Me and my partner have minor/ moderate learning disabilities. Should we have children?

[Benny91]

As I feel it wouldn’t be right to have any?

Do you know anyone with a learning disability that has children? As I find it quite rare with our disabilities to have children!

We are both 33

So our life situation is: jobs; me Bus Driver, her Nursery Nurse. Combined salary is £65,000. We both drive, although she drives an automatic car. We both bought a 2 bed house.

We both just get confused with certain things that’s all. My girlfriend gets confused more with stuff than I do. But she’s really good with looking after kids at work though!

For what it's worth I don't think that you need to be conventionally intelligent to raise happy children. You need to have stamina and the ability to cope in a variety of difficult situations though.

You asked for opinions giving very vague information and you got them.
There is a whole range of disabilities. Someone who can live independently, work, do things for themselves is different from someone who will be dependent on others for everything, passing on their condition and being supported by others for life.

My grandmother had learning needs (could barely read or write). She married my grandfather, a labourer, and their two children went to grammar school in the 1950s and became a teacher and a GP. I always think of them when I see queries like this. For obvious reasons I’m glad my grandparents didn’t decide against children. Although reliable contraceptives didn’t exist when they married in 1940 of course, so maybe no “decision” was made.

So my view is that if you can offer a child a solid home life, opportunities to develop their interests, and lots of love, then go for it. I’d say that to anyone, not just you.

You can’t find MN that ableist, you post variations on this theme on a regular basis and nothing ever seems to change.

Excellent post. More people need to to consider their capabilities and their relationships before they have children.

Just read some of the disasters on MN and these are fully functional individuals without disabilities. Apparently anyway.

@Benny91 "minor learning disabilities" is too vague?
How "minor" do you mean?
You clearly know how to join an online forum and create a post so you have reading/writing and technology knowledge.
I was at school with a girl with "learning disability".
I don't know what her actual disability was - probably severe dyslexia. She struggled with reading and writing and had a 1 to 1 teaching assistant.
But everything else she was "normal" (sorry that's an awful way to put it but I hope you understand what I mean).
She went on to have several children. She could look after them perfectly fine.
I have worked with several people with "minor learning disabilities" too in ordinary regular jobs.

Great reply’s here, I would say no. I have severe endometriosis live alternating surgery’s and was told I couldnt have children so when I did fall pregnant I lived was in fear of having a girl and potentially passing this on, luckily I had a DS. But aside for the accidental pregnancy I had zero plans of having children risking them having to be in pain like me.

You need to consider what you want in life and what it would be like having children. If you want children but may need some extra support then you could start having conversations with your GP/social worker about what's involved and what support you might need. You also need to consider the genetic aspect and what has caused your learning difficulties. If it's a syndrome caused by missing or extra genes there may be a risk of transmission so you need some genetic counselling too. I would start by reaching out to your GP and take it from there.

@Benny91 if you can raise a child in a stable and happy home then YES! Don't let anyone tell you you should't

Completely depends on the learning disability. “Mild” and “moderate” cover an extremely broad range…

It depends what the learning disability is. If it's just a low IQ, then I'd go for it. My DM has learning difficulties, as in, a low IQ, my Dad maybe average IQ. By the time I was 7 I'd surpassed both of them in reading and maths. I'd say my Mum's reading age is that of maybe a 9 year old? However, my DM has tons of common sense, and is brilliant with kids. - she worked as a childminder for 35 years. She was, and still is, a brilliant Mum. The only thing she couldn't do was fill in the tax return, but my Dad could (just about) do that.
And, guess what? I turned out to be really clever - I have a Ph.D. in a STEM subject and work in tech. I've done very well for myself. I mix with a lot of clever, middle class people, and my DM has the most common sense out of any of them. And yes, the way cleverer people look down on the not-so-clever is shocking.
IQ is just like height - lots of genes affect it, as well as environmental factors, so it's perfectly possible for 2 short people to have a tall child and vice versa. So unless you know you have a single gene anomaly, and there is a high chance it would be passed on, then I'd go for it.

You've both got jobs that require specific training that you have obviously passed or you wouldn't have the jobs.
You've bought a house so you can obviously handle finances.
I don't see the problem with you having children personally.

How long have you been together? Does your partner want children? Do you have family and friends who will be there to support with advice, babysitting, practical help?

how does your LD affect you day to day? And your partner?

you earn well between you, but would one of you become a stay at home parent or would you juggle 2 jobs and childcare?

all of these are questions most people consider when deciding as a couple whether or not to try for a baby.

We both just get confused with certain things that’s all.

It depends on the severity of the consequences. How would that impact the care of a newborn and the raising of a child? Would there be safety concerns?

Depends on the learning disability, I have Autism and 2 DDs, normal IQ, married, home owner etc. From the outside a typical normal family.
But its been incredibly hard, ive spent many a night after the have gone to bed, crying and exusted, yet I have to turn up the next day and do it again, I spend nights in the hospital with them when there unwell, looked after them when I'm unwell and no support available. Home educated during lockdown, school meeting, sibling rivalry, forms and paperwork, behaviour challenges you name it, this is common to all parents not just me, but having Autism is both a blessing and a curse with raising DDs.
I've have to find a lot of self coping strategies, for days when I'm burned out ect, yes husband helps a lot but he works full-time.
Not to sound negative we also have lots of fun, happy times to balance it out.
But you have to think how will you manage your disability with the reality and the tough parts of raising kids.

Then of course you can bring up children, perhaps with a bit of help with things that confuse you. Whyever not?

Well that sounds pretty capable and financially better off than many. What about if one of you was at home with the kids rather than earning? Could you still afford all your bills?

What kind of thing do you get confused with? Is it admin, forms and websites etc, or could it include safety risks like cooking ?

My eldest DS has severe ADHD and his partner has severe anxiety. They have decided not to have DC as they acknowledge they have times when they struggle to cope with themselves. He makes a great fun uncle though to his friends DC.

Oh you'll be absolutely fine!

She'll have a better idea than most new parents about how to care for a little one!

With regards to getting things muddled sometimes, I'd just make sure that your health visitor, future schools etc know the best ways to communicate with you and share information.

You've both got a lot of responsibility and trust at your jobs, you've got a very decent shared income, you've got a home. That sounds like a really strong start to family life.

Children need love, safety, care, routine, support, play, joy and you can give them all of that. It's still OK to ask for support, advice and help but I think you're in a happier and more stable place than a lot of the people who post on mumsnet.

What sort of things do you get confused with?

Looking after children at work is completely different from being responsible for them 24/7.

Haven't you posted about this before, it sounds very familiar?

The last thread like this I saw was very different as it was a couple that were both unable to work and just volunteered a bit. My response to that was very different as obviously you can't have a baby and just volunteer to look after it for 2 hours a week.

Respectfully, @Benny91 — I remember at least some of your previous posts, which were all about feeling a failure in life because you’re a bus driver, not having any friends, feeling ‘behind on life’, asking what would make a man a ‘failure’, struggling financially. It doesn’t sound as if you’re in a financial position to have a child, regardless of your learning difficulties. But I agree with pps. Lots of things to consider, like whether there’s a genetic component to you and your partner’s learning difficulties, whether you would be able to meet the needs of a more severely disabled child, finances etc.

I would have voted No based on your OP but I filtered and read your later posts. You both sound like fully functioning members of society based your jobs (and the eloquent nature of your posts) and on that basis I can't see that it would be unfair on any future children to bring them into the world. I don't want to undermine your disabilities and I'm sure you have overcome barriers to get where you are, but I find it hard to believe that your disabilities would be that bad to do the jobs that you do and write as well as you have done. So I'm actually a bit sceptical of this post and I don't believe you know how poor the written language skills of people even without a diagnosed disability can be. Haven't read any other answers so I'm intrigued to see how my response looks against others, which I'm off to read now