To think that the person who DOESNT want any more kids is the one breaking up the relationship?

[laptopstanley]

This is hypothetical because I’m not really going to leave my husband over it (though I am angry and sad).
When we first got together we talked about how many kids we wanted. Him; one or none, me; four or five. We sort of settled on three.
fast forward and we now have two. Youngest is now 6. He was very clear he didn’t want more and got a vasectomy after second. I was postpartum and felt I couldn’t really push him not to.
Now I feel resentful toward him and wish we could have more.
I keep seeing these husbands everywhere who are lead by their wives on how many kids or are the ones wanting loads of kids.
We talked again and I said he’d be the one breaking up the family if he decided he would rather not be together than have another baby, he said it would be me leaving and breaking up the family if it was a deal breaker.
has anyone had to accept they will never have another baby?

You wanted four/5 so you settled on three. He wanted one or none. Which one of you would be getting something much much closer to what they actually want? Two is a fair compromise between zero/1 and 4-5. Who even has enough money to have five kids?! Only literally multi millionaires I'd think.

Many people can't have any or have kids with profound disabilities. You should be grateful for what you have.

Having less kids than you want but still having some is much better as a position than having multiple children you do not want. That's simply not fair on the children or the unwilling parent. And it's dreadful to produce children knowing you do not wish to have them.

I have two children. I wanted a third. DH didn’t. I listened and accepted. There was no blame to be laid.
If I had decided to leave to possibly have a third with someone else it would absolutely have been me breaking up the marriage.

I would have wanted more than two and would have been upset if Dh said no, so I do sympathise. I got very lucky and had twins on my second pg so the conversation never arose. If your vision is of a large family then it's hard to move on from that. Considering you met a man who wanted one or zero I think you've done well to have two. As for your AIBU I don't think it really is one person or another who ends the relationship. The real issue is the decision prioritise your wants above the relationship. This is understandable if you are a couple without children when one wants them and one doesn't but it's madness even hypothetically to break up a family because it's not the exact family you want. Life doesn't always go to plan. I know many men let the women decide on the kids but many men also let the women do all the child rearing. If you are a woman insisting on another without a partners support then you are foolish because that could be a lifetime of no support and disintegration of a relationship.

Please bear in mind that if you leave your husband you won’t be seeing your existing kids half the time, will be on a reduced income and will have to get used to seeing another woman getting involved in your kids lives, and potentially deal with another man trying to poke his nose in raising your kids.
Your kids will have 2 homes. You may have to sell your current home and they will be carting clothes and school work between 2 homes. You will have to share Christmas and other events.
Unless you actively really dislike your husband and want to leave him anyway, make the most of what you have.

I tend to think 2 children is enough for anyone tbh!

I planned to have 2 or 3 children close in age. Husband was similar agreement.

First pregnancy was horrific, awful sickness and then followed with post natal depression. Was hard for us both and us much as I wanted them close together he was not happy to put me and us through it again. We eventually had our second 6 years later (sadly sickness returned)

I would have loved more or closer together but my husband didn’t want to put our family at risk - I will always wander about that 3rd. Now they all older with uni costs etc I’m quite glad we have an age gap and stuck to 2!

I think he has been honest with you from the start, you need to decide if your family is what you want as is, if your unhappy that’s your choice.

God you sound awful! Leave the poor man alone.

You can’t force him to have another baby if that’s not what he wants.

It's not a fault thing. You both went into the marriage and into parenthood of the 2 DC you have, knowing that you both wanted different things. That's equally on both of you.

You can only decide for yourself - do you want the family you have more, or the possibility of more children more, with your existing family looking different?

You can't decide for your DH, and likewise, he doesn't have the power/right to stop you from leaving if that's genuinely what you want. It's not his decision of no more children, or your decision that you can't live without the possibility of more children which would "break up the family", but your mutual incompatibility.

Stop blaming each other and feeling resentful, figure out what you each actually want and work out a way forward. Maybe relationship counselling would be helpful?

For example, maybe DH would feel open to another DC in a few years' time, with a larger gap - you could look at a long acting contraception yourself (or vasectomy reversal). Perhaps you would get the busy home/big family feel you want by pursuing a career where you work closely with children over several years, developing relationships with them, or by pursuing close relationships with cousins or DC's friends and inviting them round frequently so it feels almost like a "second home". Perhaps (if DH on board) you could look into short term fostering or hosting students or childminding, if it's more that you like the idea of a "full house". Perhaps pets could fill a similar sort of role. Maybe you could co-parent amicably but have further DC by IVF and sperm donation.

Thought experiment: How would DH feel if you stayed together and did not TTC but got pregnant accidentally? How would you feel if you split up and you never meet anybody else/never end up having more DC?

Yes, some of these suggestions are bizarre or extreme or probably don't work, it's just ideas to mull over and really think through the whole scenario.

He was upfront with you right from the start. You assumed you could convince him to change his mind. He's already got one more child than he initially thought he wanted!

Also, "sort of settling on 3" means nothing. Me and DH both thought we wanted to have 4 or 5 kids - before we actually had them, and fully experienced how much work and energy they entail (rather than just hearing about it second hand), and decided two was plenty.

I understand it's tough for you to not have as many children as you wanted, but at the end of the day, you married a man who said he might not even want any children at all! So if we're talking about who is being unreasonable, I'm afraid it's you.

You were daft to think someone who wanted 0-1 children would have wanted 3 children, children are not something you can compromise on. No one is breaking up the family, you both got yourselves in too deep when you clearly wanted different things. You are both responsible.

You may resent him and break the relationship up that way, or you have more children than he wants (like frankly happens a lot) and he doesn’t like it and leaves. The most mature thing to do is to accept that the maximum number for either parent has to be the maximum number full stop, you can’t negotiate up.

Hasn’t every woman with any children had to accept at some point that there will be no more? It is part of life. It may be bittersweet but it isn’t the end of the world.

It’s been over 6 years since you birthed your last child. I have to say it’s very assumptious of you to speak about breaking up your existing family when you have no guarantee you can even get pregnant or deliver another baby.

Let’s say hypothetically you do leave, the chances of you meeting someone immediately or within a few months are low. Because with respect, and this will be a bitter pill to swallow but I’m just being realistic, your market value in the dating scene will have dropped. It won’t be like when you were dating your DH. You’ll be older, divorced with 2 kids. Men have their pick nowadays with all the dating apps, people have become much more disposable in dating. You could meet someone relatively soon, I guess it depends on how high (or low) you bar is. So let’s say again hypothetically you meet someone after a year of leaving, the average time span from point of meeting to a planned pregnancy is 3 years. That will be putting you 10 years from your last pregnancy. Again, very confident and highly assumptious of you.

You don’t mention any other strains in your marriage, just your resentment to your husband for not giving you what you want. If he is otherwise a good man, this is a you problem, this is not his. Go to therapy, take up a new hobby, you’re a person not just a baby making machine. There are other sources of happiness and joy in life. Don’t break up yore family, it’s not fair to your existing children.

It would be you breaking up the family. Imagine tearing apart the family of the two children you already have in a quest to find a man willing to get you pregnant. That would be insane.

The fact that you're angry and sad by the reality you're now facing doesn't mean your husband is in the wrong. No one should ever be forced to have a child they don't want. This fundamental right trumps your desire for a third.

You need to manage your attitude. Be happy that you have two healthy children and an unbroken family to raise them in. It's more than a lot of people get. Her thankful for what you do have rather than resentful over what you wanted but can't have. We all have to come to terms with this sooner or later.

It doesn't matter though does it? This is just point-scoring and assigning blame. The outcome is still the same regardless - a family who are no longer together.
Nobody is legally obligated to have the number of children they thought they might have 15 years ago. People change, circumstances change and, may I remind you, your husband wanted at best 1 child. He already over-achieved.
No, it's not right that other men you know are being blackmailed led by the women. They are not sperm donors, they are human beings with their own needs, wants and desires. Having said that, sperm donors are available to you should you wish to end the relationship in order to have more children.

Neither one is breaking the relationship. They both have equal rights to their own views. It’s not a blame issue.

Of course it’s the person who wants more and decides to leave because of it. I have one and I am done. If I could get sterilised I would. DH is in agreement but even if he wasn’t I wouldn’t just breed myself so I’m not accused of breaking up our family.

I’d tell him to be happy and content with what we have. If he wanted to leave then it would be him breaking up the family, not me. He would also be walking into the unknown. There’s no guarantee that he would even meet someone else and have any more kids. Also what message does that send to the children you already have? Sorry you weren’t enough so I broke up our family to potentially never have more kids. Now you have two homes, two step parents and I only see you 50% of the time.

It sounds like you were a big mismatch to begin with though OP. Wanting one child compared to 5 is a huge difference.

No child should ever be born to a parent that doesn’t want them. You married someone who it sounds like didn’t really want a family at all and are now surprised he won’t get on board with having 3/4/5 kids?
You’ve dodged a bullet in imo - as well as the crippling costs of teenagers, every large sibling groups I know has at least one sibling who is no or low contact, and none of them except one has had more than two kids themselves, the one with more has 5 but they are all adopted…

I wanted 3 kids, husband agreed. I ended up needing ivf and had a haemorrhage during my c-section. My husband was terrified he was going to lose me. He didn’t want to take any risks with any future pregnancy so we are one and done. And that’s ok.

I also put in a similar thread that if a parent is willing to prioritise their desire over a hypothetical child over the stability and needs of their existing children and break up a family over this, I would question whether said person is actually mature enough to be having a baby anyway.

It doesn't really sound like you agreed to 3 - you knew he was on the fence, he told you he was done, and you have a lovely family of 4 people. I really do appreciate how difficult it can be when things don't go exactly as you want, but marrying someone who wants 1-2 kids and being surprised that he wants... 1-2 kids seems a bit confusing. If a larger family was a priority it wasn't a great decision as you can't exactly compromise on children, they all deserve to be wanted by both parents.

I wanted 4 originally and my husband wanted 2. We agreed - clearly - to try for 2 and then see how we both felt. It ended up taking years with infertility and miscarriages to have our 2 beautiful kids. He was super, super done after that and I accepted I needed to prioritise my health (I ended up with a few issues after my son's birth and am still struggling 10 years on). Of course I was a bit sad as my image of 'family' was a bit different, but there are a lot of good things about having 2 wanted and intensely loved kids we can afford to send to Uni as well.

It’s impossible to know how many children you want before you are even a parent. Every child should be wanted by both of their parents and you can’t force someone to have a child they don’t want. If he doesn’t want another, he doesn’t want another. You can accept that or choose to leave him and try to find someone else who wants more children.

I totally agree with this.

You have two beautiful children. Spend and enjoy your time and energy on what you do have, rather than thinking of wanting more.
I think it would be absolutely wrong to split up over this.
If everything else is fine in your relationship, you have love, respect and a lovely home, then why throw this away. You would be spoiling a stable environment for your 2 children.
This way you can also spend financially more on the 2 children.
I think it is good that your husband is being honest about his feelings, rather than just letting you have children and than not be interested in their upbringing.

I say that because I wanted children my husband was like yeah go ahead and then he wasn't interested in helping or spending time with them. We had no family holidays and no fun time.

You will thank him when they are 18 and 20 and you are perimenopausal and the hormonal baby fever has abated
This is exactly what happened to me. I went from wanting another baby so desperately nothing else matter to being so grateful it didn't happen, I could have cried!

You have both compromised, you have less children than you wanted, he has more. I think that given the difference in wants, you were both pretty foolish to pursue the relationship in the first place - you made the effort to ask the question, then ignored the answers and ploughed on regardless. Considering he ideally didn't want children, I suppose he is making the bigger 'sacrifice' although to be honest the only losers are the children. He didn't want them, and for you they are not enough. Don't add to the misery by breaking up the family.