Why Potential Grandparents Should Use ‘If’ Not ‘When’ in Conversations About Future Grandkids

The language we use affects the well-being of others

Unsplash+ with Getty Images

Do you know anyone who may be interested in our stories here at Life Without Children? Please share us with them by clicking the button below. Or maybe, it would be helpful to send this article to that woman in your life who is hassling you for grandkids.

---

When I was six years old, I knew definitively what I wanted to be when I grew up — a grandmother. I clearly didn’t understand how things worked, as I also knew that I didn’t want children.

Not everyone gets to be a grandparent.

My ex-mother-in-law was fanatical about having grandkids. I’m talking obsessively fixated. She wanted to buy the house next door to me and my now ex-boyfriend, to look after her imagined grandkids. She spoke about being in the labour room with me to witness the birth of a child I hadn’t even conceived. Heck, she bought a toilet training seat for a kid who didn’t exist.

The only snag to her plotting and planning was that I didn’t want children, and I had no plans on having them. She knew this.

And still, she steamrolled ahead with her baby-centred dialogues. Her one-woman crusade to become a grandmother.

It was a devastating period of my life. The fight for my authenticity sabotaged my mental health and induced a deep-rooted feeling that there was something wrong with me. Something so desperately wrong.

For those who follow my writing here at Life Without Children, you will know that I encourage using the word if instead of when in conversations that centre on having kids.

Since experiencing baby pressure from my ex-mother-in-law, I’ve made it my mission to advocate for all women without children. While we are still a minority, it’s perfectly normal not to have children, almost one in four women don’t have kids — for varying reasons — and yet, we are still shamed, silenced and othered.

Ideally, we wouldn’t ask anyone about their reproductive plans, but if it’s relevant and appropriate, saying “If you choose to have children, and you are able to…” is far more inclusive of all reproductive positions than the presumptive and reductive line of “When you have children….”

The same goes for conversations about grandparenting. Every time I hear someone make a reference to when they become a grandparent instead of if they become a grandparent, a little part of my soul wilts.

Because we don’t always get what we want. This “when” word only puts pressure and expectation on others. And when those others are still children, I see this as a form of pronatalist grooming.

No one is entitled to grandchildren

I understand many older women harbour a desire to become a grandparent; this is perfectly normal.

But when women laser focus on their romanticised notions of having grandchildren without accounting for the wants, wishes, circumstances and potential fertility difficulties of their children, they feed into a growing sense of isolation, shame and loneliness that many women who don’t have children experience.

In the New York Times article The Unspoken Grief of Never Becoming a Grandparent we hear from some women whose adult children have chosen not to have children. These women speak of trying to change their daughters’ minds and of the grief they feel at not being a grandparent.

It also mentions a widespread attitude that many older women hold that having grandkids is a form of reward for ageing.

Honestly, I found the article a hard read, given the duress I was put under by my ex-mother-in-law. For me, there was inadequate expression of love and support for those opting out of having children, and instead, it focused on the poor women being deprived of grandkids. I mean, I get it, that was the angle of the article, but it left a bad taste in my mouth.

Because I couldn’t help but feel those opting out of having children were being painted as selfish and cruel for denying their mothers grandchildren. Which feeds into the crass stereotypes already circulating about childfree people.

The New York Times article specifically stated that when grandchildren aren’t provided, the relationship between mothers and daughters can become damaged and fractured. But what it didn’t give any sensitivity to is when children are actually wanted, but for any number of reasons, they don’t come. The grief of childlessness is complex. It’s raw. It’s disenfranchising and life-altering.

And this grief belongs to the person experiencing the childlessness. Sure hopeful grandparents can experience their own type of grief at not becoming a grandparent, but they don’t get to appropriate the grief of the childless.

I suspect there may well be many people out there who relented to the pressure and had children so their parents, or in-laws, could have grandchildren. I feel for them. I feel for the children. I wonder how they are getting on now.

My ex-mother-in-law tried to coerce and manipulate me into having a baby that she could coo over. She used tears, promises of jewellery (?!) and shaming and begging tactics. I’m grateful to my authentic self for standing firm.

The truth is, just as no one is entitled to children. No one is entitled to grandchildren.

Childlessness is not solved by wanting kids badly enough

Recently, I engaged in an online dialogue with a stranger. I know, I know, I should have known better. This lady had published a post about something she would do when she became a grandparent. Her kids are 13 and 15 years old!

I squirmed. I cringed. And before I knew it I was tap tap tapping a reply. A polite reply, although I admit I reacted from a place of being triggered, transported back to memories of my ex-mother-in-law. I didn’t want this lady’s teenage daughters to suffer like I did.

And despite our dialogue, my suggestions that her kids may not want kids or they may not be able to have them, she was adamant that they would have kids. And that if there were any issues, they would find a way to overcome them.

I let this simmer for a bit. But it felt like a punch in the stomach to all my childless friends. Did this woman really think people who are childless just haven’t tried hard enough? That they just haven’t explored all their options?

So, with my advocacy hat on, I explained that sometimes childless people, despite how desperate they are for kids, have exhausted all options and are left without a much-longed-for baby. I delivered a cold, hard and deeply uncomfortable truth that sometimes you can do everything possible and end up with no kids.

But that didn’t initiate any realisation in my new online friend. Rather, her response was full of solutions: “In which case, my daughters will just adopt.” Of course, just adopt, silly me, I forgot about the saviour of adoption, that knight in shining armour.

I could have bowed out, but rightly or wrongly, I continued. I shared this incredible article by my friend Charlie Brown titled We Must Stop Asking Infertile Women, ‘Why Don’t You Just Adopt?’. In this article, Charlie shares the realities of adoption, unpacks the ethical issues and highlights how difficult it is to be approved as adoptive parents.

Adoption is not an easy path and comes with no guarantees.

But again, my new friend resisted. I don’t think she read the article; she just replied to me, saying that she had friends who had adopted, and everything was rosy.

Finally, I put down my weapon and stepped away. I wasn’t looking for a fight. I just wanted a bit of awareness and sensitivity. I wanted to do my bit in stopping another woman from becoming like my ex-mother-in-law. I wanted her daughters to know that they would be loved, accepted and happy whether they had children or not.

I guess some people just don’t get it.

There are other ways to build relationships with children

Look I get it, it sucks when life doesn’t work out the way we hoped. But if we want to build relationships with children, there are many ways to do this outside of having grandkids.

I don’t need to be blood-related to someone to view them as my family. I don’t need to share a surname or family tree to love them, spend Christmas with them, or drive them to a hospital appointment.

I can’t help but feel some people regard blood relations as providing a guaranteed connection. Perhaps there’s a sort of expectation of obligation.

In his enlightening video, the spiritual leader, Sadhguru says,

“Right now, I want people to understand. What you are looking for is not a child. What you are looking for is involvement. Right now your problem is you can not involve with people unless they came out of your body.”

This wisdom gives me goosebumps, and it’s exactly how I see it. The nuclear family, and the extended nuclear family are so desperately harmful to our sense of involvement, community and connection.

One of the women in the New York Times piece speaks about feeling on the outside of her friendship group since all her friends gloat over their grandchildren, and she has nothing to contribute. Maybe now she will understand what it is like to be a woman without children (whether by choice or circumstances) in a friendship group full of mothers.

But here’s the thing, if women so desperately want to have grandchildren, I would ask them to consider what it is they want from being a grandparent, what is their fantasy? Maybe they have romantic notions of taking the kid to the park, of cooking with them, or rocking them as a baby.

All of these desires can be realised with other children.

They could volunteer as ‘baby cuddlers’ to help soothe and comfort the distress of babies born to drug addicts. Or they could volunteer with a youth club. Perhaps they could join a befriending scheme and team up with a family who have no involvement from biological grandparents due to estrangement, geography or death.

And my favourite suggestion — what about teaming up with a single mum, who has no support network?

Just as there are many ways to be involved in children’s lives without being a mother, so are there ways to be a surrogate grandmother.

---

After we split up, my ex-boyfriend got married and had a baby. So the ex-mother-in-law eventually got her much-longed-for grandchild.

But for those who don’t always get the grandchildren they want — I get it, it can seem cruel and unfair.

Where talk of having kids is concerned, we can all do better at being more sensitive. Not everyone wants children, and not everyone can have them. So let’s abolish presumption and err on the side of caution.

The language we use can make all the difference to how women feel about their lack of children. If we speak in a manner that recognises children are not a given, the woman in our lives will hear this as acceptance and love.

Remember, it’s “if” not “when”.

By Ali Hall

---

Thanks for reading this piece, which was originally published on Medium. If you enjoyed it, please share it with others.

---

Not everyone can be a paid subscriber; if you find these words valuable, you can support my work by leaving a one-off tip.

---

You may also enjoy my other Substack Abnormally Normal, a place for everyone who feels like they don’t fit in.

---

Come and find us in our other online spaces.

How to Write with Us | Instagram | Substack | Medium | Threads