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I think as long as you can take time to stay informed about the world or work a job outside the home, you will have other things to talk about than your baby. I haven't had a kid though so I don't know how this is in practice.
Hmm I know lots of women who are interesting despite having a baby. I think in the beginning, while the baby is still very young and everything is very new, this might be the case, (just as brides talk about weddings all the time), but by the time the baby reaches 1, most mothers are sort of over the newness of it and ready to get on with their normal lives.
This is one of my greatest fears too. But I have two friends with newborns and I think they are still ok. Maybe its cause newborns don't do much to talk about.
I think the issue here is "Define interesting." When you're a mom, presumably your interests shift somewhat! I've been the odd one out with my friends for years ... they almost all have kids, and I don't. They have lots to talk about with each other about their kids and school and whatnot, and I'm sure they find it interesting! (But I have had lots of interesting non-kid conversations with them, too.) I think it's just natural that what consumes a lot of time in your life is going to be what you are most likely to talk about. If you spend most of your time at work, you'll talk more about work. If you spend most of your time with your baby, you'll talk more about that. (And if you're planning a wedding, you'll talk about that all the time - ha ha)
I've been a part-time stepmom for about 11 months and I'm going to be have a baby of my own come October ... so we'll see if I can still talk about other stuff after. I just hope I don't traumatize other women by telling labour horror stories like my very good friends did shortly before I got married. ha ha
Me and my fiance talk about this quite often. I think it also relates to how you keep a marriage interesting after the kids have turned into adults. You have to remember to keep a life outside of the children. Have hobbies and such. Make sure you continue to make time for the things you love now (yoga, reading, shopping...whatever). Im working on finding a hobby now before the babies come!
I think the key is to make sure you have an outside interest besides "baby." For instance, I have a coworker with two kids, 3 years and 6 months however she hardly ever talks about her kids! Her husband is in Iraq right now so I know she has her hands full but she makes sure to still work part-time and is involved with playing in a soccer league. I would never describe her as boring :)
@kieshamichaels: You raise a great point. While I admit, most of my conversations are child-related (and still quite intelligent at that), it is important to me that I maintain my identity as a person as I journey through motherhood. Our daughter is our world and quite frankly, the center of our lives.
However, I do take the time to find "me time" where I enjoy crafting, wedding planning, and tinkering about my house. I'm also in school working on a second college degree (nursing), so I have various areas in my life that I carry interesting/intelligent conversations about that do not always involve stories about Madi's latest antics or photos.
But, at the end of the day, my child is my priority first and foremost and if I tend to gravitate towards conversations involving her, I'm not sorry for that. Most of my friends are mothers themselves and have never expressed disinterest.
I'd worry if my single friends never wanted to hear about kiddo, but I also don't expect to ONLY talk about the baby. I relate this to work parties held OUTSIDE of work. I try not to talk JUST about work, but so many people do. Or, they will ask one quick question like "how is your family"..."fine"...then move back to work. That is so boring to me! I hope that means I won't be that way, but I know I do talk a lot about pregnancy now (mostly w/ other people's questions prompting it).
Also, when/if my world revolves around baby, I will be almost 31 with lots of experiences for conversations I can fall back on when my current life get too baby-centric for friends w/o kids. ;)
hmmm... it seems as though you got some good advice on your "why do people become boring after they have babies?" post from a few months ago. You won't understand until you have one of your own I guess.
@northernazbride: I was thinking the same thing.
Personally, I think I'm pretty cool, intelligent and interesting. And I think my other mom friends are too. No how to guide, either you are or you aren't, regardless of having children or not.
I agree with Miss Starlet, I think people are interesting or they're not before and after baby. I have an acquaintance I met through work before she became pregnant and this sounds horrible, but honestly she was never interesting. She was socially awkward, overly sarcastic, obsessed with silly childlike things. After baby is exactly the same although she is now completely incapable of talking about anything other than her child, which I personally find annoying because the conversation would never in a million years change to me and my wedding or anything like that.
My sister, on the other hand is the complete opposite. She has 3 kids now and you would never know it unless you specifically asked her. She works full time and has a ton of support from her husband who does a lot of the parenting work so she can have a life outside of being a Mom.
My SIL was like this when their kids were born! we would try to have conversations about other things and somehow it would take 2 minutes for all roads to lead to her kids :) that said I have had a lot of friends have babies in the last year and i am plesaantly at the very reasonable amount of time they talk about their kids - it gives me hope I won't turn into someone who can't talk about anything else
I think it has a lot in common with how new brides talk about nothing but...their wedding. People like to talk about themselves and life stages they're going through. Having a baby's a BIG one, but I don't find it that different than all of us coming here. How many newbies have introduced themselves saying they needed to find a place to talk shop because they've exhausted their friends patience on all things wedding?
I think it is so easy for moms to come to define themselves as "MOM" and nothing/no one else, which makes a person boring. Really any person without some dimensionality becomes super boring.
What it comes down to is...and you'll know this when you have a baby...when you have a child, at least if you're a good mother, they become your ENTIRE WORLD. Sure, I still have a full time job, I still have hobbies and of course I love to carry on a non-baby-related conversation, but when it comes down to it the most important thing in my life is my child and anybody who knows me could easily guess that.
A majority of my Facebook statuses are baby related (wedding related as of late) but I make it a point not to make it always be about the baby as I can see how that can get annoying to my childless friends. I have one friend in particular who posts every single day about her children and really does have no life outside of being 26 and a mother of soon to be 4. I both envy and feel bad for her for being such a hardworking stay at home mom.
When I had my baby I naturally gravitated toward my parent friends and my non parent friends naturally drifted away. I feel more accepted at work where all of my coworkers are older.
People are going to talk about whatever consumes their life the most, and having children is all-consuming, mentally, physically, financially...it takes over. But that doesn't mean you need to let parenthood completely strip you of your former identity. The problem is most moms, including myself, feel like taking time for their own interests and hobbies is selfish. So you end up with a person who completely gives up their own life to assume the identity of caretaker of their families. So next time you want to think they're "boring," remember the sacrifices they've made to become so, it's nothing anyone does consciously.
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I was watching SATC- the baby shower episode where the women were talking about how after having a baby, women can't talk of anything else. Carrie said she knew lots of interesting women with careers and whatnot after having a baby, and Samantha said to name one and she couldn't. This made me realize that I don't know one woman who had kids and was still interesting. By interesting, I mean could carry on intelligent conversations without changing the topic to her baby and occasionally doing activities without the baby. I realize that having a baby changes things, but one of my big fears about having a baby is that I will become like this too. I mean no offense to any of the moms on the board- I am strictly relaying my experience with people I know in real life. So how do stay interesting after having a baby?