"I chose to be childfree for life at 16 after babysitting and realising I never wanted to look after kids for free"

Real Fix

Credit: SWNS / Tera Chantelle  A woman says she decided to remain childfree for life aged 16 when she worked as a babysitter and realised "I never want to do this for free".  Tera Chantelle, 29, says instead she chooses to be her "own main character" - and people brand her selfish.  But she believes that there are more forms of "love and happiness" than getting married and having children.

Transcript

00:00 the freedom that I have to get up and travel without anyone hassling me or have to bribe

00:07 them or beg them to come on this journey with me.

00:10 Hello, my name is Terra Chantel. I am an author, a comedian, a life coach, and an actress. We are

00:23 here talking about the Child Free Movement, which I am so excited to talk about. I believe I

00:29 decided this around age 16. I remember scrolling on Twitter and seeing that I tweeted, "I will

00:38 never had kids," and I don't even know what compelled me to just tweet this. I believe I

00:44 was a babysitter at that time and just having that awakening how hard parenthood is, and I'm just a

00:52 part-time babysitter just for a few hours, and realizing this is a lifelong commitment. This is

00:59 a lifelong job that doesn't even pay you, and I knew I was not built for it. The best thing about

01:06 being child free right now is the freedom that I have. The freedom just to get up and go, get up

01:12 and move, to get up and travel without any car seats, without anyone hassling me or have to bribe

01:20 them or beg them to come on this journey with me. I feel like I'm just being misunderstood,

01:26 and I can feel like I'm being the odd person out, the oddball out, living around so many people

01:34 that's just following a certain script without asking questions or without even considering

01:41 the possibilities behind bringing someone into this existence that didn't ask to be here.

01:48 How you treat people is how you are being remembered, not about how many kids you produce

01:54 here. I will quit a job in an instant if it does not feel right for me. I don't mind living a slow

02:02 paced lifestyle. I don't mind not living on autopilot because I have more time to do things

02:09 I love, whether that is my hobbies, whether that is writing, whether that is editing. I have to do

02:14 things I love and realizing that the money will come eventually, so I don't have to be so pressed

02:23 for money at this moment because I don't have any mouths to feed but me, and I know I will feed

02:28 myself. It is very much of a conscious decision, just realizing the climate of the world that we're

02:36 living in and just hearing all of the horror stories of dating. I'm not really interested,

02:44 or it's not a driving factor because I have found so much fulfillment into my own existence, into

02:51 my own life, so I realized that I give myself meaning, I make the meaning of this life, and I

02:59 truly find joy in the small things. Just reading a book makes me joyful, going outside in nature

03:06 makes me joyful, and of course, I don't mind being friends with so many lovely people. I have been

03:13 single for eight years and I've also been practicing celibacy throughout this whole journey in my 20s,

03:18 so that has made me come to the realization that I am consciously single at this moment.

03:24 [Music]

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