Thumbing through last month’s Real Simple magazine, I came across an interesting snippet of information. According to research led by Carnegie Mellon University, adults with children are 52 percent less likely to catch colds than childfree adults.
Surprisingly, it wasn’t the news of my inferior immune system that got my goat. It wasn’t even the article’s suggestion of my overall inferiority in its closing line: “Yet further proof that parents are superhuman.” (Um, no. They’re just exposed to more viruses that their kids bring home from school, so they build more resistance. Basic biology.)
No, the thing that’s prompting my whine this week is that yet another magazine that started out as a magazine for women, is drifting more and more towards being a magazine for moms. Is nowhere sacred?
It’s Whiny Wednesday. What’s needling you today?
I LOVE THIS BLOG.
i love that it’s not all fluffy and “i was sad that i was infertile till i got happy about it!” but i also love that it’s not negative and whiny all the time. it’s kind of just exactly how i feel about infertility: it sucks. a lot. but there are still so many good things in life. it’s good days AND bad days. i hate when people try to get me to focus on one or the other only.
anyway. thanks.
Closing lines as this make me think of Catcher in the rye: “I would rater puke”
***
My whine of of today.
I am sharing an office with 20 other people. It was already late in the afternoon, half of the office already left, when a coworker (=annoying father of two) asked me in front of everybody:
“Klara – if I take a sick day to look after my child, what percentage of the pay will I get?”
(to be clear: 1. I do not work in HR department 2. I do not have kids )
I had enough and I answered: “And you are asking me?”
***
(I am clever enough not to ask him for advice which dog food is the best. Since I know he does not have ANY dog).
This one’s a pure moron too
I’ve been saving this whine for 6 days. 🙂 And I’m not even sure I feel whiny about it any longer, but here goes. Last Thanksgiving Day, a friend who we usually have over, brought her brother. He’s a nice guy and very academically smart, but maybe not very socially smart. Anyhow, he got to making conversation with my father, which I could overhear, and the conversation was about his having more grandchildren. He said, maybe when my nephew gets married (which we expect will probably be in the next year/year and a half). And so my friend’s brother asked about me having kids. I’m now officially 44. So my father says he doesn’t think that will happen, and the kid persists in asking why not… not to me… but to my father. And so my father says that he thinks dh maybe didn’t want to have kids. I absolutely hate it when people poke their noses into my business regarding having or not having kids, but when they ask my parents or ask me in front of them, it is worse. I’ve never talked openly about this with my parents. My mom has asked and I’ve told her that we tried, but just didn’t have any. I don’t know if she shared that with my father, and he was just saying something to get out of an awkward situation, but I didn’t like feeling like he was pinning it on dh. That’s all. At the end of the dinner, when he was saying goodbye he told me to urge his sister to have a baby because he wanted to be an uncle. I just said, I didn’t think I would do that. I probably should have said, that is none of my business… hint, hint.
People are so wierd and inappropriate…good for you for keeping your cool. I was once the topic of an email between all of the managers at work (which I just happened to see on my boss’ desk…who was a woman!) explaining that she needs to plan for another trainee soon to take my place as she is sure that I would be planning for a baby soon (I was 32 or 33 at the time). I was speechless that my eggs were the talk amongst the management water cooler not to mention how unprofessional (and likely illegal) this was! I did approach her about it…especially when I had to explain that we didn’t want kids (we actually can’t due to infertility but like I am going to give them more fuel to add to the fire!) Anyways Iris, I feel ya. I don’t ‘understand how smart people feel like they have the right to talk about other people’s choices like it’s no big deal…when really it is probably the biggest decision out there that alot of us don’t have a choice over! Melanie
IrisD, this man sounds like a moron – I hope he’s really young and that’s why he was asking such cretinous & intrusive questions… I would’ve flipped my lid
He’s not that young, just very inexperienced, and comes from a culture where people are pretty involved in everyone else’s life and pressure for people to have kids has probably traditionally been greater than here. But, I’ve dealt with this sort of thing from others.
My whine is about a friend of mine. She recently got married, hasn’t tried to get pg yet, but insists she will have trouble like I do because out of her seven sisters one had to do IVF to get pg with each of her kids. I hate how she tells me she can relate to my pain when she has no clue what it’s like and I ‘m sure she will get pg as soon as they try.
Actually, this is incorrect! From MY experience (especially for women), parents are MUCH MORE LIKELY to get colds due to their lack of sleep and the germs brought home by their kids — especially nasty little BOYS in daycare! I am a childless, virgin lesbian in real life, and at 30 years old, I go more than a year between colds and would be very surprised to see this change. I just see it as proof that you can create statistics to say pretty much anything — even if it is the exact opposite of the truth!