16 Things Only Women With Zero Maternal Instinct Understand

Baby Mama
Baby Mama

Having no maternal instinct doesn’t necessarily mean you don’t want kids somewhere down the line. It just means that, at least for right now, kids are (understandably) terrifying to you. So here’s to all the women out there who feel like they haven’t quite developed that nurturing capability quite yet.

1. Baby talk is not your thing. On the contrary, you just talk to kids like they’re tiny adults. It would not be abnormal for you to get into a heated debate about the election with a couple of 6-year-olds.

2. All you remember about Tamagotchis is that yours was always dying.

3. You have no clue how to hold a baby. If someone was ever stupid enough to place a baby in your arms, you just remained as still as a statue and asked “Am I doing it right?” over and over again until they were smart enough to remove the child from your grasp.

4. Now, you know to say no right away. If someone asks you if you’d like to hold their child, you just say “I’m okay, thanks,” as if they were offering you a beer.

5. Same goes for babysitting. No amount of money could convince you to spend several hours being fully responsible for a small child’s life. In your eyes, you’re doing the kid’s parents a favor by not offering to babysit.

6. If you ever have somehow ended up as babysitter for the night, you’ve actually asked the kids what was for dinner, as if they were the ones in charge.

7. You are way more comfortable with kittens and puppies than you are with infants. Hell, you’d even take a baby hedgehog over a small human.

8. …Because whenever you’re in the presence of an infant, you’re just convinced something will go wrong. Even the smallest spittle will lead to you screaming “Is it okay?!”

9. You cringe at terms like “placenta” or “birth canal.” Or “child.”

10. You can look at a baby and have no clue if it’s eighteen months or two weeks old. You pretty much think of all children as the same until they’re about ten.

11. When women tell you the pain of childbirth is so worth it, you’re like Is it, though?

12. You were never the nurturing friend in college, holding someone’s hair back while they stood over the toilet vomming. Usually, you were in the adjacent stall cursing Burnett’s vodka.

13. Regardless of what you’ve been told, you still picture babies emerging all clean and beautiful during birth, like the way they did on 90s sitcoms, as opposed to the actual gory reality.

14. You have a horrible habit of interacting with toddlers the way you would with a puppy – whistling to them, offering them treats in exchange for their friendship, etc.

15. You’re pretty sure no child is actually cute when it’s first born. But you have mastered the art of saying “So cute!!!” genuinely – because what else are you supposed to do for those first couple weeks when all babies look like aliens?

16. You’ve stopped caring when people ask “So when is it going to be your turn?!” Because you screaming “What do I do??” when someone tries to hand you a baby is answer enough. Thought Catalog Logo Mark

I’m a staff writer for Thought Catalog. I like comedy and improv. I live in Chicago. My Uber rating is just okay.

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