alt Hacker News> Agreed. I'm well travelled. Have had a very fun and satisfying dating life. A great career. Accomplished many life goals. Nothing comes close to fatherhood.
I completely agree with you. But I can't say around me, people, movies, society ever sent the message that parenthood is terrible. The way I interpret the message was always "this was hard, this was grueling, but I wouldn't change it for the world". I didn't get this apparent contradiction until it was my turn.
I think the people who miss almost all of these "tickboxes" and can somehow link it to the kids become unhappy with parenthood. If they ever feel their personal time, romance, career, success suffered because of the focus on the children, they will end up in the "disappointment" camp.
I never personally met anyone who was willing to admit regret of having children but I did meet people who were disappointed and put a veiled blame for their failure on the children.
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That's great insight. My sister missed some of these milestones and I hear echoes of what you describe in some of our conversations.
I feel a lot of regret having had children. Not 100%, but it's always going to be more than 0%. I adore my kids but it's too much for my brain and it makes me miserable a lot of the time. I don't bring it up except to counsellors (or anonymous internet bros, apparently) because (a) it's not actionable - there is no going back (b) it's a bummer and no one has anything to say about it.