What Your Eating (And Other) Habits Say About Whether You Should Have Kids
Every month or so, I receive an actual paper card in the mail from my mom with mysterious contents. It could be coupons for Fancy Feast or the Banana Republic outlet. Or a Whole Foods gift card as a hint to stock our bachelor fridge with more than just Bud Light and dijon mustard. But more often than not, it’s an article on writing or the baby issue pulled from an actual paper magazine or newspaper she still reads. Her most recent find was an article from the Wall Street Journal called “Getting Junior to Move” and she’d circled this excerpt:
One of my college friends had kids many years before anyone else in our group was even considering children, and he used to give the following advice (mostly unsolicited): “Think,” he used to say, “about how you like to eat. There are some people who like to eat reasonable food three times daily, while others would prefer to save their money and eat mediocre food most of the time but occasionally have an amazing meal.
“If you’re one of the second type, go ahead and have kids, because life with kids isn’t all that fun for the most part, but from time to time they bring incredible joy. And if you identify with the first type, you may want to rethink the kids idea.”
I’m so used to my thoughts and behaviors more closely matching that of the Childfree, that I was quite taken aback to find myself 100% camped in that second group, in almost every aspect of my life. I’m a save-n-splurger. A starve-n-binger. A delayed gratification sort of gal.
Yes, that’s me!
On the mini-honeymoon Drew and I took when we didn’t have enough vacation days, we spent one night in Phoenix, one night in Sedona, and one night in Vegas. Normal people might’ve stayed in reasonable hotels all three nights or just splurged for the special occasion and booked top-notch hotels all the way through. But I insisted on staying at the glamorous Red Roof Inn our first night so we could stay (relatively) guilt-free at L’Auberge in Sedona the second. It was quite possibly the most depressing dump I’ve ever had the misfortune of staying in. But it made our arrival at L’Auberge all the more sweeter.
Monday through Friday, I’m a pretty disciplined eater – breakfast muffins chock full ‘o fruit and nuts made with applesauce instead of oil, salads every day for lunch, something packed with veggies and whole grains for dinner. I’ve developed some kind of health nut reputation around the office, but none of my co-workers are around to see me make a complete animal out of myself on the weekends. Grilled cheeses before bed. Four-figure calorie tallies in “light” beer and martinis. Omelets the size of hubcaps. Animal-style fries off the In N Out secret menu. I had seven chocolate chip cookies last night after powering down a full plate of Chicken Tikka Masala and basmati rice. Friends, I get after it. I’m like a death-row inmate on her last meal, every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. And I enjoy the hell out of it after a week of those loathsome salads.
These are the major categories of delayed gratification that come to mind, but when I dig a little deeper, I find that this behavior manifests itself everywhere in my life. I re-use Ziploc bags long past their prime because it makes finally plucking a fresh one from the box is so exhilarating. I pull on the same pair of socks after work for a week at a time and when I finally toss them in the laundry basket, it’s not without some overly dramatic commentary like, “We had a good long run, didn’t we, Argyle?” before turning back to the excitement of choosing next week’s pair. I keep a spreadsheet of my $16 SuperCuts haircut dates to see how often I can hold out and beat my average of going every 12 weeks. I struggle to keep myself awake in the afternoons at my desk, but allow myself a second coffee only once a week on whatever I deem to be the most deserving day.
Why do I do this to myself? [At first blush, it may seem that it’s because I’m paralyzingly cheap and limitlessly disgusting with a borderline social disorder, but indulge me for a moment.] Why not spend a few bucks and a little extra time to have nice, fresh, new things all the time? Why not add a few carbs, toss in a slice of pizza now and then during the work week so I won’t need to go on a binge session every weekend? Well that just sounds plain old boring. What then is there to look forward to? Does not every day seem just the same as the last?
I suppose it all comes back to finding satisfaction in delayed gratification. Something, it appears, I’m rather good at. Something that the author of the aforementioned article believes makes me well-equipped to handle the daily self-denial of life with kids in support of bigger rewards down the road.
But I’m not sure this is a fair comparison. Are we looking at apples and oranges here? Or is this a pretty accurate indicator of parental fitness?
Discuss!
24 Responses to What Your Eating (And Other) Habits Say About Whether You Should Have Kids
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Just stumbled onto this blog and I LOVE it! I have a book recommendation for you:
http://www.amazon.com/Why-Have-Kids-Parenting-Happiness/dp/0547892616/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1358235286&sr=8-1&keywords=why+have+kids
It’s actually sitting on my Kindle right now, I just haven’t had a chance to get to it. But thank you for the recommendation, and for reading the blog!
I don’t think that’s a reasonable indicator. They WHY of the choice would probably be more important than the choice itself. For instance, I am part of that second grouping but for multiple reasons, none of which jive with being a parent. One reason is that I’m making myself eat healthier so it’s an issue of total control over my diet, and allotting myself splurges. Another is that, while comfortable, we’re not swimming in cash but the wife and I do enjoy some of the finer things. That means we like to save up and spend on ourselves, collecting up experiences rather than souvenirs. Also not a strong indicator of choosing parenthood.
I don’t mean this in an insulting way, but perhaps the logic behind second choice being an indicator of parental viability is more along the lines of “if you don’t mind having things be mediocre as long as there’s a bit of a reward every now and then, you might want kids”. All of the above could lead to the same choice but don’t remotely show the same value system.
Well put, Adam. I think you’re right – the intentions behind the actions say way more than the actions themselves.
The “scrimp then savor” thing only works if you actually really really want the “savor” prize. And as we know, babies =/= delicious food.
The article assumes that there is an equivalency between delicious food and all the joyful moments I see on my Facebook feed. This, presumably, makes worthwhile all the 3:00 a.m. projectile vomiting stories I also see.
But if even the joyful moments are just “meh” to you, not something you truly crave in your life, then what the hell are you making all the sacrifices for? It would be like salads all week followed by… a slightly nicer salad?
From my mom friends, it seems like the hormones which hurdle through your body after you have a baby help to convince you that your slightly nicer salad is THE BEST SALAD EVER OMG SALAD!!!!1! Even my friends who were ambivalent about parenthood now cross their heart and swear that their salads, er, I mean babies, are the sources of the most fulfillment in their lives, even as they complain about poop. So perhaps there is a biological trigger in there that allows you to get a massive amount of satisfaction from something you previously only found mildly cool. And for some reason, the Wall Street Journal knows all about it? Creepy.
Whoa – your notion of the only pot of gold at the end of this rainbow being a slightly nicer salad is terrifying! I do wonder how much hormones have to do with it, as you mention. Perhaps a topic for another post…
My best friend had a baby a few months ago, and somewhere in her many “what to expect” type books, she read that during pregnancy, your brain actually develops new neuron pathways – your brain physically changes so that you will have an instantaneous ridiculous love for your baby as soon as it’s born. I think it’s nature’s way of making sure the species survives.
The food question is interesting. I’m curious as to what the WSJ author meant by “reasonable food”, since he apparently didn’t mean reasonably priced.
Btw, my mom still mails me random stuff – usually wedding/birth announcements from the local paper about kids I went to school with. And I totally wear the same pair of socks after work through the entire week.
Thank you for making me feel better about my sock habits. It would be so interesting if we could ever do an experiment where a pregnant woman’s brain DOESN’T develop those new neuron pathways and just see what kind of struggle ensues. Because I think when we say it’s something like that with neurons, it’s hard for those of us who aren’t pregnant to understand it.
From the perspective of a parent, I think that’s a pretty useless analogy. For one thing, it makes no sense. And as the comments show, there are a number of ways it can be interpreted, any of which can lend themselves to a valid justification of one’s feelings. Full disclosure though – I’m not generally a fan of the WSJ’s pop-parenting features.
Girl Named Jack’s comment about formerly ambivalent parents becoming fulfilled by their salad babies made me think. I wonder if some adults, particularly women, are hesitant to admit they really want children lest they be seen as “homey” or “underachieving” or in some way falling short because of some perceived expectation that having children means sacrificing your own self and is therefore weak and uncool? (I’m just thinking out loud… Don’t pick on me!) So, not wanting to admit to themselves or to others that they actually want children, they just sort of waffle about, then they have children and feel free to admit how much they actually enjoy it?
(And it is so possible to love having kids while complaining about poop! It’s part of the human condition to complain, poop is just a super-convenient target!)
Oh, I’m sure many women feel that way – domesticity has almost become a bad word. Which is really a shame because it’s an important part of life – making a home feel like home, strengthening family ties – regardless of whether you have kids.
lol, thats definitely a way I never thought of it.
We are scrimpers and splurgers too – like our fantastically awesome (and quite expensive) hotel in Berlin. Totally worth every cent of treat. Especially the breakfasts.
And I think the others have it: Its about whether you can contain yourself through the shitty stuff, holding out for the promise that good stuff WILL happen.
Also, bear in mind that depending how your budget looks, some of those things you have previously called the cheapo option to afford the splurge may become every day – the nice hotel in Sedona might actually end up completely out of your budget. (avoidance of this is why I’m pushing for just the one kid, things are far more affordable that way)
So true – the Red Roof Inn may become our new exotic getaway if we have kids!
Your friend got the logic a little messed up. The conclusion is not that you should have kids, just that only people who can have delayed gratification should even consider having kids. It’s just a prerequisite, NOT a “therefore you should” kind of thing.
Remember how much you look forward to those little splurges later? Remember how much they mean to you, how much they make the rest of the time worthwhile? Now imagine your children preventing you from enjoying those splurges, so that all you have left are the mediocre days…..
Totally agree with you on the pre-req thing. I have to imagine though that if you become a parent, you start classifying splurges differently…like maybe you don’t crave a night at L’Auberge, you crave family time at Disneyland. Wait, that sounds horrible…
I don’t know about the food analogy…but I don’t think it’s merely crap. Any analogy is going to be limited, and this has some obvious limitations. I was just thinking, though, about the salad/slightly better salad analogy that someone mentioned, which made me think of another method of comparison.
I think there IS a kind of person who prefers being comfortable above being joyful, who prefers stability to excitement, who prefers met expectations to surprise possibilities. Really, that person is me.
But despite that, my experiences with my daughter are not merely slightly better salad. They are the highest moments of my life. Now, since I’m not a really emotional person, those highs are not nearly as high as they likely are for a lot of people. But they’re enough to make me shed tears, just like I did when I proposed to my wife. Which I’ll use as the comparison point.
If your proposal wasn’t particularly much of a high, you might choose a different “high” moment. But, using the best feelings you’ve ever had as a starting point, how much hell would you be willing to go through in order to experience them, or better, on a semi-routine basis?
I’m not actually sure what my own answer to that is. My wife saying “yes” to me was a pretty great moment…but I got over it pretty quickly, and my engagement was frankly kind of sucky (lots of in-law troubles). If I still had to go through the rotten engagement again, but could have my wife say “yes” to me just once a year, it probably wouldn’t be worth it. Once a month? Maybe. Maybe not. Once a week? Yeah, that might be worth it.
There’s also the fact that some people are more able to prepare themselves and their lives for a frequent endorphin-high moment of parenting…once a day, or multiple times even. A lot of factors would go into that. I probably don’t hit it every day, but watching your sleeping child gets pretty close, even when there have been a lot of tantrums that day.
You bring up a really good point, which is how quickly those highs (even the very best ones) can fade away. I’m probably the same as you in terms of things fading pretty fast – maybe we just have ADD. But it sounds like for you, it’s worth it.
What Disneyland is seriously lacking is daycare. Think how much fun you could have if you were able to leave your kids at the on-site daycare so you could enjoy Disneyland yourself. Some department stores have that, so why not Disneyland?
I think we could make a killing if we set up that business there. Except that no one in their right mind would entrust us with their children.
Trust, shmust. They’ll warm up to the idea after a few hours in the park. This is why you put the daycare center in the middle of the park, or as far from the entrance as possible, for a little added incentive. Or you sneak some subliminal messages into the endless “It’s a Small World” tune, which is just waiting to be exploited for mass hypnosis.
Thank you for getting “It’s a Small World” in my head for the rest of the week…
I had no idea in- n- out had animal style fries. Darn you, responsible chains… Why can’t you expand to the South? Now I have to wait for my next trip to CA or AZ to try them out
I do pity you without your In N Out in the south. I can’t believe I lived my first 24 years without one in the Midwest.
I’m not sure that analogy holds up for me.
I prefer the one about having kids being similar to being on a roller coaster: higher highs, lower lows; whereas a childfree life tends to be more emotionally steady, with medium highs and lows (of course, even that analogy isn’t perfect – there are some lows and highs that can touch us all… see: the death of someone close, falling in love).
I definitely agree that the rollercoaster one is probably a closer fit…but I’m starting to wonder if any analogy will really do it justice.