The Other’s Club for childfree women: Christchurch woman building online global community

“But I think the more we talk about it, the more people are accepting that this is a choice that’s to be respected … It’s showing people you can choose to not have children and have a joyful and fulfilled life.”

Danni has recently launched The Other’s Club, an online group for paid subscribers who don’t have kids – whether by choice or circumstance. For $10 a month, users around the world get access to events, Q&As and forums. Conversations between users range from how to cope with people’s reactions to being childfree, to musings by women still deciding if they want to be a mum and those who have lost or are unable to have children, all the way through to threads about films, food and pets.

“There’s even a space to share your achievements. Because a lot of the time, people who don’t have kids don’t really feel seen,” Danni says.

She describes the community as “a place to connect, be understood and make new friends”.

Parents are not banned, but Danni believes by making it a paid platform, they are less likely to try and join the conversation, which has happened on her Facebook and Instagram accounts.

“So I really wanted it to be a place that was quite safe, that people felt was very intentional. I think when something is paid for, people are a lot more intentional about if they want to be there or not,” she says.

And while many parents who have engaged with her content have been supportive, she says others have tried to invalidate her decisions not to have children – or attempt to change her mind.

“I see people sharing stuff on social media as a way to connect with other people like them, and immediately parents will come into the conversation and misconstrue and misunderstand it: ‘you’re going to miss out’ or ‘I can do that too’.

“And as much as my content is for people that don’t want to have kids or can’t have kids, it’s also for the people around them to see that you can have a fulfilling, happy life without them.”

Data collected from the 2023 Census showed the number of people whose assigned sex at birth was female who had never had children rose from 15% in 2013 to 17% in 2023. And in 2025, the national fertility rate was 1.57 births per woman according to Stats NZ. The rate has been below the replacement rate of 2.1 since 2013.

Danni Duncan wants to show people that life can be fun and fulfilling with or without children.

Danni, who lives in Christchurch, likes kids. A lot. She is the oldest in a family of four, adores her nieces and nephews, and worked with children as a speech therapist before becoming a content creator. But after two years of “sitting on the fence”, she and husband Alex realised life without kids was the life best suited to them, their goals, finances and relationship.

There was a sense of relief when she eventually made the decision to stay childfree.

“I think that relief told me everything I needed to know,” she says.

“Don’t get me wrong, there are still moments where little darts have come back into my mind. Like, did I make the right decision? But they’re just moments. And I just remind myself it’s totally okay to miss out.

“And it kind of clicked with me, just this morning, that wanting to have kids is not the same as wanting to have those moments.”

She knows she’s not following the traditional path society has historically laid out for women, but that’s where her platform comes in: by putting herself out, she wants to help change the conversation – and expectation – around having children, and hopefully, making others feel less alone in the process.

But when is a woman’s decision ever really hers alone? Danni says her stance has come with backlash. Whether it’s the men who have suggested she will die at the hands (claws) of her cats, or the women who like to tell her she will simply die alone, the feedback has, at times, been “a big shake-up” to her mental health. Since we spoke, she has taken some time away from social media to help work through that. But she is slowly learning to manage the way it impacts her.

“It is just the typical hate that you get on social media, which, unfortunately, I’m getting used to. And to be fair, that stuff is like water off a duck’s back. It’s when people misunderstand me and I know I’m being perceived as a bad person. I really struggle with that.”

Finding those people who do understand her was another reason for building The Others’ Club. Making friends as an adult is tough, and without the commonality of antenatal classes or your child’s schooling, it can feel impossible. But like lots of things in life, it’s about balance.

“I love my friends. I love my friend’s kids. I don’t want to not hang out with them, but a lot of the time it is really boring. Because you’re not in that world and there’s only so many times you can talk about sleep routines … It doesn’t mean you don’t want to be there for that. It’s just you want more from [some of your] your friendships, which I think is completely respectable,” Danni says.

“But the point isn’t to compare our lives and say one is better. The point is just to have a choice and for people to accept that.”

For more information, visit theothersclub.com.

Bridget Jones joined the New Zealand Herald in 2025. She has been a lifestyle and entertainment journalist and editor for more than 15 years.