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2 kids, 2 adults, 1 queen bed, and no personal space. I regret not splurging on a king-size mattress while my kids were little.

by with No Comment Xpandfy

For Christmas one year, my husband and I bought our then 2-year-old son a Nugget Couch. It was amazing, and more comfortable than our mattress. Wait, was our mattress really that bad?

I was pregnant and had thought it needed replacing (after all, it was over 10 years old), but the play couch pushed us to make a mattress purchase, which, on some days, I think we rushed into without considering some important things.

We chose a queen mattress, the same size as the one we were replacing. At the time, the king seemed like a luxury we didn’t need. And we certainly didn’t need to spend the extra money, either. Now, I see things differently.

Adding a second child changed the dynamics in our bed

When it came time to shop for our new mattress, my husband casually mentioned upgrading our queen bed to a king, but I had little interest, and we never discussed it much past that.

I’ve always felt like king-sized beds were too spacious. At hotels, they required scooting over to reach the center of the bed. Who wants to do that?

We went with the queen, and things were fine for a while. After all, when just one child toddles into our room and climbs into bed, there are cuddles and coziness. However, when two children wind up in our bed, there are feet in each other’s faces, and everyone winds up a bit uncomfortable, especially now that they’re 4 and 6.

Sometimes a child will wind up lying sideways. Once, I might have suggested that someone sleep at the end of the bed, where one might picture a dog or cat (neither of which we own). The extra space a king-sized mattress would provide sure would come in handy now.

We play games on our bed

My husband started a game with our kids where he pretends that our blanket is a “hungry house” that will eat up and envelop them. The kids also love it when we pretend they’re airplanes and toss them into the bed, where they squirm like rollie-pollies. These activities take up a lot of space, and having more room to roll around and play would be a plus.

Once in a blue moon, our kids will decide to bring all their stuffed animals into the bed and make a suffie mountain, or play hide-and-seek under the covers. Then there are the nights when our daughter climbs into our bed and announces herself with a doorbell sound. I cherish these silly moments of connection and know they won’t last forever, so I want to encourage them as much as possible now.


The author poses while skiing.

The author says her family spends a lot of quality time in the bed she and her husband share. She now regrets not splurging on a king-sized mattress when she got a new bed. 

Courtesy of Anne James



I feel like I missed our chance to upgrade to a king-size bed

Now, four years later, I question why I didn’t consider my husband’s suggestion to upgrade to a king-size bed seriously. As an item that’s only replaced every 10 years or so, and with a higher price tag, it’s a big decision.

It seems too late to change mattress sizes now since we’d need both a new bed frame and mattress, and it doesn’t make sense to replace ours, which works perfectly fine.

At some point, our kids will stop crawling into our bed. By the time we’ll need a new mattress again, I likely won’t feel the same desire or need for a king-size bed. But if I chose again with younger kids, I’d get a king.




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I thought not having kids was my biggest regret in life. I realized that I could be the cool aunt instead.

by with No Comment Xpandfy

In my 30s, I was the only one of my three siblings who wasn’t married or starting a family. At holidays and birthdays, I smiled through it and lead into becoming the cool aunt to my nieces and nephew. On Mother’s Day, however, I began bracing myself.

Each year, my mom would give me a card that said something like “Happy Mother’s Day from the dog.” It was meant with nothing but love. She wasn’t trying to minimize what I didn’t have — she was trying to include me. Still, each card landed like a small, unexpected dagger.

A reminder of the life I thought I was supposed to be living, but wasn’t.

I always imagined I’d be a mom

My mom would gently explain that I was a huge influence on my nieces and nephews. That they looked up to me. That mothering my dogs counted, too. And in a real sense, she was right — I wasn’t ready to accept it. I loved my dogs deeply — they kept me grounded and accountable. I was present in my nieces’ and nephews’ lives in meaningful ways, with time and energy to play with them.


Dog jumping mid-air

The author gets to be the cool aunt and dog mom now.

Courtesy of the author



But privately, something still felt unfinished. I had always imagined I’d be a mom — driving a carload of kids to and from sports practices. Instead, I was the kids’ biggest fan, attending every hockey game or soccer match I could. At that stage of life, it felt like I was standing on the outside of a world I wanted for myself. For years, I held two truths at once: gratitude for what I had, and grief for what I didn’t.

That tension softened slowly over time — through perspective and by watching the realities of parenthood up close rather than the polished version in my head. I now understand those Mother’s Day cards differently. I see my mom’s big heart for what it is and always has been — her way of saying: “You matter. You belong. Your life counts, too.”

I saw the benefits that came without having kids

When I once confided to a friend that my only regret in life was not having children, he said, “Yeah, but look at all you’ve done. You might not have been able to do those things if you’d had kids.” His comment shifted something. For the first time, I allowed myself to see that not having children came with benefits as well as loss.

My siblings are wonderful parents, and their kids are thriving. But even when everything is going well, parenting adult children carries a constant low-grade stress: worries about their happiness, careers, relationships, health, and the world they’re inheriting. There’s an ever-present sense of responsibility that never fully goes away.

I care deeply about my nieces’ and nephew’s happiness, but I don’t carry that same weight. Instead, I live with a different set of trade-offs. The consequences of my decisions fall on me alone. That freedom has allowed me to further my education and take risks I might not have taken putting kids first, like: leaving full-time jobs to finish a TV pilot, jumping into dock diving my lab, and chasing a new dream of owning a quarter horse rescue and competing in reining.

I can say yes to opportunities that would be impractical for someone juggling school calendars and tuition bills.

I’m the cool aunt

And I still get to show up for the kids I love. Being the cool aunt turns out to be its own form of parenting — from a distance, without daily responsibility but with real influence. My role is lighter, but it’s not insignificant. Recently, my niece decided to attend the same college where I earned a graduate degree. Before she left, she told me: “Yes, the aunt influence is real.” It was said casually, but it landed deeply. Proof that presence doesn’t require parenthood. That modeling a curious, creative, and independent life can be just as formative as enforcing rules or paying for that college degree.

There’s a peaceful relief in releasing the version of adulthood I once carried guilt for not achieving — that lingering expectation of a conventional family life.

I still think about the life I once wanted. But I no longer see it as the life I failed to have. It’s simply one path among many. And the one I’m on now — dogs, dreams, creative risks — feels intentional. I’ve kept those Mother’s Day cards because they remind me that I have the very best mom. Her words and belief in me have taken decades to fully embrace but now that I have, I know: there is more than one ways to nurture, more than one way to matter, and more than one way to build a full life.




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Microsoft manager explains how she pivoted from admin to AI — and doesn’t regret her English degree

by with No Comment Xpandfy

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Brit Morenus, a 37-year-old senior AI gamification program manager, based in Charlotte, North Carolina. Her identity and employment have been verified by Business Insider. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

I’ve been at Microsoft for a total of 13 years, but for five and a half, I was a contract worker.

I graduated from college with a degree focused on English, communications, and marketing. I first landed a job at Microsoft as a contract executive assistant. I stayed in that role for about eight months, then joined the marketing team.

Eventually, I had the opportunity to take a really special position, but it required knowing gamification. Gamification is about integrating game mechanics and motivators, such as storytelling and reward systems, into learning. So I was going to teach people about our products and sell them in a gamified way.

I spent about a year getting certifications that taught me about gamification. I upskilled and learned how to create games, what game mechanics are, and what motivates someone when they’re learning.

That was the position where I was able to prove my impact, and they decided to bring me on full-time. I stayed in that role for another six years, training the frontline and customer service support to develop the right sales skills.

Eventually, I had the opportunity to start gamifying learning about AI. They wanted someone with gamification skills, and my certifications and experience made me the ideal candidate.

I didn’t know much about AI yet, aside from using it for personal reasons, but transitioning to an AI role was actually faster than pivoting to gamification. Since I held the gamification role for about six years, I became really good at it. It only took about three months for me to upskill in AI.

In my first three months on the team, I made myself knowledgeable about AI to the point where I could teach others about it. That’s when I got a certification in Azure AI Fundamentals. It was a certification specific to how Microsoft’s AI works.

I helped my entire team get it, and then I helped my entire organization start working on it. Then I helped the greater customer service support organization work toward getting it as well.

Get outside your comfort zone

My advice to those who want to transition would be: Don’t let fear keep you from stepping outside your comfort zone. There’s so much ambiguity about changing roles or companies, but there’s no time like the present.

With AI specifically, you just need to learn. Everyone already uses it, but you need to understand how it works, because that’s how you can understand what to do with it.

It’s also important to upskill yourself. You have to be willing to constantly move and learn more, because it’s going to keep changing — and faster than you can grasp it. Sometimes AI makes wrong predictions, but it is using words to make that prediction. So I absolutely need to use my English degree in order to figure out keywords and how to prompt it to do the right thing.

I don’t regret my English degree

Up until this Al role, I always joked that I wasn’t using my English degree. But now I use it everywhere, and it truly does help. It helps with things like talking to executives and also with the role itself.

It’s important to know the language of AI and how it operates. So now, more than ever, I am using every bit of my English degree and understanding English, grammar, and how it all functions.

For example, there’s a tagging process that happens behind the scenes with AI, just like on social media. Looking at an image, it might tag it as a woman, or a supermarket, and that gives it a confidence score and tells you if it’s relevant or not, and if it’s what we’re looking for.

A lot of it is more about understanding how to apply the English language than about AI — so, thanks, Mom and Dad, I am using the degree you paid for.

This is part of an ongoing series about workers who transitioned into AI roles. Did you pivot to AI? We want to hear from you. Reach out to the reporter via email at aaltchek@insider.com or secure-messaging platform Signal at aalt.19.




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I left a mom group over parenting decisions. I don’t regret it.

by with No Comment Xpandfy

I should have sensed the judgment the minute I arrived at the first playdate with four kids in tow and another on the way. Instead, I was thrilled to finally find my “village” that I’d heard so much about — a group of moms who met a few times a month at nearby play spaces and coffee shops to commiserate and encourage each other.

I even brushed off the first comment I was met with, which, in hindsight, should have been a warning sign. “Wow, are they all yours?” It wasn’t the first or last time someone had a “witty” one-liner about my family size, which was completely on purpose and by choice, if they must know. My kids jumped into the playground with the others, and I settled in to find my new besties.


Mom and daughter

The author felt her parenting style didn’t match that of her moms’ group.

Courtesy of the author



The thing about mom groups, though, is that they often aren’t obviously terrible. In fact, they check all the boxes — moms at similar ages, stages, and struggles, getting together for camaraderie and community. We all had similar jogger set mom uniforms and extra-strong lattes on hand, hidden in the pockets of diaper bags to make it past “no food or drink” signs at indoor parks (no? Just me?).

But they aren’t always necessarily a good fit. All the feelings from this almost-perfect mom group I was once a part of resurfaced when Ashley Tisdale wrote an essay in The Cut, talking openly about how her mom group turned toxic.

I’m a free-range parent

My first feelings that I was “different” came when two of the younger kids had a small collision at the bottom of a slide. They tripped, fussed a bit, and in my parenting world, were ready to get back up and carry on. I’m used to being around people with widely differing parenting styles, but not used to being judged for mine.

I felt like my free-range parenting was judged by other moms who were more helicopter parents. The mom of the other kid who collided picked the child up, brushed them up, and performed a full check-up. Meanwhile, my own child popped up, whined a little, and ran off.


Boy in park

The author needed a safe space to vent and felt like the group she found was not it.

Courtesy of the author



Band-Aids and tissues were coming out to counteract tears, and a full-scale breakdown of the situation, complete with apologies and moment-by-moment recaps, had commenced. I enjoyed my coffee and didn’t give it much thought. I hadn’t noticed yet that my parenting style was a mismatch. To be clear, this is just my perception.

I needed a place to vent and feel safe

Slowly but surely, questions about my family size began to infiltrate conversations. I was used to one-liners from grannies at the grocery about having my hands full, but it felt like an onslaught.

It was the same thing with my career. After the group learned I was a working mom, running my own business full-time, I started to feel like an outsider. People spoke a lot about the negative sides of daycare, and the perks of being able to be a full-time mom, Their comments made it seem they weren’t interested in a different perspective, nor was there a question about why I work (because I want to) or about the immense benefits my kids have gotten through day care. I felt like there was an assumption that I was stuck in this terrible world of working motherhood against my will, with no way out.

Over time, I felt like the circus spectacle, and felt I had to have all the i’s dotted and t’s crossed on parenting topics, to show the naysayers that I was doing just fine with many kids, rather than finding a soft landing place to vent and share.

Parenting can be so isolating

I was lonely and desperate, so I clung to my mom group. The alternative was too scary. Nobody to hang out with on a boring Saturday or text when things get tough. It’s not just me — two-thirds of parents find the role isolating and lonely. But one day, I realized the abyss was better than the alternative.

This was the day they moved all the get-togethers to 10 a.m. on weekdays. They knew exactly where I’d be at 10 a.m. every weekday — working.

Although I haven’t found a similar style group, I realized that instead of looking for a whole village of besties, my village was already around me. It just didn’t look like 10 moms with lattes at play group. Instead, it involves the trainer who asks if my kid is over his third bout of strep, or my mom’s friend who texts me with some press-on nails she likes that would look good on me.

My real friends don’t demand we have precisely only 1.5 children, helicopter around our babies, or only wear pink on Wednesdays.




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