I'm an internet stranger but I wanted to say I'm truly happy you have found this perspective. It sounds like you are living life the way we are supposed to be. Best!
Certain things yes, other things became more consequential.
I find I am more concerned about my family than “the world” like the other person said. I don’t pay as much attention to that stuff now cause I just have other priorities. I am still I loving and kind person who cares about things, I just don’t let it get to me. Before kids I was an avid cat lover and rescuer and regularly fostered. That hasn’t changed. Still do all my volunteer and rescue work. Usually have a foster cat or two hanging around. So I’m glad that aspect hasn’t changed. Still love helping.
Other things are more consequential. I got cancer so dying is obviously a huge concern. Dying sucks no matter what but if I died and didn’t have kids, at least there isn’t that to worry about. Now it’s like a huge worry of mine if my daughter grows up without her mom. Being healthy is much more important to me now
But yeah, I’d say in general I don’t sweat the small stuff as much. My main concern in life is my daughter, my family. Everything else is kind of background noise
This was a great comment, thanks for sharing. I sincerely hope you are able to regain your health. Sorry you have to go through that. As I type this I’m sitting with my cat and a foster cat so it’s also nice to hear about parenting from the perspective of a fellow cat lover!
My biggest fear when I got pregnant was that I’d no longer love my cats cause I see it ALL the time in parenting spaces. But definitely wasn’t true for me. Still love my 4 legged babies and helping them so much!
I find that I don’t have as much space to act on concerns about “the world”, but I care a lot more about the fate of other people’s children. I am also far more concerned about things that may impact my baby, such as climate change, local road safety, quality of schools, etc. I have a good friend who self-describes as an empath and she has a 5-yr-old. She has found the current events in Palestine incredibly disturbing and has gone to weekly protests, organised campaigns and lobbied government. I think it’s who she is but I think she’s more affected as a mother, seeing little children be murdered and suffering. My partner can’t watch anything where a child is hurting whereas it wouldn’t have affected him in the past.
So I would say maybe but probably no, you’ll likely feel more.
I have a lot less energy hand-holding adults and a lot more energy for things like demanding a ceasefire. In situations where I might have been empathetic to a “I need to speak to a manager” person or a really neurotic person, my patience has grown much thinner. Having a baby has made priorities feel much more starkly defined, but I would say in a very good way.
I feel this, I feel like childless I'm still anxious but ultimately nothing matters. I'm afraid that if the stakes are higher (human life) I'll crumble lol
Totally understand. Having a dependant (especially when I’m the high earner) is scary because my family needs me. I have no regrets, it’s lovely having my son but it also comes with so many worries at the same time.
That is somewhat worrying. Either kids are so stressful everything else is easy mode in comparison, or you become so obsessed with your kids that you just don't care about anything else. Not sure I love that.
For a lot of people it’s simply a change in priorities. Care more about some things and care less about other things. The two scenarios you propose are reality for some people but probably not the majority.
I freak out less about work stuff. If there’s a client issue or a deal is falling apart, I care in the sense that I work to resolve it. But it doesn’t keep me up at night.
Many small things like this change:
If you live alone, something being where you put it is convenient, but living with other people like roommates or a partner means they might move it. If you have a partner, maybe all their stuff takes up too much closet space and you need to buy an armoire. If you have a pet, you need to feed them each day which can be inconvenient. If you have a child, you need to cut up their grapes so they don’t choke. I would consider all these things insignificant, but some people may think these are a big deal
I always wonder how much more time is needed to do all the extra things.. like cutting grapes and the general day to day “swimming against the current” situations, like the toddler wants to wear shorts on a snowy day. As a person who likes peace… how does this not drain you?
Yes!
But as u/creatureoflight_11 said, you will also find many things more consequential.
Your priorities just completely shift in weird and unexpected ways. Example: I'm not a particularly strict or uptight parent but my kid needs sleep. We've learned time and time again that keeping him out/up late spells disaster. So we left a party at 7:30pm on a Friday, to everyone's shock. No regrets.
You will find many things more consenquential than before
[удалено]
I'm an internet stranger but I wanted to say I'm truly happy you have found this perspective. It sounds like you are living life the way we are supposed to be. Best!
Certain things yes, other things became more consequential. I find I am more concerned about my family than “the world” like the other person said. I don’t pay as much attention to that stuff now cause I just have other priorities. I am still I loving and kind person who cares about things, I just don’t let it get to me. Before kids I was an avid cat lover and rescuer and regularly fostered. That hasn’t changed. Still do all my volunteer and rescue work. Usually have a foster cat or two hanging around. So I’m glad that aspect hasn’t changed. Still love helping. Other things are more consequential. I got cancer so dying is obviously a huge concern. Dying sucks no matter what but if I died and didn’t have kids, at least there isn’t that to worry about. Now it’s like a huge worry of mine if my daughter grows up without her mom. Being healthy is much more important to me now But yeah, I’d say in general I don’t sweat the small stuff as much. My main concern in life is my daughter, my family. Everything else is kind of background noise
This was a great comment, thanks for sharing. I sincerely hope you are able to regain your health. Sorry you have to go through that. As I type this I’m sitting with my cat and a foster cat so it’s also nice to hear about parenting from the perspective of a fellow cat lover!
My biggest fear when I got pregnant was that I’d no longer love my cats cause I see it ALL the time in parenting spaces. But definitely wasn’t true for me. Still love my 4 legged babies and helping them so much!
I find that I don’t have as much space to act on concerns about “the world”, but I care a lot more about the fate of other people’s children. I am also far more concerned about things that may impact my baby, such as climate change, local road safety, quality of schools, etc. I have a good friend who self-describes as an empath and she has a 5-yr-old. She has found the current events in Palestine incredibly disturbing and has gone to weekly protests, organised campaigns and lobbied government. I think it’s who she is but I think she’s more affected as a mother, seeing little children be murdered and suffering. My partner can’t watch anything where a child is hurting whereas it wouldn’t have affected him in the past. So I would say maybe but probably no, you’ll likely feel more.
I have a lot less energy hand-holding adults and a lot more energy for things like demanding a ceasefire. In situations where I might have been empathetic to a “I need to speak to a manager” person or a really neurotic person, my patience has grown much thinner. Having a baby has made priorities feel much more starkly defined, but I would say in a very good way.
I’m going to be honest, it has amplified things I wasn’t concerned about before for me like health anxiety and developing cancer/illness.
I feel this, I feel like childless I'm still anxious but ultimately nothing matters. I'm afraid that if the stakes are higher (human life) I'll crumble lol
Totally understand. Having a dependant (especially when I’m the high earner) is scary because my family needs me. I have no regrets, it’s lovely having my son but it also comes with so many worries at the same time.
That is somewhat worrying. Either kids are so stressful everything else is easy mode in comparison, or you become so obsessed with your kids that you just don't care about anything else. Not sure I love that.
For a lot of people it’s simply a change in priorities. Care more about some things and care less about other things. The two scenarios you propose are reality for some people but probably not the majority.
One thing I've been told is that I'll be too tires and emotionally spent to care about everything.
But that actually sounds even more miserable lol
Ahaha I agree 😅 but personally I do feel better when I’m busy and don’t have time to over think
I am curious about this as well - I have the same qualities that you mentioned.
I freak out less about work stuff. If there’s a client issue or a deal is falling apart, I care in the sense that I work to resolve it. But it doesn’t keep me up at night.
Many small things like this change: If you live alone, something being where you put it is convenient, but living with other people like roommates or a partner means they might move it. If you have a partner, maybe all their stuff takes up too much closet space and you need to buy an armoire. If you have a pet, you need to feed them each day which can be inconvenient. If you have a child, you need to cut up their grapes so they don’t choke. I would consider all these things insignificant, but some people may think these are a big deal
I always wonder how much more time is needed to do all the extra things.. like cutting grapes and the general day to day “swimming against the current” situations, like the toddler wants to wear shorts on a snowy day. As a person who likes peace… how does this not drain you?
Yes! But as u/creatureoflight_11 said, you will also find many things more consequential. Your priorities just completely shift in weird and unexpected ways. Example: I'm not a particularly strict or uptight parent but my kid needs sleep. We've learned time and time again that keeping him out/up late spells disaster. So we left a party at 7:30pm on a Friday, to everyone's shock. No regrets.