My husband Brad and I typically do not enjoy the stereotypes given to our state. We find Alabama, especially our home city of Birmingham, to be a thriving community on the cutting edge of medicine, communications and creativity filled with warm, intelligent, artistic and philanthropic people. Our city is an urban center filled with historic treasures and new, innovative developments offering festivals, activities and events that keep our calendar full year-round.

Brad is a banker with a large, international bank headquartered here and I work as a graphic designer for an architecture and interior design firm.
We came to Birmingham after graduating from the University of Alabama with a tight group of friends from college. We all met in college, graduated together, came to Birmingham to start our careers and our marriages. We all share so much in common, but Brad and I always knew we were a bit different and that became apparent as after a few years babies and nurseries became the focus for everyone but us.

That’s where we get to the one part of southern life and the stereotype we’d say is right on track. In our world, you go to college, you get married and you have babies. Like a good biscuit recipe, this formula for family is passed down. So when Brad and I decided to forego the hand-me-downs and shared that our life would be a childfree one, we were shocked to find our friends were not supportive. Our parents and siblings came around to the idea pretty quickly, but our friends could not get on board. Too many conversations, painful moments and emotional emails to recount but the statement we feel best sums it all up was when a very close couple told us that they did not see us in their lives anymore as we were making the “unnatural choice”.

Brad and I have since moved past the bitterness building a life rich with charity work, community development and events along with incredible friends we have made throughout the journey. We have learned so much from our experience and hope we can be an example for other childfree DINKs in our area. In the end we are so grateful to have had the opportunity to be free to embrace and create this incredible DINKlife of ours.

We also longed for the opportunity to find an outlet for our old friends to enjoy an activity with us and get a glimpse of our full and rich DINKlife. We have always BBQ’d and wanted to compete in local BBQ competitions so two years ago we formed a BBQ team and cliché or not, we have realized that there is nothing like healthy competition and good southern BBQ to bring old friends together! It’s never perfect but after ten amazing years of the DINKlife we can’t wait to see what the next 10 have in store!