If you don’t have more than 2 children, why?

[Anonymous]

Two is the max. that I could handle financially, mentally & physically. We have a son and a daughter, perfect combo for us. If I want one more child, it must be because I have 2 sons & I really really want a daughter.

Friends that I know go for 3rd child because they have 2 sons, and they end up getting 3rd son when they want a daughter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why didn’t you have more children? What would motivate you to have more?

With two we could be man-to-man (meaning, one parent to one child). With more than 2, you have to swith to zone, and I wasn't up to the task. Two are enough. Then there's the cost of college, which would have meant limiting choices for all the kids, which we didn't want

[Anonymous]

Rude question. Short answer is infertility and it wasn’t God’s plan. Frequently told we are such great parents we should have more. Lost both our fathers the year our child was born and too afraid of a failed adoption. Such is life. My only is happy and all his friends have siblings but spend as much time as allowed at our house.

[Anonymous]

To the folks who are saying this is a rude question: why are you on DCUM? This is an anonymous forum where people can ask questions they are curious about without having to be rude and directly ask them to someone’s face (potentially offending them). You also don’t have to answer the question…

People are wild.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I didn’t want more than two. We have replaced ourselves, that’s more than enough.

This.

The definition of narcissism.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why didn’t you have more children? What would motivate you to have more?

Finances and family support. Otherwise I would live to have 4 or 5.

This + age. I'd have loved to have four if we had all the money and support we could possibly need and had started younger.

[Anonymous]

Because what I do with my uterus is none of your business? It might be a choice, it might be circumstance. Take your judgments, ideas, ideals, abs shove them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To the folks who are saying this is a rude question: why are you on DCUM? This is an anonymous forum where people can ask questions they are curious about without having to be rude and directly ask them to someone’s face (potentially offending them). You also don’t have to answer the question…

People are wild.

It’s rude because it ends with asking people
What would motivate them to have more.

And anonymity doesn’t make these questions less rude. It just makes them anonymous.

[Anonymous]

Don’t understand why this question is being asked as though two kids is so uncommon. I’m used to seeing DCUM posts about having 3 or 4+ kids but never about 2. Oh well.

Me personally, I always wanted four, but got married late (34), dealt with infertility, so first DC didn’t come until 38. I think we could have squeezed in two more kids, but DH kept putting it off, so we didn’t have our DC #2 until 5 years later. Felt too old to have more kids after that.

A friend of mine has three kids and she recently said “the world is designed for families of 4.” I do think our life is a lot more convenient without a third child, but the transition from #3 to #4 is probably easier.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why didn’t you have more children? What would motivate you to have more?

More hours in my day.

[Anonymous]

Adopted a newborn 10 years ago, as a single mom. Could not afford to adopt another BUT wouldn't want to-- she completes me, and we have a great life.

[Anonymous]

DH was one of 4 kids and thought it was too many. Was clear before marriage that two was his max. Two was my minimum, so that made it a pretty simple decision.

[Anonymous]

Our family felt complete after our second was born. No regrets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our family felt complete after our second was born. No regrets.

This. As soon as I held DC2 for the first time, I knew my family was complete.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DH was one of 4 kids and thought it was too many. Was clear before marriage that two was his max. Two was my minimum, so that made it a pretty simple decision.

Curious what your DH's birth order was. I am one of four as well and it's interesting to see how different our takes on that being a good or bad number of kids are:

Eldest had 2 kids
Second had 4 kids
Third had 1 kid
Fourth had 1 kid

I always think of this when people talk about the positives and negatives of having 3+ kids. I think people forget that siblings tend to have very different experiences within a large family and that sometimes the benefits of big families get concentrated in one or two kids. Which also means the downsides of being in a big family can get concentrated in one or two kids. I think willingness to have more than 2 kids requires you to believe that it will be good for all your kids and in my experience this is unlikely -- the more kids you have the more likely it becomes that at least one of your kids will struggle due to being lost in the shuffle.