does having a baby/kid wipe out most of your life problems?

[FlowerPower00]

No. Life gets harder with children. Don't get me wrong, I would walk on hot coals to have my children, however children DO NOT SOLVE PROBLEMS.

[Coldjensens]

Originally Posted by FinsterRufus

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Do you have any experience with being a parent after overcoming abuse and related family problems and depression?

abuse? Depends on the definition.

family problems? Well we certainly had a dysfunctional family. We (siblings) beat, cut, burned and hospitalized each other at times. I just thought that was normally until I got out in the world a bit more.

depression? not sure I recognize it. My siblings at times suffer from debilitating depression. Sometimes I have had similar symptoms, but it is hard to distinguish form just being tired, hung over or feeling low. Anxiety attacks i can recognize, but I am able to shove those away when they come (some of my siblings have to take meds for anxiety).

However I am not sure what any of that has to do with children.

The idea that having children is a cure for depression or mental illness is absurd. The idea that someone suffering from severe depression or mental illness should have children to make themselves feel better or get their head together seems like an incredibly bad idea to me. If anyhting it may be a reason not to have children, but if you can control it, there is not really any reason it should keep you from having kids.

[FinsterRufus]

Originally Posted by Coldjensens

abuse? Depends on the definition.

family problems? Well we certainly had a dysfunctional family. We (siblings) beat, cut, burned and hospitalized each other at times. I just thought that was normally until I got out in the world a bit more.

depression? not sure I recognize it. My siblings at times suffer from debilitating depression. Sometimes I have had similar symptoms, but it is hard to distinguish form just being tired, hung over or feeling low. Anxiety attacks i can recognize, but I am able to shove those away when they come (some of my siblings have to take meds for anxiety).

However I am not sure what any of that has to do with children.

The idea that having children is a cure for depression or mental illness is absurd. The idea that someone suffering from severe depression or mental illness should have children to make themselves feel better or get their head together seems like an incredibly bad idea to me. If anyhting it may be a reason not to have children, but if you can control it, there is not really any reason it should keep you from having kids.

You need to read the OP again. There's nothing in it that suggests severe depression - which can come on apropos of nothing - or mental illness.

The OP seems to be going through a fairly normal stage of struggling family relationships after abuse as a child. There's nothing abnormal about that. Many people go through it. A lot of people don't even consider it as a factor before they haul off and have a family.

They do need to figure out how they're going to live with it and make their peace with their past. Definitely before children. I'm glad the OP thought about it enough to post. It's not the OP's fault somebody's abusive actions put them in this place.

There's a difference between that which reasonably causes a person to be sad or struggle with relationships, and actual mental illness. They are not the same thing.