To dislike the phrase 'our family is complete'

Theoretically anyone who has twins has one 'unwanted' child!

i presume the phrase just means a couple isn't planning another and it stops invasive questions. I don't think it reflects anything negative if they do in fact go on to have another. Unwanted at the time of planning does not mean the child isn't loved and adored when born. Also circumstances and wants can change over time.

If all the things to claim to have an opinion on!

When my marriage ended, I had people telling me I'd want a third eventually. I used to tell them that nothing would convince me to have another child, not even pregnancy.

I didn't want a third. And that is fine. It would have been unwanted which is why I never had a third 🤷🏻‍♀️

Why do you think we care?

if people want to say their family is complete, it doesn't affect you.

Whatever discomfort you are feeling about your family set up to cause this reaction is yours to deal with. Dont put that on other people's shoulders

I kind of get what you mean. When people already have a child/children, I always think it sounds a bit harsh to the older kids, like they weren’t enough to complete them. But I know that’s not what’s meant by it.

A friend of mine has used this term a few times on social media. After her first it was “you complete me and your dad”, then after the second it was “you complete our family even more than we thought possible” and the same after the third and fourth. I bet she wishes she never started saying it now😅

When I had my third child I had the strong feeling that our family was now complete and I am sure I said so to a few people. I would have aborted subsequent pregnancies had they happened as any more children would indeed have been unwanted. I got sterilised. Because my family is complete.

A useful phrase to ward off people asking if you're having another!

There's nothing wrong with saying an additional child would be unwanted. The child doesn't exist.

This. I typically see this phrase used to tell off busy bodies who think everyone should breed more, regardless of how many children people have.

The only post I have ever seen it on was one where someone I know was desperate for a girl and, after having two boys, 'surprisingly an unexpectedly' became pregnant with the girl she so desperately had wanted and her husband used the phrase when posting about her birth (I think he was actually making the point to his wife at the time).

I said it after having one child. No way I was going through that again 😂

Our family was complete after one child. A second would have been unwanted and we took measures to make sure a second did not materialize. we knew we only had the resources for one child.

What is wrong with not wanting more children?

How can anyone look at a family who feel ‘whole’ and complete and content and make that into something you personally dislike? What does another person’s family and how they feel about it, even have to do with anyone else? Is it because it implies they are happy with their lot? Woe betide.
There are so many things in the world to have negative thoughts and opinions about ffs. Pick one of them to seeth at.

Yeah, this would be my assumption.

Agree it’s generally to ward off annoying comments about more children, especially if you’ve got 2 or 3 of one gender and don’t want the ‘are you going to try for a girl/a little boy’

Or a friend who recently put it when announcing her DDs birth, she has one son who is twelve (she had him very young) and was fed up with people suggesting she would need to have another close in age.

Never move to Turkey. They have women named ‘Yeter’ there, which means ‘Enough’. It’s traditionally the name given to the family’s last child, implying a wish for no more children.

I said it just to shut people up when they started banging on about "giving" DD a sibling.1 was enough for me.

I said it. For us, two dc - one boy, one girl - and me being 38 years old, we knew it was complete and didn't want to be asked if we were having more.

I also dislike the “this is the one who made me a mum” and “this is the one who completed our family

Although, just to add a thought, I have heard it said in relation to having one of each, and this I completely disagree with and very condescending. Do people who use it in this way think that if you ‘only’ have kids of the same sex, that your family is incomplete??

I remember feeling very much that our family was complete after having our 3rd baby. My sister and my best friend felt the same after their second. Their feeling of what a ‘complete family’ looks like is unique to them, just as mine is to me. I also feel like this is a complete non-issue!

I used it, along with a breezy “one and done!” to stop people asking about a second child. Which I desperately wanted to have but couldn’t.

I see it constantly on social media when someone has had their second child and find it quite smug. Also implies that a 3rd child would be unwanted,

And there's nothing wrong with saying that unless of course they have a 3rd child 😂 Like if they shared a throwback of when it was just them with the 2 kids and said 'ah, back when the family was complete'

I'm just saying I dislike it

Yeah it’s a stupid social media phrase used by people who live their lives on Instagram and Facebook. They are the people who also post photos of their kids together with a caption saying “My 🌍”. Cringe.

Don't use it then.

It’s a little cringeworthy, but then a lot of the stuff people say is borderline cringe/idiotic.