The Wall Street Journal blog The Juggleis on the topic of parenting and depression today with a post entitled "Is Raising Children Linked to Depression?" Sue Shellenbarger reports:
"New research shows older parents have higher rates of depression, compared with childless adults. In a study of parental status and depression among 17,469 adults over the age of 51, researchers found that having no children, either biological kids or stepchildren, was linked to lower rates of sadness, insomnia and other depressive symptoms, compared with having children. The results held true across all marital status groups, married, divorced or never married."
Hmmm. I don't know about this one. There are so many things that can lead one to depression that it's hard for me to see a direct causal relationship between parenting and depression.
Here's what I want to know: Did they look at socioeconomic status of these parents? Did they look into whether the people in the study had a history of mental health problems? Did they take into account where these people lived and what kinds of resources they had to help them in parenting (good schools, parks and playgrounds, social networks, etc.)?
What about the married couples who long to have children but have infertility issues and can't have the families they long to have? Infertility is a leading cause of depression. Did the research factor this in?
I do know that lots and lots of studies have found that parents are less happy than people without children, and that this finding holds true across socio-economic lines as well as various other lines. Parents also have lower marital satisfaction rates compared to married people without kids. Apparently almost every study done on parenting and happiness has come up with this same finding (Dan Gilbert, who is a psychology prof and researcher at Harvard, has lectured and written on this quite a bit. I suspect you could find his recently online lecture about happiness if you googled it). I don't know if studies have been done on married couples who want kids but can't have them, but I do know rates of ppd are really high among women who struggled with infertility and then eventually got pregnant, so I imagine you might find that even many infertile couples who don't have kids are happier than many infertile couples who do, at least during certain periods. I think the finding about happiness and parenting makes a lot of sense, actually, but I suspect you would find different results in a different culture where parenting is more of a communal activity. In our culture parenting tends to really isolate most people and tends to put enormous stress on marriages and women, especially, because we have so little communal support. Parenting takes enormous time and money and energy and being a parent means you have way less time for the sorts of things that make most people happy: healthy eating, getting lots of sleep, time to work on your marriage, good friends, free time, exercise, a deep spiritual life…and we have so much emphasis on productivity in our culture that most of us try to have multiple kids, try to spend quality time with them, try to work, try to get our kids to a billion enriching activities, try to have enough money to buy nice stuff for us and for them and to live in a nice house, and at the end of the day find ourselves depleted and stressed…so I think this has less to do with having kids and more to do with how our culture deals with relationships and parenting.
Personally, I ditto the Musers above sentiment. In talking to someone recently, who happens to be a Pastor and a parent, she indicated that now that her children (both "good and honorable people") are grown she and her husband have looked back on the experience in as unbiased a way as possible. While they clearly adore their children, they had some enlightening thoughts to share. Conclusion: They wouldn't do it again if given the opportunity to go back in time. Why? Their marriage and personal health (spiritual, physical and mental) was simply too compromised by the stress of having children. No fertility issues. No PPD. No long-standing mental health issues. Just honesty and realism prevail there. Even with a small child at home, I get it. I literally collapse internally when I imagine anything happening to him. But if I am honest, I would think a lot harder before deciding to have a child I hadn't yet conceived and didn't already know and love.
To confuse matters further here are some conflicting pieces of research on the topic of who is happier- the child-free or parents:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/143792
http://www.grist.org/article/ones-enough/ *
*note, though that even the research that shows parents are happier indicates that is only true for having one child, any more are linked back to depression.
The Muser – Very well put, indeed! You hit some very important/key points, which make so much sense.
I think it depends on the individual as well. We never really know how good a parent we will make until we have become one. I can personally say that raising an 18 month old and a 3.5 year old has taken a toll on my sanity. My husband on the other hand has never been happier.
I know so many childless/childfree couples who seem totally happy. They travel, sleep well, have lots of friends and have no regrets.
Although I love my children dearly and hope to have a special bond with them down the road, I'm not sure I would do it again. Of course this is someone who hasn't had sleep in 18 months and can't even pee alone speaking.
I also wonder if the answer depends on what age one's children are. I would suppose that it may get harder and harder as your children get older. At this age, my children love me without question. We are always together and we have happy silly fun for the most part.
They've never said "I hate you" or "You're the worst mom ever". They haven't had hormones surging through their bodies yet. They haven't had the "opportunity" to do something horrible to disappoint me like breaking and entering or aggravated assault. They haven't grown up and married someone I can't stand.
I'm hoping our relationship never changes, but that's probably not realistic, is it?
Although everyone can questions whether person A or B should have children, it seems very much our culture. My husband pointed out that two of the biggest life events, birth and death, cost so much money that it tends to overshadow the emotion involved with the event. Happiness at having a child, and then getting the hospital bill a month or so later.
I have to agree with The Muser.