Depressed - husband doesn’t want another baby

[Adeline261]

I feel horribly depressed and low at the moment because I really yearn for another baby but my husband doesn’t. I understand I can’t change his mind and haven’t tried but I’m really struggling. We’ve already got two lovely boys almost 6 and 4. They’re a handful but great fun.
I just don’t know how to feel better. The word sad doesn’t cover it, I feel horrible every single day. I struggle being around my friends who are pregnant and hearing about larger families with 3 or 4 children physically pains me.
I came from a small insular family so I’ve always wanted a larger family. I thought I had outlined this to my husband when we met. Obviously not well enough.
What do I do?
Already in therapy

You could have a 3rd child and it could be another boy. It could have serious health issues. Why not be grateful for the 2 boys you have.

Also I am one of three and I absolutely hated it. I vowed if I had children I would only have 2.

This is absolute bollocks. I have two brothers who while I'm not close to them are close to my parents. My dad and his brother always remained close to their parents.My husband and his brother are VERY close to their parents, my lovely in-laws. We've had countless family holidays together and family occasions together and they are very involved grandparents.

My male cousin is close to his parents and they regularly help out with childcare and go away together as a family. My parents have friends who have sons and are all close. Me and my husband have friends and other male family members in our extended family who are still close with their parents and those that have kids are all involved.

It's only on mumsnet I see this narrative that boys ditch their mums and family when they get a wife. It very much doesn't happen in real life. I have two sons and I'm not even the slightest bit worried this happening.

Yes boys tend to go off more than girls. But that’s down to how you raise them as well.

If you have a genuinely good relationship, are not the type to be controlling or demanding are easy go with the flow. Not going to accuse the gf of stealing your baby away from you and don’t blame everything he ever does that you don’t like on her.

You’re likely to have a nice lovely normal family relationship with your son And his wife and children in the future.

Also don’t favour one child over the other because that’s a sure way to push one away as well.

Dh would spend much more time with his parents and us as a whole family if he felt there was space for us emotionally and time wise.

But his sibling takes it all so we are self sufficient in every way possible it means they don’t get many invites because we don’t want to invite 7 people we want to invite 2 but 2 will inform the others and now it’s bigger than a nice meal and our children enjoying their grandparents.

@Adeline261 - my lovely, nothing goes perfectly for any of us. And I know how unfair things can seem, especially when you see other people getting the things that you are yearning for, but can't have. I never managed to successfully breastfeed any of my dc, and I spent years beating myself up and considering myself a failure as a mum, because all my friends could breastfeed so easily and here I was, utterly unable to do the most basic thing and nourish my own child.

It contributed to postnatal depression, although I was already prone to clinical depression as a result of childhood bullying, and I have had a lot of therapy, and antidepressants, to get me to a stage where I realise that I did my best, and that I have raised three healthy, happy young men.

I think it is good that you are in therapy, and I hope that it helps you to come to terms with your situation as it is, and to be able to enjoy the life that you do have.

I went through similar but I just have one child. We always thought we would have a second but my DH changed his mind. I was so resentful when all my mum friends started to get pregnant with their second.

My way of making peace with it: understand that my DH is entitled to change his mind, he didn’t deceive me. Having smalls kids is different from the idea of having small kids - you only know how full on the experience can be when you go through it. Understand his reasons - I had to accept he was right in many points (no village support; two busy careers, with mine being the worst); a big health scare with our son when he was born that could be potentially linked to genetic causes so we would have to go through many checks etc; lack of time for things that were important for us individually and as a couple - we both were so busy pursuing our own interests before the kid.

He is a fantastic and hands on father to our son but I think he would have struggled mentally with another child. It became a non brainer decision after a while reflecting on his reasons.

YANBU to feel as you do, since it sounds like you always wanted a larger family, but your DH is NBU either and whether you made your wishes clear or not doesn't matter, because he's allowed change his mind.

Before we have DC we have no idea what it will really be like. When I met my DH he wanted two or three, but having had our first I had to persuade him to have our second - he'd have been perfectly happy to stick with one because it was so much harder work than he'd realised. Having a DC with a health issue or SEN makes a lot of people reassess what they know they can cope with too. It sounds like your DH has a very demanding job and adding another DC into the mix is maybe just a step too far for him.

But back to you - you clearly struggle with your MH and honestly OP I would be grateful for what you have. Have you always been a glass half empty person? You have so much to be grateful for! Practising gratitude sounds twee and like nauseating therapy speak, but it can really help to remember how fortunate you are. You have two wonderful DC so stop focusing on what you don't have and look at what you do.

So you do in fact want a girl so she'll be your companion when you're older? That's wrong on so many levels and you're clearly confusing modern reality with a Jane Austen novel. Concentrate on the lovely boys you have and don't spoil their precious childhoods with this obsession. You're looking for something, and I'm sorry about that, but another baby is not the answer.

It honestly doesn't sound like you're mentally stable enough to have another baby I think your husband is being sensible. You need to be putting the family you already have first and get yourself well for them. Unless you're exaggerating about having clinical depression flooding your body with hormones and sleep deprivation isn't going to help. I have bipolar so I obviously have periods of depression and I can barely look after the children I have let alone extras. If I had of been diagnosed prior to having children I wouldn't have had children as its selfish their lives are significantly disadvantaged due to my illness

The thing with babies is there is no compromise, you can’t have half a baby!

I was the other person in this scenario-DH wanted more, I absolutely did not. We did not have anymore because obviously that would have been quite stupid. DH made peace with it a few years ago as our youngest hit double figures and he now agrees it would have been chaotic and daft.

So much of your woes are about things you're imagining. You could just as easily imagine nice things or ideally try to live more in the moment instead of draining the fun out of that by conjuring up these worst case scenarios. There are ways to shift your thinking and to also listen to more positive influences. Just because there's some cliched bs pedalled about boys vs girls doesn't make it so for your children. Think of boys who live with their parents for life! Which isn't exactly preferable, but there's a whole spectrum between and you've zero idea how things will go because none of us know and all we can hope for is that our kids are happy and healthy.

Stop swallowing the crap other people talk about total unknowns and feeding your fears, and engage more fully in the children you have and in your own life and interests because you can't live through the DC anyhow, no matter how many you have. You needn't ever be alone if you cultivate other friendships and fulfilling pursuits instead of investing everything in offspring and not even being satisfied with that now when they are young and sweet and need your attention.

Anecdotally, i've always found that the mother / son bond is harder to break.

I understand your sadness - I love big families too but ultimately it needs two yeses to have children / more children.

I will say whenever the media / commentators bang on about birth rates and blaming women alone for it… I think that so many of the women I know, it’s not them who wanted to stop at the number they have. It’s their male partners.

so you want a girl who is going to live near you and have babies because that’s what you want her to do 🤦‍♀️

I have a friend with three girls who have all moved to abroad to Australia, New Zealand and America. None have children. You can’t base your choices off what you expect your children to do in the future.

don’t base your choices based off your expectations of gender roles

I always wanted 3 but as my husband already had a child, we stopped at 2 because of car size, house size etc and yes, I was sad about it for a while but now they're all teens or in their 20s and I can see that they all have a much better quality of life than if we'd stretched ourselves further financially. I can see that my career's much stronger and more advanced and interesting without the extra years of mat leave and part time work. We don't have loads of money but we'd have had even less with another person in the mix.

And that's what you've got to bear in mind that it's not just another baby. It's a baby who becomes a toddler, a school child, a teenager, a student, a young adult, and all those dramas and financial responsibilities along the way.

Is it the baby stage you miss? I see a fair few mums on here who yearn for that phase of parenthood.

The freedom comes much earlier when you stop after 2. I'm at that stage where only one child's left in high school doing GCSEs, they're all so much more independent. There's still a lot of parenting to do, it's just different.

What are your husband's reasons for stopping at 2? Have you discussed them or is it just a straight out no?

It's something to talk with your therapist about but it's also something that needs to be a shared decision with you and your husband.

Honey, nothing goes perfectly for ANYONE ever. Get off social media.

More therapy x

I have an only child, a son, and totally get your fears. However I am someone who left for uni and lived hundreds of miles away from family, and I was so happy, so I know my son if he chooses that path of independence will most likely be too.

We can't curate our lives to that degree. My mum has 2 daughters and we both buggered off at 18, one of us doesn't get along with her. I have friends with adult sons who have lovely close relationships. As you've seen when plans don't. Work out as expected (I know exactly how you feel in that regard! ) do trying to imagine how a third child may solve this or that may not be the case. It might put stress on your marriage for one.

Nothing goes perfectly for anyone and insisting on having everything exactly as you want is a recipe for misery. It's painful to be longing for a baby you can't have, but the obvious alternative is breaking up your existing children's home on the chance that you might have one later. Would that count as a perfect outcome?

I'm a single mum of one, that wasn't what I ever imagined but I work hard to appreciate what I have rather than envying others (I could envy you, with your happy marriage and lovely family of four, as would many).

I think it's also a socially and environmentally responsible thing to do to stop at 2 given the already massive strain on planetary resources/climate change etc, rather than doubling yourselves IYSWIM. Perhaps you could think about that as well?

Be grateful for what you have ( two healthy kids ) rather than what you don’t have

you have 2 choices stay
leave - try and have another baby with someone else

I'm sorry, OP. It doesn't seem fair that a husband (as it so often is) can just change his mind about having a larger family after seeming in favour of that (if he did seem happy with having three), and the wife just has to take that reversal and massive disappointment with a sweet smile or she's being unreasonable.

Realistically, your best option is to focus on your boys and the very real benefits of only having two, but that feeling of being backed into a corner by your husband and forced to accept something you really don't want, must be so hard. Perhaps couple's counselling would help your relationship?

You already think your 4 year old is going to move abroad when he is an adult?

You are spiralling and will waste their childhoods worrying about the future

Agree wholeheartedly with this. I grew up as one of four. My parents (despite being extremely wealthy therefore able to give us anything we wanted) just couldn’t cope. I don’t think anyone could. I just got forgotten about.

I do think anyone with 3+ is selfish.

My DH was the same I wanted 3 kids he said he didn’t want any more after 2. I am 52 now and am so glad he didn’t want any more, the cost, the reduction in experiences we would have been able to give them, bigger car etc… plus my DD has been in MH services for 5 years and her behaviour has almost lost us our marriage. I couldn’t have coped with 3 and I know my case is extreme but many of my friends are also finding parenting teenagers/ young adults really tough.

I think you need to reframe your situation someone told you boys leave their mothers and you will be lonely!! They all leave and you build a new life around you and your DH. My DS is still with us travelling the world, coming home inbetween- you have at least 14 more years before your youngest goes to uni (if he does)!! why on earth are you thinking that far ahead!!

I have 2 but wanted four as there is only me and my brother and there is 11 years between us and we have a superficial relationship. Now mine are 21 and 26 I'm glad I only had two. They never went without anything, both were able to learn to drive, both attended (and still is for ds21) university. Bloody hell the expense once they reach their teen years can't be under estimated!

You have two healthy happy children. Your husband doesn't not want any more and that's his right. Keep up with the therapy or find a new therapist.