Leaving number of DC to chance

[ItWasThePenguins]

I'd love to have a large family. Whilst I am not a practising Christian i have always considered myself one. I'm not sure what I think of God 'having a plan' for us etc,, but I do think that whatever decisions you make, it can't be wrong. You make the best of what you have, be thankfull for what you have, follow your heart etc.

I would really love to have lots of children, and close together.
We have DS 20months, and ttc#2 (delayed due to severe pnd - annoyed at myself, but I only recently learnt to believe in myself and felt competant as a mother).
I'm only 20, DH is older, so there is plenty of time for lots of DC.
How do I approach talking to DH about leaving it to chance after having DC2? Ie, dtd when we feel like it without any conraception at all. (TMI - we usually chose to do 'other things' rather than 'that'.)


Sorry this is really garbled. Basically -

• Do you think it's a good idea to leave it to chance.
  
• How do I talk to DH about this.

[ItWasThePenguins]

also, got pg first cycle with DS, on 2nd cycle ttc atm, always get pg very quickly, as did mum, nan etc.

[rubyslippers]

Personally no I don't think you should leave it to chance - these are children you are talking about

Real people who need taking care of and nurturing

I think you should have a sensible discussion wiht your husband abut children and how many you BOTH want

[MrsMeaner]

We believe that God provides, and he gave us five children :)

I think you have to take a bit of responsibility in terms of financing. God will give you the strength to cope with all your children.

[ItWasThePenguins]

I've always said I wanted at least 5, close together. And DH loves children and has always said he's happy with whatever I want, we've talked about having 4/5 before and that's fine. It's just the leaving the age gap to chance mostly.

[AKissIsNotAContract]

It's up to you and your DH if you want to do this. Do you hope to be like the Duggars? I think it would be irresponsible to do this unless you are fairly wealthy, especially with the introduction of the benefits cap at 26k. It would be a pretty miserable existence for 10+ kids growing up poor. But ultimately it's between you and your DH and no one else's business.

[joanofarchitrave]

I think talking about how many children you'd both like would be an easy start to the conversation. If he feels the same as you about wanting a large family, you need to spell out that to you, having 15 or 20 would be fine with very little gap between them (or whatever you feel). It's worth being sure that if he says he wants a large family, he doesn't mean three or four.

Then you could say that you don't want to use contraception for the foreseeable future. It's up to him then.

[AKissIsNotAContract]

Ah x-post, you only want 5. If you plan to stop at 5 and don't want to use contraception will you just stop having sex when you get to 5? If you're only 20 then that could happen by the time you are 30! No sex from 30 onwards might be difficult.

[Firawla]

You could do this but reassess the situation after every child though..
why not just continue with your ttc for now then see how you feel after that one is born, if you want another one straight away then go for it, but you dont need to decide your whole life plan now

[EdithWeston]

You need to talk to your DH about what you want your family life to look like and how many children you and he would like (maybe a specific number, or generally in terms of lots or two maybe three, or 2/3 then let's have another think about it). Then it should be easy to decide if you are going to plan the spacing (and how) or if you'll just do nothing to prevent their arrival and see what happens.

[ReallyTired]

I have a friend who has allowed God to plan her family. (She has nine kids!) She uses extended breastfeeding to space her children. Extended breastfeeding is part of God led family planning. My friends has about 2 and half years between children.

You are young and you have plenty of time for more children.

[ItWasThePenguins]

Well I don't only want 5, but I've always had that figure in my mind, IYKWIM, I'd like at least that.
Atm we have 4 double bed house, plenty of room, managed to save £10k in just less than a year, and without scrimping too much, so I think we could cope with several more, (and DH looking at promotion atm, has become indispensable over last 6-8months at the company, has national managers and high up in head office people calling/emailing every few days, and calling back to thank him etc).

I have nothing against contraception, was on coil until few months ago.

Thanks

[ItWasThePenguins]

Sorry, x-posting...

[littleducks]

I'm with Firawla, you can 'leave it to chance' and reassess between children, as your feelings may change. I also had my kids at that kind of age. I originally wanted lots (well 4 or 5 not 15!) but am on a 'break' that may or may not be permanent, i havent decided, after only two!

I don't see any problems with having a relaxed attitude to conceiving, to me it feels more comfortable than planning and ovulation testing etc.

[ShellyBobbs]

As others have said, you may feel differently after you have had a few. I had 3 in 4 years and due to them all being so young I knew that for me, anymore at that time would have been completely selfish as I was just managing 'quality time' with them all (school work with eldest, nursery stuff with DS etc). I think anymore AT THAT TIME would have tipped the balance and the others would have missed out.

It's a very personal decision and one that you can only make when you have more children around you, you will know what is right for you.

Good luck.

[sashh]

Shouldn't you have discussed this before you got married?

[lisaro]

Can I ask what you mean by "always get pregnant quickly"? It sounds like there have been more. Are you trying (maybe subconsciously) to replace a child?

[ginmakesitallok]

Isn't getting pregnant always just "down to chance"????

[nooka]

It seems a little premature to be thinking about having five children when you've not yet conceived your second, and especially when you had severe PND first time around. I'd wait until your second child is born and see how you feel as a family at that point. If all goes well and you both are happy with the idea of having more children then that's the point to start talking about gaps. You are pretty young as far as mothers go, so there isn't any great hurry (you have potentially 25 more years of childbearing ahead).

[WasabiTillyMinto]

follow your heart sorry but i think you should follow your head. your heart is just what you want.

you & DH need to provide for these children for 18 years.

[BerylStreep]

I was one of 5 children, and although it is nice now that we are all grown up to have a choice of siblings to chat to, when I was growing up it was far from a bed of roses. My Mum gave advice to my older sister not to have too many children because in her words 'there is only so much time and love to go round'.

I also think the world is over-populated enough, so with my own family, we stopped at 2.

What is it about wanting a large family that attracts you to it? Do you actively want lots of children (exactly why?), or is it that you believe in God's will, or teachings about contraception?

Good luck TTC2.

[HumilityYetStrength]

I believe in God's will myself but I don't close my eyes when driving!

Children are a blessing from God but the truth is that everyone has some choice. You can't plan them to order but you can aim for approx 2, 5 or 15.

In some large families, it's the older DCs who do much of the parenting. Another way of saying that a large family is very different from a small one.

Finally, if you have 10 children by 40, would you want 100 grandchildren by 80, and 1000 greatgrandchildren born from your 60th to 120th birthday?? What will be your relationship with each one? Will they even know you? Your and your DH's free choice but do keep thinking it through to go into this with your eyes open.

[Graciescotland]

DH and I are leaving it down to "chance", we're older than you I'm about to be 33 and currently 30 weeks pregnant with no.2 so our window is obviously a lot smaller.

We're also what I'd consider to be very financially secure so if we have five kids we'll still be able to have a really high standard of living. If there was the prospect of being reliant on benefits I think it'd be selfish to have lots of kids especially given the current government/ economic climate.

I say that as someone who grew up on a housing estate with a single parent who was on benefits, there were three of us and it was tough, I think the cost of living makes it even tougher for families today.

[Crinkle77]

You also need to consider if you would be able to cope with having lots of children very close together as it will be hard work.

[AMumInScotland]

I think that when you're still getting past pnd and ttc#2 is a bit soon to be sure you want large numbers of children and small age gaps. Do chat to DH about how you'd like to have more, and about what you'd like to do about contraception once #2 has arrived, but don't get too hung up about this being the "right thing" for you to do at this stage. Your views may change once you have two small children to look after, or they might not.

Leaving things to chance isn't fundamentally either a "good" thing or a "bad" thing, but you need to think through the implications before deciding to leave it to chance, and to make sure that DH is comfortable with it. He may have always said he's happy for you to choose, but if he's watched you suffer with PND then he may have his own worries about the effect of having lots of children right away.