""It's because she doesn't have kids," one of the doctors said. Those six words fell out of his mouth with little effort and hung in the middle of the room in the hospital where I had worked for nine years. Laughter broke the silence, and the conversation moved back to the business at hand. People packed up to leave, but I kept turning over his words, which felt big and heavy."
"My reproductive choices had been casually brought up and then discarded in the middle of our otherwise collegial conversation. In an instant, my joy had been made small. My child-free life was the butt of a joke. As a woman in my 40s, I was no stranger to unsolicited comments about my choice not to have kids. Since these judgments were familiar to me, I usually shrugged them off, but this moment hit differently."
"I've frequently encountered the notion that a woman without kids is somehow absolved of all life's burdens and efforts. A lack of children, apparently, is the only reason I can have fun. Sure, there are perks to not having kids, but the assumption that my autonomy comes without the normal weight of human experience is flawed. As an academic surgeon at a major medical hospital, I have plenty of responsibilities."
A casual remark in a physicians' meeting—"It's because she doesn't have kids"—dismissed a colleague's reproductive choice and shrank her joy. Laughter followed while the conversation resumed and the comment lingered. The exchange reflects a common assumption that women without children are freed from burdens and therefore uniquely able to have fun. That assumption ignores professional responsibilities, caregiving and emotional obligations, and relationships outside parenthood. The physician emphasized a busy academic surgical career, numerous responsibilities, people who rely on her, and a rich personal life filled with travel, friends, and love, affirming the value of a child-free life.
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