Anyone Have Kids Soon After Dating/Getting Married?

[Anonymous]

Started dating at 21.5.
Engaged 10 minths later.
Married 7 months later at 23.

First kid 12 months later-24
Second kids at 26.
I'm now 46.
Wouldn't change a thing.

[Anonymous]

OP here. Sorry for not replying back yesterday.

My husband and I both want kids and decided last year to start trying at the start of this year. I have hesitated. I do want kids but two of our closest couple friends had a baby in the fall, and the second just had their second child. They both have told us many times how hard it is to have a baby and what a huge impact it is on the relationship. We will be parents for 18+ years and I wonder if taking 1-2 more years to be childless is the best thing. I don’t want to be one of those couples who has kids and then complains how their relationship has been impacted by kids. I know it will to some extent, regardless of how long we have even together, but I guess I’m nervous and a little scared to change our current situation. Things are just so easy and I worry we won’t have time to keep nurturing our marriage with two young kids.

We are very happy and in a very stable relationship. We are in a good financial place and can afford to have kids.

[Anonymous]

It will definitely change your relationship. It’s kind of like deciding to start a small business with your best friend. Sometimes it’s great and you discover how well you work together. Sometimes it’s a disaster, and you both feel overworked and under appreciated. It’s not always obvious what it’s going to be, and some of it depends on your child(ren) as much as it does either of you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn’t wait another year at 33.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Sorry for not replying back yesterday.

My husband and I both want kids and decided last year to start trying at the start of this year. I have hesitated. I do want kids but two of our closest couple friends had a baby in the fall, and the second just had their second child. They both have told us many times how hard it is to have a baby and what a huge impact it is on the relationship. We will be parents for 18+ years and I wonder if taking 1-2 more years to be childless is the best thing. I don’t want to be one of those couples who has kids and then complains how their relationship has been impacted by kids. I know it will to some extent, regardless of how long we have even together, but I guess I’m nervous and a little scared to change our current situation. Things are just so easy and I worry we won’t have time to keep nurturing our marriage with two young kids.

We are very happy and in a very stable relationship. We are in a good financial place and can afford to have kids.

Pro tip: it will not matter how long you wait. Kids are hard whether you’ve been married one year or 20 years.

[Anonymous]

We were in your shoes and choose to freeze embryos. It allowed us some peace of mind in regards to fertility and bought us time to get to know each other better. It also made the concept of kids more real to my DH and he started reading books about parenting and doing more prep work. The only downside was that it was expensive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Sorry for not replying back yesterday.

My husband and I both want kids and decided last year to start trying at the start of this year. I have hesitated. I do want kids but two of our closest couple friends had a baby in the fall, and the second just had their second child. They both have told us many times how hard it is to have a baby and what a huge impact it is on the relationship. We will be parents for 18+ years and I wonder if taking 1-2 more years to be childless is the best thing. I don’t want to be one of those couples who has kids and then complains how their relationship has been impacted by kids. I know it will to some extent, regardless of how long we have even together, but I guess I’m nervous and a little scared to change our current situation. Things are just so easy and I worry we won’t have time to keep nurturing our marriage with two young kids.

We are very happy and in a very stable relationship. We are in a good financial place and can afford to have kids.

Pro tip: it will not matter how long you wait. Kids are hard whether you’ve been married one year or 20 years.

+1. If you have a child that has any type of challenge whether that is neurodiversity, differing physical abilities, or mental health changes or if you have any fertility challenges, those are known stressors on a marriage no matter how long you are married. Basically any path of even trying to have kids, no matter when, opens up a possible stress point. It comes down to how confident you feel in your relationship and the confidence you have in yourself to deal with what life throws at you.

FWIW, I feel like I grew closer to my DH when we had our first child. Parenting together and seeing what a great parent he is, opened a different side to our relationship. We hit some bumps in the road parenting a neurodiverse child and fortunately we have been able to get on the same page and work together.