Sustainability Director hops off the fence—Massachusetts, Age 32
I originally posted a version of the story below to the Reddit’s forum, r/fencesitter, for people “on the fence” about having children. A raw, vulnerable discussion followed, then several commenters and I were permanently banned from the sub with no explanation.
Trying to come to terms with the impact of our choices—Anonymous
Tread lightly is a motto I live by and one I am trying to instill in my two young children.
I speak to them often about being gentle to the earth and we try as a family to make choices that do more good than harm - to the environment and to the people around us. So when I sit here considering if we should have a third child, it seems completely unreasonable for us to do so.
Olivia Andrews—Age 38, Cape Town, South Africa
I am 38 years old and have made the decision to remain child-free. I’m not having children for environmental reasons. I’m worried about what the future holds for our planet with climate change. My partner and I have been together for 16 years. He also doesn’t want children. If he did we would not have got married.
Angela Gott—Age 65, New York
I am now 65. I never married, nor had children. My sister is 60 and she never had children either. Both of us decided in our teens that we never wanted to have children. We were raised in Louisville, Kentucky and are college educated. Our adoptive parents had “time” to enjoy their married lives for 11 years before adopting me in 1951 and my sister in 1956.
I think about the world my child would inhabit—Ellen Pierson
I want to have a baby. I can imagine that baby growing into a toddler, a child, a teenager, and finally an adult. I think about the names I might choose for my son or daughter, the books and stories I would share with him or her, and the things we would do together.
It’s not sustainable to have children in our lifetime—Anonymous
At 21 years old, children of my own seem far far off in my mind– waiting until i finish college, until i settle somewhere, until, until, until. the problem that comes with that timeline is that cataclysmic climate change that is edging closer and closer. the change that is only becoming more real with every passing hottest day on record.
