[jlizzle30]

New(ish) parent here. Two things:

First, the bad news: lots of comments saying stuff like "Don't have kids to fill a perceived hole in your life". In general, the advice "Don't do ____ to fill a hole in your life" is good for frivolous things, but I don't think this applies to being a parent. Parenting is a biological and psychological life milestone. To me it's felt more like leveling up my maturity than buying or achieving something. An analogy is something like going from relying on my parents to moving out and being independent. I realize this step isn't for everyone, but am skeptical about 95% of ppl so confident they don't want to take a step their linage has done for thousands of years.

Second, the good news: my experiences (and accounts of friends as well) suggests that attachment to a child is less biological and more developed than you'd expect. When my daughter was born she felt like a stranger; I didn't know her. The more time I spend with her, the more she learns and depends on me, and the more I grow emotionally attached to her. This suggests you'd get 98% of the parenting experience through adoption vs being a biological parent. You'd miss out on stuff like "o wow her eyes look like mine", but at least in my experience, this has been less important than I would've thought. The big stuff like seeing them learn, their innocent joy, and you 'paying it forward' in the circle of life would be the same. (NOTE: these are my 2 cents as a biological parent. It'd be worth reading some adoptive parent accounts as well). Also, if adoption is not for you, I'd still recommend getting involved in helping kids in some way (education, financial, etc.); again, what are we here for if not to help the next generation?

[BLKNSLVR]

Well fucking said.

I know your kid(s) are going to be raised well.

I think "helping people" as a general rule is a part-proxy to raising kids.

[fatheart]

As a stepfather of a child since he was age 3 (age 9 now), I agree whole-heartedly with your second point. I have a very deep emotional attachment to him, and I've never felt like I'm missing out on anything because he's not my biological son. Full disclaimer, I have no biological children to compare my feelings/experience with. I don't feel the comparison is necessary, just adding that in case others feel it is important.

[opyate]

> my experiences (and accounts of friends as well) suggests that attachment to a child is less biological and more developed than you'd expect

We found this too, and my wife felt validated by this article she found recently:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/oct/10/the-big-idea-w...

[cat_plus_plus]

It's especially not true for frivolous things, go for it unless it will absolutely ruin your health or finances. Why would a nice car NOT make you happy? It might not give you lifelong fulfillment on its own, but then nothing will, you always have to find new goals and work towards them as a journey.

[freedom2099]

In my case the moment they put my son in my arms for the first time I felt instantly so much love! That tiny human being was suddenly the most important thing of my life!

[thefz]

> Parenting is a biological and psychological life milestone

Allow me to disagree. First: there's no evidence of any change in your body, as a male, after becoming a father.

Second: supposing such a "wireless" change would happen, getting someone pregnant and immediately disappearing from their life would yield a perceptible change even with distance and no involvement with the life of the child.

Third: I personally think there's no innate drive to parent, and only an innate drive to mate; everything else is injected by society.

[jlizzle30]

There could be a great discussion about whether male parenting and reproduction comes from the bio/psycho/social drives.

For this context, I think trying to make these distinctions is a distraction. By way of common sense, reproducing & parenting has been a HUGE factor in the propagation of human life (this is so obvious it's kind of funny to write).

[thefz]

> For this context, I think trying to make these distinctions is a distraction.

So basically you don't want to have a discussion that might make you reconsider your belief.

[jlizzle30]

No I just don’t have time to write an entire epistemological defense of “reproduction and parenting is a key milestone for humans”. It should be self evident. If you don’t think so, consider what happens if untrue (hint: no more humans).

[thefz]

You have completely missed the point of all my comments above and took your own tangent.

[medvezhenok]

Not exactly true - they have found statistically significant hormonal changes in men after becoming fathers: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/15/parenting/baby/fatherhood...

[thefz]

Reading the article... yikes. One more reason not to.

[em-bee]

yes, but did they compare to fathers who abandon their partner? or don't even know that they are a father? and likewise to fathers who adopt?

i strongly suspect that it's the act of actively becoming a parent, whether biological or adoptive that is responsible for that change in hormones

[hoorible]

Which is probably why they said “parenting” and not “impregnating”

[newsuser]

Birth of the first (and only first) child triggers what might be the largest brain rewiring in males since pubety. Women don't seem to undergo a rewiring of the same scale [1].

To me, this makes sense, given how unusual the new skillset has to be compared to pre-fatherhood life (manipulations with the newborn, deciphering needs, new attetion patterns etc.).

[1] Mentioned in the book by Stanislas Dehaene, "Consciousness and the Brain", https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness_and_the_Brain

[freedom2099]

My mother claims that the day my son was born I became a completely different person!