The decision to have children..or not

I always thought that I would want a child.

However, I was in a longish relationship where I just knew I did not want to have a child with my partner.
When I met my husband, he already had a daughter, and two former step-children, who he still had contact with.

About a year or two into our relationship, we established that we wanted a child/children together, however, my (at the time not-yet) husband, said, he would rather wait until he was out of the army.

One day, listening to the two girls argue, when we were in the States, we just looked at each other and said: One will be enough.

Then the time came nearer when he was supposed to leave the army, and one day, he came up to me, and said:
Would you hate me, if I extended my time?

At first I was TOTALLY against it, since it meant that we probably would not be able to stay in Germany, but while on holiday in Corsica, I decided that that was pretty selfish, since he already agreed to retire to Germany.
So I told him I would come to the States with him for a maximum of three years.
But also that I did not want to wait another five years for a baby, since I wanted to be a mother, not a grandmother.

His reply: Well, I guess, you better stop taking the pill then.

Six weeks later I was pregnant, and the rest is history!

One thing to add: I had a really great life prior to having my son, and I was not desperate, so it was a: it either happens or it doesn't situation.
I was not willing to undertake tests, take hormones or anything like that.

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Interesting question...!

I'd always planned to have a kid. I love kids in general, have an education degree, etc. I met my husband when I was 21, that was obviously too early but we weren't sure when we crossed the threshold to "ready." At first I was in college (no), then grad school (no), then getting established professionally (no).

We were in L.A. for a three-year stint -- my husband had a postdoc position that only lasted that long, and we knew we'd be going someplace else at the end of it. We planned to move when I was 29, and I'd always wanted to have a kid before I was 30. I hated the idea of moving someplace new and then having a baby within a short time -- I wanted to have a baby in familiar environs. So we started trying about a year and a half before we would need to move.

This wasn't a clear, "yay!!" decision. We both got seriously freaked out occasionally, and the first several times I "failed" to get pregnant I was actually relieved.

But it dragged on and on and I was starting to get concerned. Like Bohne, I didn't really want to work REALLY hard at it -- but I did want to have a baby.

Then finally got pregnant after about a year of trying ("trying" just means no birth control, here). And that meant that exactly what I DIDN'T want to have happen, happened -- I moved, and then had a baby 3 months later in a brand-new city where I knew nobody.

I think that worked out pretty well, though, overall. I was able to maximize my time in my job in L.A., which I adored, and the place we moved to (suburb of Chicago) was better for raising kids, I think. Also was able to save a lot of money from my job to tide me over when I was a stay-at-home mom.

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Hmmmmmmm....dunno, really.

Apparently, from near infancy, I was absolutely clear re not ever wanting to get married (I guess my parents and their friends put me off!) That suggests, sort of, I suppose, not having an intense desire to have kids.

I was also kind of socially retarded, (due to a lot of different family/emotional circumstances), so I was having early teen relationships in my late teens, and so on.

Then, I studied forever, and the men I REALLY fell in love with were clearly not daddy material, and absolutely did not want children.

The closest I came was with the fella I was with from 21 to 24, and we did actually discuss it. However, we both turned out to have siblings who died from the same genetic illness. There is a 2/3 chance for both of us that we are carriers, and there was no test for that, nor any test to see if a foetus had two lethal genes. That was that. No way we were prepared to take any such risk.

Even then, I was not strongly impelled, never have been since then, and I don't really have any regrets. Life is swings and roundabouts, and there is good and bad in all choices.

It's interesting, I suppose, in this context, that I have worked with kids since early 1989.....but that was more that I wanted to take a pure therapy career path, and the best place to do the kind of therapy I was interested in was in a child, adolescent and family specialist agency. Now, I am so specialized that I'd be silly not to continue to deepen that specialty, but I would consider adult work if a good enough job came up.

Mind you, I do take great pleasure in most of the munchkins I see, and watching them grow and develop.

Interestingly, compared with colleagues with their own kids (I have had sort of step kids) I mine my own child/teen experiences far more and have a much clearer and deeper set of memories of those times. They are able to use their own kids to get a real feel for the little people they see, I would imagine.

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I didn't give it much thought until I was married and deciding NOT to have children. I didn't and wouldn't have had children in my first marriage of 12 years. There was a inner voice telling me that children in that relationship would be a disaster. At the same time, I had an unusual fear of pregnancy, labor, and delivery (read phobia) so the fact that I was married to someone who hated children made not facing my fears an easy decision.

I like babies and kids but I was quite happy as a childless adult and didn't think I would ever have children.... until I divorced, remarried a couple years later, and discovered myself with a partner who adores kids and wanted to be a father. Gulp! Fear-facing time. He and I both felt strongly that pregnancies should be planned (we were both oopses and didn't want to pass that baggage onto children of our own), so we discussed timing, aging (I was 33 when we married) careers, etc., and decided to start our family shortly after we got married. Daughter K was born 13 months after our wedding. Sister M was born 21 months later - again, the timing was based on my age and energy.

As a case in point, I don't think the decision to never have children has to be a permanent one. Never is a very long time.

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JPB wrote:

I didn't give it much thought until I was married and deciding NOT to have children. I didn't and wouldn't have had children in my first marriage of 12 years. There was a inner voice telling me that children in that relationship would be a disaster. At the same time, I had an unusual fear of pregnancy, labor, and delivery (read phobia) so the fact that I was married to someone who hated children made not facing my fears an easy decision.

I like babies and kids but I was quite happy as a childless adult and didn't think I would ever have children.... until I divorced, remarried a couple years later, and discovered myself with a partner who adores kids and wanted to be a father. Gulp! Fear-facing time. He and I both felt strongly that pregnancies should be planned (we were both oopses and didn't want to pass that baggage onto children of our own), so we discussed timing, aging (I was 33 when we married) careers, etc., and decided to start our family shortly after we got married. Daughter K was born 13 months after our wedding. Sister M was born 21 months later - again, the timing was based on my age and energy.

As a case in point, I don't think the decision to never have children has to be a permanent one. Never is a very long time.

Well, the eggses disappearses, you know. Just as a starter. :wink:

Your labours were surviveable, I deduce?????

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Yeah, very much so. Turns out that it was very easy for me to become pregnant, be pregnant, and have uneventful deliveries (so much for lifelong phobias). I do wonder though if many of K's emotional issues aren't directly related to my nervousness during her pregnancy. M is a stable rock. I was very calm during her pregnancy... <shrug>

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JPB wrote:

Yeah, very much so. Turns out that it was very easy for me to become pregnant, be pregnant, and have uneventful deliveries (so much for lifelong phobias). I do wonder though if many of K's emotional issues aren't directly related to my nervousness during her pregnancy. M is a stable rock. I was very calm during her pregnancy... <shrug>

Lol! It may be possible........but first kiddies tend to be a bit more anxious/over-responsible.

Anyhoo, anxiety and pessimism may be built into our genes......the jumpy cave-person was likely the cave-person who lived to fight another day.

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got posted to wrong topic via software error....

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I'd always wanted children but all through my twenties and thirties, the men I fell in love with were unsuitable to marry and I never wanted to have a child on my own. At thirty-four I had a bout with endometriosis and my doc advised me to have a child ASAP. I cried and cried and called a couple of ex-boyfriends, snooping around, but I just couldn't see doing it on my own.

I moved to Atlanta when I was 38 and two events changed my mind forever. Sharing a house with my best friend, her mother had custody of a six-month old boy and when they came for a visit, within minutes, our house became the baby's house. There were strollers and bottles and diapers and baby paraphenalia from the kitchen to the bedroom to the den. I remember standing in the kitchen, looking around at all of this stuff and wondering how would I be able to give up my home, and the way I like my home, for a baby.

Then, a few months later, my cousin, ten years younger than I, gave birth to her first child. I went to visit her just a few days after she'd gotten home and was devastated by what I saw. My cousin had been a petite woman with a beautiful figure but an inadvertent opening of the robe revealed a roadmap of stretch marks and broken blood vessels and all I could think was, if that's what happens at 28, imagine what happens at 38?

Two months later, on January 1, I sat all alone and made the final decision to take the pressure off of myself. I no longer wanted to have a baby. It wasn't an easy decision but I'd become selfish and set in my ways and couldn't imagine not resenting what would happen to my home, my body, my whole life, if I brought a child into this world.

Now, I don't know if the fates were waiting for me to make that final decision or not but two months after that I met my husband. Ten years older than I with three kids, two adults and a eleven year old living with his mother, he sure wasn't looking to have any more.

Sometimes I regret not meeting him sooner. But in my heart, I believe there are reasons why everything happened just the way it did. Who knows? I may have been a lousy mother. Impatient, resentful, abusive. You never know.

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I always wanted children- always. I never had a Barbie doll - always baby dolls and I had my childrens' names chosen by the time I was seventeen.

But I had just watched Phil Donahue and saw a show about children who essentially live their first few years of life in the hospital because they are premature and abandoned and I thought- "I'll do that".

My husband was doing a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit rotation, so I had seen what the reality for those children was. He was in school, I was the income, I'd been told that I had an issue that would make it hard for me to get pregnant and carry a pregnancy to term, so as soon as the show was over, I called to be put on the waiting list, thinking it would take a year or two for all the paper work - and by that time, he'd be out of school, and we'd have some money so I could stay home.

Well, with all that in mind, we got amorous one night and the first time I ever did not use birth control - I got pregnant. I said, "You know - if those doctors aren't right - this was EXACTLY the wrong time for us to have done this." And then I forgot about it. About six weeks later - I asked him to go get me a Big Mac. He said, "I'll make you a hamburger-(I never ate McDonalds) but I said, "No, I want the special sauce." He remembered that I'd been saying I was tired, so he looked at me and said, "You're pregnant." He was so excited - I said, "You are gonna be so disappointed- I KNOW I'm not pregnant." He went and got the Big Mac and a pregnancy test and voila- I was.

It was two days before Christmas. My favorite picture of me is the one I have from that Christmas of me standing next to our little Christmas tree pointing to my belly and the angel at the top of the tree.

I'd never been afraid of pregnancy and childbirth - figured that women do it every day - it'd be a snap. Well- the first labor pain convinced me otherwise. HOLY ****- I thought....how do people get through this? But I did- and we had no income from June to November (I was teaching so my last paycheck was in June, my son was born in August and I went back to work nine weeks later in October - and got paid again in November).
We had collection agencies calling our house - my son didn't sleep through the night till he was two- my husband was doing thirty-six hour rotations and I had to lug plastic bags of dirty diapers up and down three flights of stairs to and from the laundromat after working all day-
but it was the happiest time of my life! Laughing

We adopted my daughter four years later.

*I saw a show in which I saw a pregnant woman's stomach with stretch marks, and I didn't know what they were until someone told me. I have fair, dry, Irish skin. If anyone should have gotten stretch marks, it'd be me. I didn't even get one.

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By the way the age thing is a consideration for me now. I'm 95% sure I want just one child. But that 5% keeps niggling. In the last six months or so it seems like all of a sudden babies have gotten adorable. I mean I've always liked them (except when sozlet was a baby, then she was plenty and I didn't really have any appetite for babyness beyond that) but recently there has been some sort of "am I sure???" thing going on.

But I'm 37. And many of the best reasons to have a kid have passed, I think. If I had another one they'd be probably at least 8 years apart. Not an impossible distance, but I can't imagine them really being friends until they're both adults. A 4-year-old and a 12-year old? Etc.

Plus, like eoe, I just don't really want to give up where we are now in life. The house isn't baby-proofed. We're finally starting to get our legs under us, financially. Sozlet's happy being an only child. If I have a child late in life, the risks go up.

And while I loved a lot of being pregnant (not all of it), childbirth itself was HORRIBLE for me. Definitely a traumatic experience that I would have to be very motivated to consider enduring again (though it would probably be much easier the second time.)

I just can't quite seem to completely close that door yet though. I have an appt. with my GYN coming up where I'm going to talk about whether I should still be on birth control pills at my age -- that will probably lead to a discussion of more permanent measures. That's when that 5% really looms.

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I would refrain from having children simply because they may end up looking like this....

http://www.sydesjokes.com/pictures/w/worst_album_covers029.jpg

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sozobe wrote:

By the way the age thing is a consideration for me now. I'm 95% sure I want just one child. But that 5% keeps niggling. In the last six months or so it seems like all of a sudden babies have gotten adorable. I mean I've always liked them (except when sozlet was a baby, then she was plenty and I didn't really have any appetite for babyness beyond that) but recently there has been some sort of "am I sure???" thing going on.

But I'm 37. And many of the best reasons to have a kid have passed, I think. If I had another one they'd be probably at least 8 years apart. Not an impossible distance, but I can't imagine them really being friends until they're both adults. A 4-year-old and a 12-year old? Etc.

Plus, like eoe, I just don't really want to give up where we are now in life. The house isn't baby-proofed. We're finally starting to get our legs under us, financially. Sozlet's happy being an only child. If I have a child late in life, the risks go up.

And while I loved a lot of being pregnant (not all of it), childbirth itself was HORRIBLE for me. Definitely a traumatic experience that I would have to be very motivated to consider enduring again (though it would probably be much easier the second time.)

I just can't quite seem to completely close that door yet though. I have an appt. with my GYN coming up where I'm going to talk about whether I should still be on birth control pills at my age -- that will probably lead to a discussion of more permanent measures. That's when that 5% really looms.

For me at 38 we decided to have the second child, however, since my first was born when I was in my 30s already, they are only a little less than 3 years apart.

As the age difference - I think they would just have a different relationship. My youngest brother was 11 years younger than me so it was more of a relationship where I took care of him alot. I think it was great for him as a young boy, I took him to the Red Sox games and things like that - so he got extra spoiled.

If your little girl likes playing mommy, it may work out nicely, but I can certainly understand why you may not want to re-change your whole life and house and stuff - babies do make huge adjustments.

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I believe biologically in your early 20s is best. However, I also believe mentally that a bit older is best.

To me what the age isn't as important as you and your spouse are ready mentally and financially. If your body is at its peak for making babies, but you cannot support one financially or can barely take care of yourself - that poor child is going to suffer.

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Thanks for all the stories and input so far!

Well. I'm already 28. And quite frankly, scared out of my wits.

I always wanted to have children in the context of a long term relationship. That relationship, for me and for my child to have a father who wants him/her - and the whole family life - it's what I always wanted "one day".

In my early 20's, it all came so close to happening. And turned to disaster. Still makes me sad to this day. It just all crashed down. I think I put babies and family out of my head for a long time after that. Didn' t even go for men who shared my values.

The pieces are falling together as far as what I always wanted before having a child. Life's good. Most of all that had to do with me. Becoming a more mature and stable person. Though I've always felt confident (whether with good reason or not!) that I would be a loving and nurturing mom, the parts that were missing before were too huge to overlook.

It's never been so right of a chance to start to think of planning teehee. So how come now I am so scared and I wasn't when I was younger? When things were not all settled in? Bah. It seems like a cruel twist that part. I understand it better and am less willing to go through with it.

I'm scared of missing my chance. But I'm scared too of having a child for the wrong reasons! And of Child birth, specifically. Though pregnancy itself appeals to me (just not the later stages!).
But I also want to be realistic. Having a child even ten years down the line maybe not be an option for me.

It's like two ways of life tugging at me at the same time.

sigh. Thanks

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I don't think there's an easy answer, unfortunately. (I know you know that, though.) I was definitely terrified at several points in pre-planning, planning, pregnancy, and beyond!! But it's probably pretty obvious through my posts here that I'm very glad I had my daughter, and I think the timing worked out really well.

Sorry if this is more info than you're willing to provide, but are you saying that you are now in long-term relationship, and that your partner is also interested in having a baby? I agree that makes a huge difference -- having a partner or going it solo. (Which is not to say that solo is impossible -- just harder.)

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I have thought about how to answer this question all day.

I never wanted to be mother. Ever. I'm not really maternal at all.

Then Mo fell into our lives. I was 40 when he was born and 42 when he came to live with us and 45 when his adoption was final.

I guess it was just meant to be.

I think I'm a pretty good mom but it was something I had to LEARN. It doesn't come naturally to me. Sometimes I feel more like a.... hmmmm.... a sociologist?... maybe.

I was faced with adopting Mo or seeing him disappear from my life.

I can't imagine there being no Mo here.

For me, the great thing about adoption was that it was just me questioning my - there were social workers, lawyers, judges. I had to have references for heaven's sake. There could be no ambivilence on my part.

And there wasn't any.

My only advice to anyone trying to decide is that if you have any ambiivience you shouldn't have kids.

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Soz, it's ok. It's been a while since I've shared around here and your questions have never felt invasive in the least.

I have been with someone for a while now who does very much so want a family. As much as I used to which makes me a bit sad to say. I want to as much in all honesty but am more cautious nowadays.
As far as enthusiasm goes. And jumping right on board.

To be honest even talking about it has been hard for me. There is a backstory which I don't think I have ever shared here. That makes it all more complicated.

Nothing is set in stone. We talk about these things. It seems we want a lot of the same things.

In a way I suppose deciding this also is a decision whether to stay in the relationship all the way or not too. It would not be fair to him if I later on decided I didn't want children. If this makes sense.

Short version of the story/question.

I don't need to decide right this minute but I do need to know exactly what I want.

The stories here are helping.

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I am not maternal either.
I have always said, while growing up, I will never get married and never have kids. My mother, sisters, friends, everyone said "Yeah right!" Now at 40, I am unmarried and have no children. I never did change my mind. I do understand women who want to get married and who want to have children and I know it is a natural instinct. I just don't have it. In fact I've been in several relationships where the guys were delighted at my condition (no pressure on them to get married and have babies) but as time went by, they broke (family pressure) and wanted to get married and talk about children. Each time the relationship fizzled or they gave me an ultimatum and so it would be over. I have no regrets (except for finding a partner who truly wanted, or didn't want, the same things as me).

If I had accidently gotten pregnant however, I would have made a great (if strict) Mom. Weird that, but I am apparently very good with kids. They appear to like me, or are attracted to my loudness in some way. Not sure why.

Ooh .... I almost forgot. I nearly changed my mind once. I met "the one". I was madly, crazily, insanely in love with this guy and he was it! I actually wanted to have a baby with him. The fact that a piece of him and a piece of me would be joined together made me so happy thinking that a baby would be the best thing to ever happen to me, aside from loving him, that I thought about getting pregnant.

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The decision to have children..or not

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