to have kids, they can decide to do this.

[fizzbatter]

Honestly, i feel like there is a lot of sarcastic tones in these threads... so pardon my ignorance if i miss any obvious wit.

With that said, i've always liked the idea of reversible sterilization as a standard. It is of course a worrisome proposition to suggest we forcefully sterilize people.. which i'm not exactly saying. I'm simply saying, what an interesting world would it be if reproduction was never by accident, and always intended.

[dagw]

I figured if we passed that test, we could handle pretty much anything.

A relationship isn't hard when you are on an adventure and experiencing new things and facing new challenges. Relationships become hard when you have spent a few years in a daily rut of kids, work, house work, bills repeat repeat repeat.

[55555]

To be fair, both scenarios are known to stress them. I have known many couples who met, were fine for months, and then went on a trip together and broke up. Traveling with someone can be very stressful.

[pinaceae]

no.

you tested with a lot of externalities keeping life exciting.

the real stress is being together through the daily, normal grind. in particular kids. where traveling for 6months through SA becomes unattainable - but you still remember those good old days.

the 7 year itch is very real and closely tracks having kids.

what you describe is the 20something vision of life. changes drastically mid-30s for most.

[ovulator]

Handle six months of adventure together?

Try eight years of monotony. I guess if you have the monetary means and nothing to tie you down to a monotonous lifestyle, this will be avoided. But for the standard 2 kids 9-5, good luck.

Not saying it isn't a stress test, but it just isn't the same. And the unfortunate truth is there is no test other than actually doing it.

[koolba]

Counter tips:

> 1. Have a longterm vision/goal for your life that is achievable regardless of financial resources/location etc.

1. Plan for financial long term future but focus on the fun in the short term. Also, good fun is a cheap fun so it's not mutually exclusive with the previous sentence.

> 2. Find a partner in crime who shares that vision and is willing to join you on what will surely be a great adventure known as your life. Life will surely be no bed of roses.

2. Don't try to find anybody. Choose science! [1]

> 3. Stress Test your relationship in some way to ensure the vision/goal is aligned.

3. Life has enough natural stresses that time alone is a decent enough indicator.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rWunrNejmA

[dozzie]

> 2. Don't try to find anybody. Choose science! [1]

"Sience! I'll kill you!" (Ahmed Scientist)

[glibgil]

handle pretty much anything for six months

Check back in six years, then fifteen, then twenty

[up_and_up]

See edit.

[tomp]

> 1. Have a longterm vision/goal for your life that is achievable regardless of financial resources/location etc.

What's yours?

[alashley]

Good plan. I find the same thing goes for friendships too. The more things friends have endured together, the more likely they are to stick together in the long run.