If you’re an only child would you marry an only child or prefer to marry someone who has siblings?

[PurpleDisco]

A friend currently has this dilemma and due to a recent chat which was full of angst it has made me think. Due to having 4 siblings myself I never thought about how only children become only adults eventually. She’s luckily always had good friends. As a child during the school holidays she felt lonely due to living rurally. She’d sometimes go to sleepovers though and always felt sad leaving as they all had big families with brothers and sisters to play / fight with. This feeling has stayed with her through life and she always swore that when she settled down it would have to be with a man who has siblings. Both her parents are only children so she never had aunties, uncles or first cousins while growing up. She wanted and still does want aunties, uncles and cousins for her children as she feels she definitely missed out on a big part of life because of her ‘unusual’ family in her eyes. Tbh I don’t know anyone else who doesn’t have at least one aunt or uncle so is it unusual? She’s got fabulous parents who adore her btw.

I do feel sorry for her but she’s 34 now and has met the love of her life who is also an only with a similar childhood but he doesn’t feel as strongly as her about the whole thing. He’s happy and doesn’t feel he’s missed out on life growing up and points out not all families are big and happy where everyone loves being with each other. They both want children but she’s reluctant to go ahead with anything because of this big issue. Everything is perfect apart from this and there’s no guarantee she’d meet someone half as perfect if she ends the relationship. Do people really think about this in such detail or could she have been suffering from depression for so many years and not realised it?

All thoughts / feedback would be appreciated. Anyone in this type of relationship with kids and are happy and content?

Whilst I can see where your friend is coming from, I wouldn’t end a relationship over this.

You make your own family. Assume they would both like at least 2 children?

My DH is an only child while I have 2 quarrelsome sisters. He really doesn't get the dynamic sometimes - we can squabble in an empty room - but they're my family. It's a relationship that I can't explain. He's very well adjusted, more than I am sometimes but I think he's grateful he's an only child.

I don't think having siblings or not should affect your own relationship unless your family's utterly toxic.

I think it would be ridiculous to give up a life and a family with someone I loved on a pipe dream.
Firstly, she might not meet another ‘right person’ in time to have kids and secondly, having siblings doesn’t automatically mean great sibling relationships or that they will have children.
I have a brother, who is not going to have children with his partner (firm decision). My DH is one of three, his one sister is unlikely
at this stage to have kids (recently divorced and early 40s) and his other sister has two beautiful children but who are unfortunately severely disabled and non verbal - we love them very much but they don’t provide the typical close family relationship bond you’re talking about, and will never have children of their own. So she could be holding out for something she will not ever find, which feels like cutting off her nose spite her face,
personally.

Couldn’t tell you the last time I spoke to any of my cousins or aunties or uncles. A funeral or wedding most likely.

Last saw my sibling last year lol

There's play dates, holiday clubs, after school groups, where they can interact with different adults. Friends become more important, that's what I've seen and has been my experience - just be proactive and generous.

Honestly can't imagine this being a factor if I met someone I loved and wanted to spend my life with. I have a brother who lives abroad, barely speak and only see each other once every couple of years. My DH has two brothers, again they barely speak. One also lives abroad - will probably be 3 years between visits. The other has 2 kids and we see each other a few times a year. The cousins get on fine but honestly we have made our own 'family' by making friends with similar age kids where we live and spending loads of time together. The kids all get on as well as cousins would and I dont feel like they are missing out by hardly ever seeing their actual cousins

I'm an only child and it didn't occur to me at all. My partner does have a sibling but they don't have kids, so our child doesn't have any cousins (or siblings). They also live four hours away, so we see them maybe once or twice a year. I appreciate that some people might think that's cruel/mad, but it's just the way life worked out.

I do feel a bit guilty for not having another child, but there's absolutely no way I could have coped and the realistic age gap would have meant they'd be very different ages anyway. We have loads of close friends with children who we see regularly which I feel replaces the cousin relationship somewhat.

I have very little/no relationship with my cousins, we aren't a close family at all. (No drama, but they live far away and we don't have much in common other than grandparents who are no longer around.) Partner is the same, he has loads of cousins but could walk past most of them in the street and not know. Some of my friends are close to their siblings, but plenty of others have very difficult relationships or are completely estranged. There's absolutely no guarantee she'd have the close-knit family she seems to think she's missing out on.

She can of course have lots of children of her own, if a big family is what she wants.

I think if she’s met the love of her life it would be a real shame if this one factor stopped this. Even if you have siblings there is no guarantee that any of you would get on - or you may live far away. Families are made of all different sizes.

The more important thing is whether they both want children. Maybe your friend would like lots of possible so it would be best if the fiance is on board

Your friend should marry the man she loves regardless of his family situation.

However I do sympathise. I’m an only child of a single parent only child. I was determined not to have an only child myself (but two was enough!). DHs parents and sibling lives miles away and we only see them a couple of times a year. My mum has now passed so in terms of local family it’s just those under my roof. It is a bit sad, I do feel it.

I'm an only child and this is something I never even considered when dating, ironically my husband has 2 siblings that live nowhere near us so DS has met his cousins twice in 14 years.

My husband is an only. He wishes he had siblings and he adores my bigger family. I wish he had siblings too. But it didn’t stop me marrying him because I love him and he’s worth more than another man with siblings because he’s him.

I am an only child and had a fab childhood. It never occurred to me to consider the sibling status of my partner. DD is also an only child.

I've been with DH since my early 20's and he has a younger sister. For a number of reasons she hasn't had children so DD doesn't have cousins anyway.

I have a friend with 5 siblings. Only one of them has children so there's no guarantee that siblings will equal cousins.

A good, supportive life partner is more important than whether or not they have siblings.

My DS sees 2 out of his 10 plus cousins on his father’s side once a year, he’s never met the rest. I’m an only and he sees more of my family.

Same here. I’m an only and it never bothered me. In fact as a child I used to tell my mum she wasn’t allowed to have any more kids because I didn’t want to share anything. My mum has two brothers and I have a few cousins and I can count on one hand the number of times I saw them growing up. She isn’t close to her brothers and was the only one to move out of her hometown. My partner has a brother, but his brother is a strange guy who still lives with their parents and they don’t really have a relationship outside of when my partner visits his parents a few times a year. Having biological relatives doesn’t guarantee a close or enriching relationship with them. Friends are much more important to me

My preference would be siblings. To date I’ve only ever dated men with siblings. But if the person was the love of my life, it wouldn’t matter.

It would not even be in the top 500 things I would factor in when choosing a partner. It’s not something I would care about in the slightest.

She sounds terribly wet and rather self-pitying. That’s likely her issue, not being an only child. Surely her partner having a very different attitude to his childhood would suggest to her that her experience is just that — her experience?

And if she’s seriously considering dumping someone she genuinely loves because he can’t provide their future children with aunts and uncles, then she’s got serious issues.

If she does dump him to have children with someone else just because they have siblings, you can just imagine the outraged, whiny posts on here, incandescent with disbelief that her BIL or SIL are moving to NZ or the Outer Hebrides or are childfree cokehead clubbers who spend weekends sleeping it off, or are just not as involved in her children’s lives as she thinks they should be.

Not all families have this though. Mine certainly didn’t despite there being aunts, uncles and cousins on my mum’s side. I’ve personally never looked at that kind of family with any sort of envy, I wonder how much is a genuine desire to hang out together and how much is obligation and keeping up appearances.

She’s magnifying something of which she has absolutely no experience or knowledge into some huge, rosy, clannish deal.

I have four siblings. They are all childfree, so DS has no cousins at all on my side. DH is the baby of five, and his older siblings are so much older, and had their children so young that his youngest cousin is eighteen years older than him.