Did the disapproval of others ever make you insecure?

Hello everyone, 

I’m (24F) from a European country and I got my bilateral salpingectomy scheduled two weeks from now. I have known a very long time that I never want to have kids, main reason being that I grew up with a narcissistic mother that made me become hypersensitive to social cues as she would often become hysterical and I had to know when to make myself as small as possible. I could never rely on her for any advice or emotional support as she would alternate love bombing and gaslighting from one minute to another, and the emotional labor that her behavior demanded me to do, made me grow up very soon as I always felt alone with my problems (others would tell me all the time how mature I was for my age since I was 3). My parents would also tell me often that their marriage started deteriorating after I was born, even though I was a very much planned and wanted child (they realized after my birth that they didn’t agree on a single thing about raising a child). To make this short, I feel like I would have nothing to offer to a child and I am completely unfit for all the tasks of motherhood as I never had a good example in front of me and in my mind, children can only ruin marriages because that’s what my existence did to my parents’. I’m so tired and I just can’t spend another 25 years of my life at the mercy of another person and being emotionally enslaved to them. I never got to be a child and I would like to experience what it’s like to do what I want and be carefree. I have so many plans about how I want to fill my time meaningfully but becoming a mother is not one of them. 

I’ll get to my point now: as I was telling people about my upcoming surgery (coworkers and family members), their reactions had one thing in common, they said; “but what if you meet your soulmate and he will want kids? You will be very sad that you can’t give that to him”. (I know it’s also on me for telling them) Of course my answer was that simply this person can’t be my soulmate because that would be someone who aligns with me on being childfree. I don’t know why but I started to think more about this and now I can’t shake the feeling that I’m making a mistake? I wanted this surgery so bad and I know it’s the right decision but now I can’t stop thinking that the reason I might end up single is that I don’t want to have a child. (I had a 5 year relationship end last year because my ex said “I know when we met you said you wouldn’t want kids ever but I thought I could manipulate you into it but now I see that I can’t so I’m breaking up with you”.) I would really like to get married in the future and travel the world and do amazing things with a true partner but what if this all comes with the price of having children? Now that I wrote this down I already know it’s insane and I know there are so many happy DINKs out there but these comments really made me spiral. Maybe no one will read this but if you do decide to leave a comment, I’ll be very grateful. I guess I’m just looking for some validation that I am still worthy and will find love despite not wanting to be a mother. In other ways I am very “maternal” in that I love to take care of people and I would love to dedicate my life to others in my work (I have a master in psychology and I’m gonna be doing more schooling to specialize.) but this is very different from becoming a mother. Most of the time I’m very secure in my decision but I really hated how these people looked at me with pity and like I was less of a woman, it actually got to me this time. If you had similar worries before, please tell me I’m not insane.