Being childless still carries stigma — even though more people are choosing not to become parents

This story is part of Amy Bell's Parental Guidance column, which airs on CBC Radio One's The Early Edition.

For centuries, the idealized path through life for many people — especially women — has been one that includes a lovely home, a loving partner and a couple of adorable children to raise.

But increasingly, Canadians are choosing not to have children. The country's birth rate hit a record low in 2020.

There are many reasons people choose not to procreate: income, health, relationship status and simple preference. But one thing they all have in common is the stigma they face for that choice.

The ink was barely dry on my marriage certificate before the "when are you guys going to have kids?" questions began. 

We dodged the issue by quickly getting a puppy to act as a decoy, but that only held off the pressure for so long. And that pressure can be unrelenting for so many people. 

'I felt somewhat like a commodity'

Lori Coombs was very set on not having children when she entered her first marriage. But she says she began to realize her value in the family she joined centred firmly on her reproductive abilities. 

That outdated view of women and their worth was just one of many factors that ultimately led to the end of that relationship, and Coombs stuck to her decision to remain childless.

"As women we go through this in different iterations in our life as valued for what we can provide to the world …like beauty, or how skinny we are," said Coombs, who is now in her early 50s.

"And I think the same thing goes for motherhood. So with that external pressure, I felt somewhat like a commodity ... my value, certainly with that family, was my ability to provide grandchildren." 

Coombs, who is from Vancouver but now lives in Washington state, says it's not just close friends and family who judge her. She thinks society somehow feels entitled to what she might have brought to the world if she had decided to parent a child. 

"Strangers that you chat with at a wedding will kind of put guilt on you that you're not doing your part in providing the world with a good human being to raise. You hear things like 'what if your child would grow up to cure cancer?' Well, maybe, but what if he grows up to be a serial killer?" says Coombs. 

Lorilee Keller, a registered clinical counsellor in Vancouver, says society needs to shift focus away from the expectation that all people can or will be parents.

"I think a lot of people are looking for friends and family to be just supportive and maybe not assume that everyone is going to go down the path of having kids or that everyone has a choice in that," Keller said.

Regret is expected

The judgment doesn't stop just because you reach a certain age, either. 

Now in her late 40s, Shauna Good decided in her 20s that motherhood was not for her. Good says she wasn't comfortable with the gender roles that still dictate that mothers are most likely to give up their careers and take on the lion's share of parental duties. 

And though she's past her "child-bearing years" — and is extremely close with her nephew and niece — she feels she's still expected to express regret for her decision. 

"Even there are expectations from my gyno," said Good, who says she's had problems with menstruation for decades but finds doctors aren't as willing to offer her treatment that would result in her not being able to have children. 

Not everyone has a choice

For those who are childless not by choice, but perhaps through infertility or the death of a child, there can be so many layers of grief, disappointment and shame.

These are feelings that are often worked through alone, for fear of being judged for somehow "failing" in their duties — especially among those who identify as women.  

"The experience of infertility and pregnancy loss is very stressful," Keller said. "And if you add on that judgment piece or that pressure piece it becomes even more stressful, for sure."

Keller says we need to be supportive of people in our lives who are working to let go of the future they envisioned. 

"There's a lot of sadness, a lot of grief around something that they thought might happen in their life. The dream of that," she said.

"Another emotional aspect that can come up is shame. There's this sense of feeling that you failed somehow. Failed as a woman because you didn't become a mother."

I love kids — so much so that I made two myself. But being their mother doesn't define me.

In any alternative timeline I should be just as valued, loved and worthy if I didn't have children — much like how we've historically viewed men. 

As younger generations face climate catastrophes, unreachable housing markets and political unrest, many more people will likely make the choice to not bring children into the world. We need to not just accept this but embrace it, and see the value in these members of our own "village." 

Whether by choice or by not, the childless people in our lives play equally important roles and deserve to be free of any judgment.