Child Free By Choice

More women are choosing to be #ChildFreeByChoice, in part thanks to the 'era of honest motherhood' where women online share the sacrifices they've made. In anonymous forums across the internet, mothers are speaking honestly about their regret and loss of identity, while films like Nightbitch, Die My Love, and Oscar nominated If I Had Legs I’d Kick You are bringing 'honest motherhood' into the mainstream. As birth rates fall, reductive headlines frame it as a 'global fertility crisis' or the fault of feminism. But when young women are faced with the reality of childcare costs, the gendered domestic labour gap and the myth that we can ‘have it all’, their reluctance to have children seems entirely rational. TikTok: ⁠⁠lilyo.farrell⁠⁠ Instagram: ⁠⁠lilyo.farrell⁠⁠ Substack: ⁠⁠lilyofarrell⁠⁠ Guests:⁠ ‘Amy’ (not her real name) voiced by Robin Weaver Corrina Antrobus No Worries If Not! is written, hosted and produced by Lily O'Farrell. The script editors were Jackie O'Farrell and Will Hilton, also produced by Will Hilton. Theme music composed by Meg Jenkins. MIND: Perinatal mental health resources SOURCES: Die My Love, Lynne Ramsay (2025) If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, Mary Bronstein (2025) Nightbitch, Marielle Heller (2024) PEW Research Centre - Among young adults without children, men are more likely than women to say they want to be parents someday (2024) CNN - US fertility rate dropped to another record low in 2025 (2026) Big Issue - Childcare costs families £1,000 per child in the summer holidays: 'It makes me feel sick' Centre For Population Change - Who uses childcare in the UK and how much does it cost? (2024) Coram Children’s Charity - Childcare Survey 2025 BBC News - 'Two weeks of paternity leave is just too little for the 21st Century' (2025) Office for National Statistics - Time use in the UK: 23 September to 1 October 2023 (2023) LSE - “They say it is love. We say it is unwaged work.” Wages For Housework (2024) The Second Shift: Working Parents and the Revolution at Home, Arlie Russell Hochschild (1989) Motherly - Viral TikTok calls out the ‘leisure gap’ - why moms can’t just relax (2024) Metro - Einstein’s misogynist manifesto: Harsh list of rules scientist gave to long-suffering wife (2018) Reddit - r/regretfulparents Facebook - I Regret Having Children BBC News - 'Like a trap you can't escape': The women who regret being mothers (2026) Regretting Motherhood: A Study, Orna Donath (2017) The List - Abigail Porter Bechdel Test Fest Wikipedia - The Bechdel Test I LOVE ROMCOMS AND I AM A FEMINIST - Corrina Antrobus (2024) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices