Heather Shaw
After finally resolving to claim more control over my life, New year’s eve, 2025 found me and my husband going out to a community gala. We arrived at the banquet hall, dressed in our glad rags and very excited for an evening of music, food and dancing. Sat with 3 other couples who we had never met, no sooner did we finish the comments on how beautiful everything looked and whether we were going to wear our festive hats during the meal, did the question get asked from the couple sitting next to us, “Do you have kids….?” What a bummer. What a drag.
Reflecting on this question over the years, I realize how its impact has evolved, shifting from a hopeful optimism to a reminder of lost control and uncertainty. In my early 30s, this question had little effect because I was still confident of my future. By my late 30s however, my response, “No. I don’t have kids” was beginning to signal that I was losing control over my life and its expectations. What was once a clear path for the future was quickly becoming unfamiliar—I no longer seemed to belong on it: both the path and those walking it no longer had the space for me and I found myself slowly becoming invisible and thrust to the fringes of society.
In my 40s, this question began to amplify feelings of lost control, diminishing belonging and introduced a feeling of deep emptiness. Responding, "No. I don't have kids," was nothing short of traumatic and very nearly impossible to verbalize. As well, in social situations, I felt as though my answer would drain the room of air—like simply sharing a part of myself would somehow ruin the evening for someone else; I empathized with the asker–people often don’t know how to respond. “Oh. That’s a shame.” (Cue the crickets.)
I have spent a large portion of my life working in the field of gerontology and educating healthcare professionals in interacting with seniors who have dementia and/or chronic health conditions. I stress using sensitive conversation—not direct questions—when building rapport. When exploring best practices for conversational techniques, I encourage gathering personal information through thoughtful, intelligent, and sensitive conversation. This question, “Do you have kids?” may seem innocuous but it often features on the list of “highly personal questions” that should be asked only when truly prepared for any response, whatever it may be.
What many people don’t realize is that there are countless reasons why someone might not have children-some by choice and some not by choice. And for most of my life, as a person who is childfree-not-by-choice, what I didn’t realize was that I was experiencing grief. It is a tricky form of grief because what has been lost-can’t be seen; rather, it involves a constant and deep sadness of what never was and never will be and therefore is very difficult to understand. Each time this question was posed to me, the grief that I was enduring was provoked. Unfortunately, it was often the case that the asker seldom knew how to respond, and my response would just hang in the air like a cry for help met with silence-maybe if we all ignore this, it will just go away. And so, for me, I learned to keep the battle contained and to rage in my mind.
As we know, grief generally involves loss and it needs to be released. Questions that touch on loss call for thoughtfulness and tenderness and perhaps should not be used as fodder for making conversation. To those who ask, “Do you have children?”, please think of something else to say-or else, be prepared to offer support. The world is designed for families and being relentlessly reminded of one’s loss, through television, novels, films, on every single vacation-and while socializing on New Year’s Eve, wreaks havoc on the soul.
Present day, I feel it is time to attempt to gain some ground. As I reflect on my response to the couple sat next to me on New Year’s Eve, I am regretful because I responded the way I usually do-in the form of a joke, “Just one!” and pointed to my husband. If I could go back in time, I would encourage myself to claim space in the world by courageously embracing this question not as an offence but as an opportunity to advocate for some sensitivity, understanding and awareness of “other”. As a start, it occurred to me that the tables could, in fact, be turned-there is another question available: the next time I am in a social situation, I just might be the first to ask, “Are you child-free?”
Next New Year’s Eve…to the couple sitting next to me, I’ve got a question too.
