When you can’t agree on having another child

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When DH and I married we agreed that we wanted 2-3 kids, but after we had our first, who is now 4, DH decided that it was more work than he anticipated and he does not want another. He is great with our daughter overall, but does not want to do it again. We both have siblings we are close to, and what makes this even harder for me is that I have a chronic illness that will mean I need care when I am older, and possibly won’t live as long as I could without this illness - so I really hate our DD to not have a sibling to help deal with all of this, even if there is no guarantee that they are close. DH is also 8 years older than I am.

We have already seen a couples therapist twice but DH thought it was a total waste and having another child isn’t something you do for someone else when it’s really not what you want. At this point it seems like I have no other choice than to let it go and be happy with our one, since I won’t just get pregnant and see what happens.

Has anyone else been in this situation and have any advice to offer? How did you cope with not having another child and letting go of it?

What exactly was “more work” than he anticipated?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I sympathize with your situation. Be aware that everyone here is going to tell you that "the no vote wins" and you need to drop it and that you should be content with the one child that you have.

However, my unpopular opinion is that you should not drop it so easily. Your feelings on this are equally valid as his. And, he is the one who has changed his mind. You entered this marriage expecting to have 2-3 children.

I think ultimately it comes down what type of person your DH is and what relationship you have. Many men are quite obstinate in their views, expect their spouse to generally go along with their decisions, and would greatly resent feeling pressured into having another. There are some men who are more flexible in their thinking, and can be persuaded by their wives. What is the real consequence for you if you continue to bring it up? Do you think he would leave you over pushing the issue? Why not keep trying. I would also remind him that you entered into this marriage with the expectation of having 2-3 kids, if you have not already.

Finally, I do think that you need to separate the issue of your health issues and you child(ren) taking care of you. You could have 1 child or 4 children and there is still no guarantee that they will step up to care you for in old age. Good luck.

How about if she was pregnant and wanted an abortion and he didn't? Would his feelings be as "equally valid" then? Cut me a break. He wants a pre-pregnancy abortion. Fair is fair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I sympathize with your situation. Be aware that everyone here is going to tell you that "the no vote wins" and you need to drop it and that you should be content with the one child that you have.

However, my unpopular opinion is that you should not drop it so easily. Your feelings on this are equally valid as his. And, he is the one who has changed his mind. You entered this marriage expecting to have 2-3 children.

I think ultimately it comes down what type of person your DH is and what relationship you have. Many men are quite obstinate in their views, expect their spouse to generally go along with their decisions, and would greatly resent feeling pressured into having another. There are some men who are more flexible in their thinking, and can be persuaded by their wives. What is the real consequence for you if you continue to bring it up? Do you think he would leave you over pushing the issue? Why not keep trying. I would also remind him that you entered into this marriage with the expectation of having 2-3 kids, if you have not already.

Finally, I do think that you need to separate the issue of your health issues and you child(ren) taking care of you. You could have 1 child or 4 children and there is still no guarantee that they will step up to care you for in old age. Good luck.

How about if she was pregnant and wanted an abortion and he didn't? Would his feelings be as "equally valid" then? Cut me a break. He wants a pre-pregnancy abortion. Fair is fair.

It sounds like you are saying that one parent's opinion on having a child is more important than the others? Please elaborate, I would love to hear more.

[Anonymous]

The guy sounds lazy!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I sympathize with your situation. Be aware that everyone here is going to tell you that "the no vote wins" and you need to drop it and that you should be content with the one child that you have.

However, my unpopular opinion is that you should not drop it so easily. Your feelings on this are equally valid as his. And, he is the one who has changed his mind. You entered this marriage expecting to have 2-3 children.

I think ultimately it comes down what type of person your DH is and what relationship you have. Many men are quite obstinate in their views, expect their spouse to generally go along with their decisions, and would greatly resent feeling pressured into having another. There are some men who are more flexible in their thinking, and can be persuaded by their wives. What is the real consequence for you if you continue to bring it up? Do you think he would leave you over pushing the issue? Why not keep trying. I would also remind him that you entered into this marriage with the expectation of having 2-3 kids, if you have not already.

Finally, I do think that you need to separate the issue of your health issues and you child(ren) taking care of you. You could have 1 child or 4 children and there is still no guarantee that they will step up to care you for in old age. Good luck.

How about if she was pregnant and wanted an abortion and he didn't? Would his feelings be as "equally valid" then? Cut me a break. He wants a pre-pregnancy abortion. Fair is fair.

It sounds like you are saying that one parent's opinion on having a child is more important than the others? Please elaborate, I would love to hear more.

Sure, I'll elaborate: the parent who doesn't want one wins. Every time. Every single time.

She has another option if she has to have a second kid: divorce.

[Anonymous]

Whoever wants few kids gets the final say.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I sympathize with your situation. Be aware that everyone here is going to tell you that "the no vote wins" and you need to drop it and that you should be content with the one child that you have.

However, my unpopular opinion is that you should not drop it so easily. Your feelings on this are equally valid as his. And, he is the one who has changed his mind. You entered this marriage expecting to have 2-3 children.

I think ultimately it comes down what type of person your DH is and what relationship you have. Many men are quite obstinate in their views, expect their spouse to generally go along with their decisions, and would greatly resent feeling pressured into having another. There are some men who are more flexible in their thinking, and can be persuaded by their wives. What is the real consequence for you if you continue to bring it up? Do you think he would leave you over pushing the issue? Why not keep trying. I would also remind him that you entered into this marriage with the expectation of having 2-3 kids, if you have not already.

Finally, I do think that you need to separate the issue of your health issues and you child(ren) taking care of you. You could have 1 child or 4 children and there is still no guarantee that they will step up to care you for in old age. Good luck.

Sure. He lied to her before marriage about how many children he wanted. Scum.

How about if she was pregnant and wanted an abortion and he didn't? Would his feelings be as "equally valid" then? Cut me a break. He wants a pre-pregnancy abortion. Fair is fair.

It sounds like you are saying that one parent's opinion on having a child is more important than the others? Please elaborate, I would love to hear more.

Sure, I'll elaborate: the parent who doesn't want one wins. Every time. Every single time.

She has another option if she has to have a second kid: divorce.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I sympathize with your situation. Be aware that everyone here is going to tell you that "the no vote wins" and you need to drop it and that you should be content with the one child that you have.

However, my unpopular opinion is that you should not drop it so easily. Your feelings on this are equally valid as his. And, he is the one who has changed his mind. You entered this marriage expecting to have 2-3 children.

I think ultimately it comes down what type of person your DH is and what relationship you have. Many men are quite obstinate in their views, expect their spouse to generally go along with their decisions, and would greatly resent feeling pressured into having another. There are some men who are more flexible in their thinking, and can be persuaded by their wives. What is the real consequence for you if you continue to bring it up? Do you think he would leave you over pushing the issue? Why not keep trying. I would also remind him that you entered into this marriage with the expectation of having 2-3 kids, if you have not already.

Finally, I do think that you need to separate the issue of your health issues and you child(ren) taking care of you. You could have 1 child or 4 children and there is still no guarantee that they will step up to care you for in old age. Good luck.

How about if she was pregnant and wanted an abortion and he didn't? Would his feelings be as "equally valid" then? Cut me a break. He wants a pre-pregnancy abortion. Fair is fair.

It sounds like you are saying that one parent's opinion on having a child is more important than the others? Please elaborate, I would love to hear more.

Sure, I'll elaborate: the parent who doesn't want one wins. Every time. Every single time.

She has another option if she has to have a second kid: divorce.

OK? I'm not sure why you are so triggered about another point of view. I already pointed out that most replies here would say exactly that. OPs husband already changed it mind once about about the number of kids, I'm not sure why it is assumed to be impossible to change again.

[Anonymous]

So, you want companionship for your daughter and you want two children to have to share the responsibility of caring for you when your health decrease. Unfortunately, neither of those is a given. There are many people, including many here on DCUM who have such poor relationships with their siblings that they didn't get along growing up, don't talk as adults and don't agree on how to handle eldercare for their parents. Additionally, there are many people who have many reasons why they cannot help with elder care for their parents.

Children cost a lot of money and are a lot of work. Your husband has now seen how much work it is and has said that he is not ready to go through all that work again. Unless you are committed to raising your second child mostly by yourself and hiring out childcare help and making enough income to support that childcare help, you can't really force him to accept the cost and work that having another child will make. I know that you want it and as someone who has two children, I definitely understand your emotions, but you can't commit someone to that for 20+ years of his life against his will.

It will be less expensive and a lot more reliable for you to get a decent life insurance policy on your husband and get a long term care (LTC) insurance policy for yourself so that if you do need elder care when you are older, you have resources in place to get you the help that you'll need. We have two kids but we still have auxiliary life insurance beyond the life insurance that our employers each provide us and we have LTC care for both of us. We made sure that the life insurance policies we had were enough to pay off the outstanding mortgage on both of our houses so that if one of us passed, they would not have to worry about the houses. Each of us makes enough money individually to cover living expenses if you take the mortgages out of the picture, so we did that. And we have the LTC policies so that if either of us has a health issue, it will not cripple the family financially. The policies will help cover either in home aides or rehabilitation/nursing facility care for us. Again, the intent was to ensure that it did not financially cripple our family and did not place the burden on the spouse or the children to care for the one with the health crisis.

I'm sorry that you won't have the family that you envisioned. You should give yourself time to grieve because it is a loss of a dream and it is emotionally difficult. But unfortunately, in this type of situation, the "no" does trump the "yes". You can continue to discuss it, but your only options are to convince him to change his mind or accept the decision.

[Anonymous]

Why did he LIE to her?
Was he shocked to learn he might need to change a poopie diaper???

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I sympathize with your situation. Be aware that everyone here is going to tell you that "the no vote wins" and you need to drop it and that you should be content with the one child that you have.

However, my unpopular opinion is that you should not drop it so easily. Your feelings on this are equally valid as his. And, he is the one who has changed his mind. You entered this marriage expecting to have 2-3 children.

I think ultimately it comes down what type of person your DH is and what relationship you have. Many men are quite obstinate in their views, expect their spouse to generally go along with their decisions, and would greatly resent feeling pressured into having another. There are some men who are more flexible in their thinking, and can be persuaded by their wives. What is the real consequence for you if you continue to bring it up? Do you think he would leave you over pushing the issue? Why not keep trying. I would also remind him that you entered into this marriage with the expectation of having 2-3 kids, if you have not already.

Finally, I do think that you need to separate the issue of your health issues and you child(ren) taking care of you. You could have 1 child or 4 children and there is still no guarantee that they will step up to care you for in old age. Good luck.

How about if she was pregnant and wanted an abortion and he didn't? Would his feelings be as "equally valid" then? Cut me a break. He wants a pre-pregnancy abortion. Fair is fair.

It sounds like you are saying that one parent's opinion on having a child is more important than the others? Please elaborate, I would love to hear more.

Sure, I'll elaborate: the parent who doesn't want one wins. Every time. Every single time.

She has another option if she has to have a second kid: divorce.

OK? I'm not sure why you are so triggered about another point of view. I already pointed out that most replies here would say exactly that. OPs husband already changed it mind once about about the number of kids, I'm not sure why it is assumed to be impossible to change again.

OP said in her first post at least THREE times that he does not want another child. So, your suggestion is she just nag him to no end until he agrees? Sure, he changed it once before, as you said, be this was after he had an actual kid and knew what having kids actually was.

Jesus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why did he LIE to her?
Was he shocked to learn he might need to change a poopie diaper???

He didn't lie. He changed his mind. It happens.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why did he LIE to her?
Was he shocked to learn he might need to change a poopie diaper???

He didn't lie. He changed his mind. It happens.

Sounds to me like he tricked her into marriage. Scum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why did he LIE to her?
Was he shocked to learn he might need to change a poopie diaper???

JFC. "Lie"? He changed his mind. It is allowed. If it had been the DW saying SHE had changed her mind and didn't want another child, would you be yelling in all caps that she "LIED"?

Discussion before marriage or early in marriage about some ideal number of kids is not a verbal contract even if you think it is, PP.

He changed his mind based on having more information. Perfectly fair. And "more work" does not necessarily mean "he's just a wimp about poop." Grow up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I sympathize with your situation. Be aware that everyone here is going to tell you that "the no vote wins" and you need to drop it and that you should be content with the one child that you have.

However, my unpopular opinion is that you should not drop it so easily. Your feelings on this are equally valid as his. And, he is the one who has changed his mind. You entered this marriage expecting to have 2-3 children.

I think ultimately it comes down what type of person your DH is and what relationship you have. Many men are quite obstinate in their views, expect their spouse to generally go along with their decisions, and would greatly resent feeling pressured into having another. There are some men who are more flexible in their thinking, and can be persuaded by their wives. What is the real consequence for you if you continue to bring it up? Do you think he would leave you over pushing the issue? Why not keep trying. I would also remind him that you entered into this marriage with the expectation of having 2-3 kids, if you have not already.

Finally, I do think that you need to separate the issue of your health issues and you child(ren) taking care of you. You could have 1 child or 4 children and there is still no guarantee that they will step up to care you for in old age. Good luck.

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