Childless women on the increase

By Stan Freeman
December 14, 2003

Childless, Lori C. Norris is not. Except where the census is concerned.

Technically, she is among the nearly one in six women in their 40s who has not had children, either by choice or circumstances. According to the Census Bureau, the percent of women ages 40 to 44 who were childless increased from 10 percent in 1976 to 18 percent in 2002.

But behind any statistic is a story, and in Norris' case, the story has to do with a super-abundance of nieces and nephews. She and her husband William - and she is only estimating here - have 40 of them, with most scattered around Greater Springfield.

"My husband and I married in 1976. We were middle and younger children from families where all the sisters and brothers had children. By the time we were married we had nieces and nephews that were up to 11 years old. So we've always had a baby around somewhere," said Norris, who lives in Springfield.

"My husband and I had an understanding. It wasn't like we didn't like kids. We love kids. There were always kids around to go to the zoo or circus. But we didn't make a special effort to have them ourselves. If they came along, fine. If they didn't, fine."

Whether or not it was because of her enormous extended family, what would have saddened some women hasn't saddened her. "I never felt that emptiness like some women do. I don't feel like I missed out on anything."

It's no secret that more women today than in previous generations are going to college, getting jobs and then delaying or foregoing motherhood. The new census figures reflect a certain number of women who wanted to be mothers but for various reasons never had the opportunity. However, others, like Norris, opted for childlessness.

There was a time when women had few choices beyond nursing, teaching and motherhood, said Nancy R. Folbre, economics professor at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst.

"But women have more choices today. Diversity is good, though. It's good to live in a world where women can be mothers or not be mothers, either way. If more people decide they don't want to raise kids, it could lead us to really value the people that do and appreciate them for what they are doing," she said.

What she doesn't like to see, though, is women who took the college/career path and then, when they wanted to have children, they found the price to pay for leaving the work force to raise a family was too steep.

"The work-family conflict tends to bite women harder than men. It just creates a starker tradeoff for them. There's been a lot of discussion about how to create family policies for work that reduce that tradeoff. Northwestern Europe - France, Norway, Sweden - has policies in place so that the number of (working) women who are childless is much smaller," Folbre said.

Those countries have high-quality, publicly funded child care, paid parental leave from work and fully paid health insurance, Folbre said.

"We have to make it a reasonable choice to be a parent without completely opting out of a competitive career. The tradeoff now is much too punishing. People have to take a very large risk and a big reduction in economic security to be parents," she said.

Having children has for so long been an imperative for women (a survival need for the human race, some would say) that to make it a positive choice for women to forego motherhood takes some getting used to - and some mutual support for women.

There are numerous groups and Web sites organized around the issue. The group "No Kidding" may have 10,000 members in four countries. Web sites such as "Kidding Aside," and "Married No Kids" offer online support.

Linda of Southwick, who asked that her last name not be used, recently organized a Westfield chapter of No Kidding and is recruiting members online at the group's Web site.

People past 30 who are without children can feel increasingly isolated as their friends and fellow workers develop families, she said.

"You lose your common ground with them. Everything in their life is their kids. If you go out with them, they're always saying they have to get home because of their kids," she said.

"I've been married for 24 years. When my husband and I were planning to get married, he asked me if I wanted to have kids and I said let's see how it goes. But I don't regret not having had them," she said.