Those questions again

A No Kidding friend recently was telling me about her weekend away at an elderly friend’s 80^th birthday party, when she was frequently asked (by many of those attending, who no doubt were also older), “do you have a family?”

Whilst I had a mother who would always use this phrase to ask whether someone had children, she said she’d never heard that before, but she still managed to give the perfect response, responding, “Yes, I have a family, a very close family, but if you mean, ‘do I have children,’ then the answer is no.”

This made me think about Mel’s recent post about asking questions, when she thought immediately about our No Kidding community’s reaction* to being asked if we have children. In writing a response to her, I realised I had a lot to say on this topic!

I'll start by saying that asking questions is important. For a start, it shows that we're not selfishly focused on ourselves, and it shows respect to the other people we are with. It's how we build relationships, and how we got to know our significant others and our best friends, after all. Isn't it?

It’s also a really useful tool for those of us who might be a little shy when meeting new people. I learned the value of asking questions when I was a diplomat attending a lot of business social functions, and found that asking questions ensured that conversation flowed when I was meeting complete strangers. It’s easy to slip out of the habit though, so a reminder to ask questions is always useful.

However, I think the questions we ask tell people a lot about us too. In fact, I think there are essentially two types of questions, split between selfish and unselfish motives:

• The question focused on what we want to talk about.
• The question that is genuinely intended to learn more about the person we are talking to.

The first, more selfish question is about things we are interested in, things we like talking about. For example, do you have kids? Do you travel?  What do you do for work? One of the commenters on Mel’s post noted that now she has children she understands that people like to talk about their children, and she forgives that question. Yet she doesn’t like being asked what she does for a living. To me, that’s a bit hypocritical. If you forgive the one question, just because it now suits your circumstances, you have to accept the second.

The purpose of this question is to find things we share with the other person. Yes, that is completely understandable. Finding commonalities is a way to feel comfortable, and focusing on them can build connections. But asking questions only to find commonalities is perhaps short-sighted, restricting ourselves to what we know, and what we are comfortable with. It is lazy. It is looking for one answer, the one that you can relate to. And so it can also be isolating to the person on the other end of the question.

That’s the issue that people going through infertility have, and even more, those of us who have no children. When you get the same question over and over and over again, it is understandable that we feel annoyed at being asked this question. The person asking it is almost invariably hoping for one response. (Though Infertile Phoenix recently noted the exception that proves the rule here.) So we know that our response is never going to get approval. We are continually asked the same question by people who we know will be disappointed by our answer.

The second question is much more generous, and can take us places we never expected to go. We don’t need to find things that we have in common with someone to have an interesting conversation. Finding that they have different interests or backgrounds or do something completely outside our own experience can open new worlds to us, teach us new things, encourage us to think about life in a different way, and learn to be more open and understanding of people who are different from us. We don’t have to be the same to share a wonder of the world, to enjoy others’ company, or to respect others’ differences.

Finally, I think that how people respond to the answer to our answers to their questions is just as important too. Do they or we respond openly, with interest or kindness, when the answer isn’t as expected? Do we read the body language and accept that this is not something the person might want to talk about, or do we probe on regardless, offering uninvited advice and suggestions, or further even more invasive questions? If someone reacts to me with an open mind and genuine wish to engage me in a dialogue as equals, then personally I have found any inadvertently probing questions are much more easily tolerated.

That is another reason that the No Kidding amongst us resent the “do you have children?” question. As I mentioned above, we know that our answer will disappoint most people who ask it, as they clearly want to be able to talk about having children. Worse than that though, we often find ourselves being judged when we respond “no.” Sometimes there can be a hostile reaction. Sometimes we are ignored, dismissed as not worthy of further conversation. This has certainly happened to me more than once, and I imagine to all my No Kidding readers.

So I think that anyone asking questions needs to think before they ask, whatever they ask, and temper the questions by tone of voice and language used. I ask people now "what keeps you busy?" rather than the assumptions, "what do you do for a living?" or "do you have children?" In their response, people who have children will pretty soon tell you, and those who are working and very busy will tell you that too, but those who are travelling or volunteering or writing or making art or caring for elderly relatives or working with Jane Goodall in Africa or  also get a chance to respond without having to challenge stereotypes or feel that they're being judged.  In return, I get the gift of new insight into worlds I could never enter.

* See comments below. I've misrepresented Mel's post, as she didn't single out our group. I did!