Maternal instincts

In today’s modern society more and more women are choosing to not have children. Something which I believe is the own personal choice of the said individual and honestly I don’t really have much of an opinion on it, the choice I mean, not the subject itself. Otherwise I wouldn’t have written this post. Although these are more general wonderingments rather than actual opinion.

I don’t think it’s weird to not have children and I would never question why a happy couple, married or not, didn’t have children. It is completely none of anyone’s business.

I was pondering the situation of people choosing not to have children and it made me thunk about the maternal instincts of women. I understand that some women have never  felt these ‘instincts’ or at least never felt maternal towards anything. Surely this can’t be the case for all women who don’t have or want children. Biologically there must be something going on.

The way I felt towards people and things before I gave birth was completely different to how I felt afterwards. The change was almost instantaneous. Like the need to protect and nurture. I also developed a stronger sense of empathy, although I believe this is something that changes within us anyway over time as we get older and see more of the world, or at least start paying more attention to it.

As women and couples are choosing to not have children, other bonds are being made like never before. We have always been a nation of animal lovers but this is becoming more abundant, especially since we have the means to share the love so quickly via social media.

I love our fur babies and scaly baby, I don’t love them as much as I love my son or my partner, but there is a definite bond there. I nurture and protect them, I feed them and talk to them, I worry when I think there’s something wrong and I cried when our rats and gerbils died. Obviously I know the loss of losing one of your non-human family is no where near the devastation felt when a person you love dies but they are still irreplaceable, at least I think so. They all have their own personalities and that can never be duplicated.

Although I have no comparison because I’ve never been this age, with this emotional capacity and not had a child, so I’m only going on what I know. I don’t know if my maternal instincts and my emotions towards people and animals would be different or if I would have just developed this way without being a Mum. Surely these types of feelings and emotions can be triggered in some other way. When people adopt children do they instantly change or is it something that has been dormant in them since they made the decision to adopt?

The thing with feelings is that you can’t explain the strength of them to someone or explain exactly how it feels because it will be different for everyone. This was just something I was pondering recently and as this is my ‘random wonderingments I thought I would share. Your thoughts are very welcome, feel free to let me know what you think 🙂

Don’t ever let anyone make you think you’re not good enough. 

Follow your dreams right now! Don’t wait until tomorrow, 

next week, next year. Stop planning, start doing 🙂

Be happy and keep smiling 🙂