Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Likely when you were dating, the kids and suburban life was some ideal mirage that seemed okay.

He’s older now, and has friends who have had kids and he knows the stories from the trenches: lack of sleep, whiney kids and teens, expensive daycare and activities, and the biggie: decline in sex because DW is wiped out caring for kids.

You waited to long, he knows what I really means to “have a baby” — it’s a lifetime of commitment and sacrifice.

He probably expects you to leave and he can date a younger model and repeat the cycle.

Op here. I am thinking this too. He doesn’t like to be inconvenienced and has a short discomfort tolerance and he is more curmudgeonly as he gets older.

I thought he would become more mature but it’s the opposite case here.

Or, he has become more mature and realizes his desires and limitations and is expressing them.

We need to stop it with the having kids is somehow the more mature or more adult decision, or that people who choose not to have kids are selfish narrative.

Flushing a decade of someone's top fertile years down the toilet because you suddenly became "more mature" is the definition of selfish.

This. OPs husband is a sick, selfish person. Declining fertility after 35 is a known, published, fact. So what her husband had done is vastly limit HER options in order to preserve his. Frankly this kind of abuse is the kind of thing which would make me not want to have a kid with him at all— what other sacrifices with your children be making to make sure he’s not inconvenienced.

To be clear, if he was saying this when she was 30 and giving her the option to pursue parenthood and a loving family elsewhere I would not feel this way. There is nothing wrong with not having children. There is everything wrong with leading someone on— even your spouse.

It doesn’t sound like you could comfortably do SMMC financially, but if you can, do that. Think long and hard before you make this man legally responsible for another human being.

Lol. It’s not abuse to have different goals and wants as your wife. Holy shit. Culture of victimhood has really jumped the shark.

It’s abuse to deny your spouse children while lying to them. It in fact used to be grounds for at-fault divorce.

Man, people have such trouble reading. He is not denying OP anything. He is stating that he doesn’t *want* that life for himself, but WOULD do it for her.

He’s denying her a child who is wanted by both their parents. Which is basically the baseline. He said he wanted to have children, and what is is saying now is he will only have children who get to live a lifetime as unwanted. That’s beyond a bait and switch because no responsible parent wants that for their child.

Anonymous wrote:

What I don't understand is that most of us grew up with two parents or maybe even one that provided for us and helped us become adults. Why do people these days think they can't hack it when their parents did? Did they come from a household of extended family or something and now they don't have it? What has changed

I think a lot has changed but I’ll cite two things. 1) my mom worked very very part time and my family had a normal middle class life in Los Angeles on my dads academic salary. We were a little unique in that we did not have family around to help

2) lower expectations/demands on child rearing and household management. Camp was ymca or similar all summer. We didn’t have tutors or therapists. My mom didn’t do orange theory or plan international travel or renovate every 10 years. It didn’t take 45 minutes to drive 5 miles.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I don't understand is that most of us grew up with two parents or maybe even one that provided for us and helped us become adults. Why do people these days think they can't hack it when their parents did? Did they come from a household of extended family or something and now they don't have it? What has changed?

People want more in life and frankly have higher standards

Anonymous wrote:What I don't understand is that most of us grew up with two parents or maybe even one that provided for us and helped us become adults. Why do people these days think they can't hack it when their parents did? Did they come from a household of extended family or something and now they don't have it? What has changed?

Anonymous wrote:What I don't understand is that most of us grew up with two parents or maybe even one that provided for us and helped us become adults. Why do people these days think they can't hack it when their parents did? Did they come from a household of extended family or something and now they don't have it? What has changed?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Likely when you were dating, the kids and suburban life was some ideal mirage that seemed okay.

He’s older now, and has friends who have had kids and he knows the stories from the trenches: lack of sleep, whiney kids and teens, expensive daycare and activities, and the biggie: decline in sex because DW is wiped out caring for kids.

You waited to long, he knows what I really means to “have a baby” — it’s a lifetime of commitment and sacrifice.

He probably expects you to leave and he can date a younger model and repeat the cycle.

Op here. I am thinking this too. He doesn’t like to be inconvenienced and has a short discomfort tolerance and he is more curmudgeonly as he gets older.

I thought he would become more mature but it’s the opposite case here.

Or, he has become more mature and realizes his desires and limitations and is expressing them.

We need to stop it with the having kids is somehow the more mature or more adult decision, or that people who choose not to have kids are selfish narrative.

Flushing a decade of someone's top fertile years down the toilet because you suddenly became "more mature" is the definition of selfish.

This. OPs husband is a sick, selfish person. Declining fertility after 35 is a known, published, fact. So what her husband had done is vastly limit HER options in order to preserve his. Frankly this kind of abuse is the kind of thing which would make me not want to have a kid with him at all— what other sacrifices with your children be making to make sure he’s not inconvenienced.

To be clear, if he was saying this when she was 30 and giving her the option to pursue parenthood and a loving family elsewhere I would not feel this way. There is nothing wrong with not having children. There is everything wrong with leading someone on— even your spouse.

It doesn’t sound like you could comfortably do SMMC financially, but if you can, do that. Think long and hard before you make this man legally responsible for another human being.

Lol. It’s not abuse to have different goals and wants as your wife. Holy shit. Culture of victimhood has really jumped the shark.

It’s abuse to deny your spouse children while lying to them. It in fact used to be grounds for at-fault divorce.

Man, people have such trouble reading. He is not denying OP anything. He is stating that he doesn’t *want* that life for himself, but WOULD do it for her.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your husband will probably be able to handle one kid, but not two. Two kids is a crazy ballgame of stress and misery and no time for yourself. It’s also harder to compromise as you get older and kids require you to pretty much compromise everything. He will be miserable.

Sad, but true.

+1. This is why I have an only child.

Me too. I probably could have handled the stress of two. Dh, not so much. I loved dh more than the idea of a theoretical kid, and I didn’t want to introduce something to our lives that made him miserable. So we stuck with one. Fwiw I have a general theory that my friends with two kids where are least one is a girl have happy or at least tolerable marriages (assuming they did before kids). My friends with two boys all have marriages in the crapper. So you take the risks when having two that things will be bad. All my friends with one kid have pretty reasonable lives, balanced marriages etc. I honestly don’t know why more ppl don’t have one kid.

That's weird. From a sample size of two I can say that my best friend has two boys and a great marriage and another very close friend has a girl (older) and a boy and her marriage is a disaster and has been for a long time.

Also, we wanted one kid and ended up with surprise twins (no fertility treatments or IVF or anything like that, just spontaneous). Obviously that's not the norm, but just saying, there's a lot you probably don't know about people's lives, so it seems weird to generalize like you did.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Likely when you were dating, the kids and suburban life was some ideal mirage that seemed okay.

He’s older now, and has friends who have had kids and he knows the stories from the trenches: lack of sleep, whiney kids and teens, expensive daycare and activities, and the biggie: decline in sex because DW is wiped out caring for kids.

You waited to long, he knows what I really means to “have a baby” — it’s a lifetime of commitment and sacrifice.

He probably expects you to leave and he can date a younger model and repeat the cycle.

Op here. I am thinking this too. He doesn’t like to be inconvenienced and has a short discomfort tolerance and he is more curmudgeonly as he gets older.

I thought he would become more mature but it’s the opposite case here.

Or, he has become more mature and realizes his desires and limitations and is expressing them.

We need to stop it with the having kids is somehow the more mature or more adult decision, or that people who choose not to have kids are selfish narrative.

Flushing a decade of someone's top fertile years down the toilet because you suddenly became "more mature" is the definition of selfish.

This. OPs husband is a sick, selfish person. Declining fertility after 35 is a known, published, fact. So what her husband had done is vastly limit HER options in order to preserve his. Frankly this kind of abuse is the kind of thing which would make me not want to have a kid with him at all— what other sacrifices with your children be making to make sure he’s not inconvenienced.

To be clear, if he was saying this when she was 30 and giving her the option to pursue parenthood and a loving family elsewhere I would not feel this way. There is nothing wrong with not having children. There is everything wrong with leading someone on— even your spouse.

It doesn’t sound like you could comfortably do SMMC financially, but if you can, do that. Think long and hard before you make this man legally responsible for another human being.

Lol. It’s not abuse to have different goals and wants as your wife. Holy shit. Culture of victimhood has really jumped the shark.

It’s abuse to deny your spouse children while lying to them. It in fact used to be grounds for at-fault divorce.

Anonymous wrote:For me it meant he would financially care for them but all parenting was on me. From infant through teen yrs it’s on me. Diapers, middle of the night feedings, preschool choice, IEP meetings, drs appts, summer camp, learning to drive, managing play dates.

In short solo parenting with a financial safety net. I knew this going in and I was okay with it. He loves the kids and now that they are older teens he’s more involved but the baby/Elem/MS years were all on me.

What I don't understand is that most of us grew up with two parents or maybe even one that provided for us and helped us become adults. Why do people these days think they can't hack it when their parents did? Did they come from a household of extended family or something and now they don't have it? What has changed

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Likely when you were dating, the kids and suburban life was some ideal mirage that seemed okay.

He’s older now, and has friends who have had kids and he knows the stories from the trenches: lack of sleep, whiney kids and teens, expensive daycare and activities, and the biggie: decline in sex because DW is wiped out caring for kids.

You waited to long, he knows what I really means to “have a baby” — it’s a lifetime of commitment and sacrifice.

He probably expects you to leave and he can date a younger model and repeat the cycle.

Op here. I am thinking this too. He doesn’t like to be inconvenienced and has a short discomfort tolerance and he is more curmudgeonly as he gets older.

I thought he would become more mature but it’s the opposite case here.

Or, he has become more mature and realizes his desires and limitations and is expressing them.

We need to stop it with the having kids is somehow the more mature or more adult decision, or that people who choose not to have kids are selfish narrative.

Flushing a decade of someone's top fertile years down the toilet because you suddenly became "more mature" is the definition of selfish.

This. OPs husband is a sick, selfish person. Declining fertility after 35 is a known, published, fact. So what her husband had done is vastly limit HER options in order to preserve his. Frankly this kind of abuse is the kind of thing which would make me not want to have a kid with him at all— what other sacrifices with your children be making to make sure he’s not inconvenienced.

To be clear, if he was saying this when she was 30 and giving her the option to pursue parenthood and a loving family elsewhere I would not feel this way. There is nothing wrong with not having children. There is everything wrong with leading someone on— even your spouse.

It doesn’t sound like you could comfortably do SMMC financially, but if you can, do that. Think long and hard before you make this man legally responsible for another human being.

Lol. It’s not abuse to have different goals and wants as your wife. Holy shit. Culture of victimhood has really jumped the shark.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Likely when you were dating, the kids and suburban life was some ideal mirage that seemed okay.

He’s older now, and has friends who have had kids and he knows the stories from the trenches: lack of sleep, whiney kids and teens, expensive daycare and activities, and the biggie: decline in sex because DW is wiped out caring for kids.

You waited to long, he knows what I really means to “have a baby” — it’s a lifetime of commitment and sacrifice.

He probably expects you to leave and he can date a younger model and repeat the cycle.

Op here. I am thinking this too. He doesn’t like to be inconvenienced and has a short discomfort tolerance and he is more curmudgeonly as he gets older.

I thought he would become more mature but it’s the opposite case here.

Or, he has become more mature and realizes his desires and limitations and is expressing them.

We need to stop it with the having kids is somehow the more mature or more adult decision, or that people who choose not to have kids are selfish narrative.

Flushing a decade of someone's top fertile years down the toilet because you suddenly became "more mature" is the definition of selfish.

This. OPs husband is a sick, selfish person. Declining fertility after 35 is a known, published, fact. So what her husband had done is vastly limit HER options in order to preserve his. Frankly this kind of abuse is the kind of thing which would make me not want to have a kid with him at all— what other sacrifices with your children be making to make sure he’s not inconvenienced.

To be clear, if he was saying this when she was 30 and giving her the option to pursue parenthood and a loving family elsewhere I would not feel this way. There is nothing wrong with not having children. There is everything wrong with leading someone on— even your spouse.

It doesn’t sound like you could comfortably do SMMC financially, but if you can, do that. Think long and hard before you make this man legally responsible for another human being.