An article in the New York Times outlined the hidden pain of parents who will never become grandparents, due to the choices of their children.
Journalist Catherine Pearson wrote, “A growing number of Americans are choosing not to have children. Their parents are grappling with what that means for them.”
Pearson stated that in 2014, 60% of adults 50 and older had at least one grandchild. In 2021, that rate fell to slightly over 50%.
The author added that many adults in the United States are not having children, and one of the top reasons is that “they just don’t want to.”
She told the story of parent Lydia Birk, a mother of three who has kept her favorite copy of The Velveteen Rabbit since her adult children were young.
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Birk “loved being a stay-at-home mother,” Pearson reports, and she looked forward to the day she could share her favorite stories with her grandchildren. But her three children are not planning on having children.
Birk said that the decision is “right for them,” even though it breaks her heart.
“I don’t have young children anymore, and now I’m not going to have grandchildren,” she said. “So that part of my life is just over.”
Birk’s husband John added, “That is a best and worst thing about having kids. You watch them make their own decisions, different from your own.”
Therapist Claire Bidwell Smith added that even parents who say they understand their children’s choice on an intellectual level still have a deep sense of longing and loss when they realize they will not have grandchildren.
“You always hear people talk about how great it is to be a grandparent, how it’s better than being a parent,” Smith said. “I think when people don’t get to experience that, there’s a very real grief that comes with it.”
She added that American society tends not to recognize this grief, and people do not know how to discuss it. She encouraged parents to acknowledge their grief and “sit with it.”
Pearson then quoted psychologist Maggie Mulqueen, who said that a lack of grandchildren in one’s old age can introduce existential questions about life and legacy, since at that point, the elderly have fewer years ahead of them than they do behind them.
Mulqueen added that millennial and Gen Z’s refusal to have children can strain their own parent-child relationship. She said it can even feel like a personal rejection, with the parents thinking, “Did I mess up as a parent so much that my kids don’t want to have children?”
Mulqueen said that older parents who miss being around young children and have no grandchildren on the horizon can try to find other ways to spend time with children, like tutoring at a local elementary school.
LifeNews Note: Grace Porto writes for CatholicVote, where this column originally appeared.
