I am at the time of writing this post at the still young age of 25, but all around me, I found parents and the joy of child rearing is really something that is impossible to describe. It is a wonderful sensation. Watching a baby become a child and even after see the incredible person they become is a miracle of life.
Of course, part of that miracle of life (cloning not withstanding) involves two people who were born as opposing genders. (the effects on gender changes has not been studied extensively on how it affects reproduction.) And to that end, I have spent far less time thinking about recently.
As I mentioned in a previous blog post, I am putting dating on hold while I focus on myself. But now that I am approaching the second half of my 20s, the fatherly feeling is starting to take hold. Of course, it should also be natural to want to be married before any of this occurs. I find myself not thinking about relationships anywhere near as much as being a parent, and when I daydream about being a father, the mother is either not in my thoughts, or in most cases, completely absent to the point where the future me in question is a single father.
I found this intriguing and began to wonder why my subconscious thought would keep thinking in such a way. The more and more I thought about it, the more I realized the answer. One nasty word defines it. A word that almost destroyed my teen years, Divorce.
As an aspie, knowing who to trust and who is your enemy is a daily struggle. Its like a CIA investigation with your friends and family as people of interest. No more vulnerable does a person become to the whims of another than in dating and marriage.
Now before I continue, I know the feminists reading this are expecting me to play a female blaming game here. Before I write my next thoughts, I want to make it clear that in many ways, women are discriminated against. But when it comes to taking care of children, men are far, far, far, far, more likely to lose the custody battle that comes with divorce.
I have the added problem of being on the Autistic Spectrum. A court judge could rule me unfit mentally to take care of my children. Even worse, I plan to make myself a very wealthy man as I move forward into the future, and that wealth can be heavily used against me in a child support case. I cannot think of anything worse than to lose the ability to watch my children grow up and pay all their child support.
This is a real fear of modern men and is certainly contributing to the fact that marriages are down and divorces are up. Its not how it used to be. There is so much to lose and companionship and love is not a fair offset for this (no matter what you may believe about love)
The usual response I get to these fears is that this will never happen so long as I choose the right woman to marry. I would like to refer you to the already mentioned point about people on the Autism Spectrum not always having the greatest judge of character. And the cynic in me remembers so called friends who waited a very very long time patiently to strike me in the back. whats to prevent a marriage that seems wonderful to become the same?
Honestly, the possibility to raise children and watch them grow up is a wonderful idea to me, but the marriage and increasingly likely divorce that come with it terrify me. Even worse, my parents own divorce certainly helped shape my brothers and I into the cynics we are today and I do not want to warp my own children in such a way by making the same mistake.
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