Query for a moral dilemma

[JoeCollins]

Preface: I've known this girl since we were in college. Over 10 years, and we've kept in touch on again, off again. Never in a "relationship" other than friendship where the most physical thing we've done is flag football.

My friend and I were having coffee today. She married a guy two years ago who already had a child. After that child, he didn't want any more kids, not at all. He was, to say the least, very up front about this. This was a bit of a running joke at the wedding, not because he didn't want any more, but because she didn't want ANY and here she was inheriting one. Fast forward now, and he's talking to her about getting a vasectomy. They don't want kids, and this way she wouldn't have to take hormonal birth control, she just has to live without fun for a few weeks. She agreed to this, but is having him plan it for the fall. They're big outside people (camping, et al) and this way they don't miss out on their usual outdoor activities.

Well, that's the reason she gave him.

She told me she's already stopped taking her birth control pills. Seems like caring for his "little monster" (a joke, you can't avoid it, the kid's there, it's gonna happen, she is a part-time mom) has awoken her apparently latent mommy instinct. She's also eating all her meals carefully, working out lightly, you get the idea. Add in some extra fun time with him, and she's making a major play to become a mom by having an "oops" baby. I told her she should just own up to him about wanting a baby, but she says he is sure he doesn't want any more kids. I asked if this meant she asked him, brought up her wants, and she played word games a bit dodging the answer.

Now I'm in a moral quandary. I'm friends with her, and she told me this in confidence. I don't know this guy at all really. I don't even know if he'd believe me if I told him, because we don't know each other, or if he'd assume an ulterior motive.

This is not the woman I know, and I don't just mean wanting kids. I mean, the woman I knew would never have even considered this duplicitous action. The quandary is not just the moral "told in confidence" though. We've told each other things that are extremely personal, extremely private, some that could be extremely damaging if exposed in both directions.

I don't like the idea of staying silent here. I consider what she is doing morally wrong. No one, man or woman, should make a decision like this by fiat. Apparently two (female) friends have said this isn't so bad because, since she's helping to take care of his first kid, she's got a "right" to have her own with him. Since I'm apparently the lone voice telling her to be honest and tell him, it wouldn't be much of leap to figure out who told him, even if done via note or similar.

I don't know what's happened to my friend. I used to hold her out as the prime example of actual equality in action. Now, well, I just don't know how to handle it without it blowing up in my face.

Knowing a friend of mine is about to deliberately fuck up another person's life

I think that's a bit extreme. There a plenty of examples of "unexpected" pregnancies that end up in a happy family situation. No one knows what will happen or how any one would react. She may not get pregnant at all = no problem. She may get pregnant but have a miscarriage. She may get pregnant and decide on her own she wants to leave this man. She may get pregnant and once faced with the reality of a child with her, the man changes his mind and not only steps up but embraces fatherhood with her. He already has one child don't forget. Nothing is certain and to describe the theoretical birth of a child as "fucking up" someone's life is unjustifiable. People do change their minds.

No one knows what will happen or how the male partner will react if all this does result in a child.

The only two things that are certain here are 1. the woman is behaving immorally and badly towards her partner and 2. the OP has no business breaching a confidence to tell this man who he isn't even friends with.

I think generally when you are/someone is considering telling a third party that they have no real connection with a devastating piece of information that may cause a life explosion, it pays to examine your motives very, very carefully. It is rarely as simple as "it's the right thing to do; I'd want someone to tell me."

OP - are you really sure that you don't have an ulterior motive? It could be anything from not liking your friend's partner/thinking she settled so hoping this would split them up to wanting her for yourself to a prurient smug desire to cause a bit of trouble whilst standing on a moral pedestal. I'm not saying any of that is the case but that you should very, very closely scrutinise your own feelings and motivations.

It's not your position to tell him.

If the friend's husband is so vehemently anti-children, then he should either have already had a vasectomy or should use condoms on all occasions, or restrain from PIV sex. Otherwise, there's always a risk of pregnancy.

Your duty is to your friend. Not to her husband.

The friend is planning to trap her partner into having an unwanted child before he can get a vasectomy. That, in my view, is despicable. Yes, the partner should take precautions, but he probably trusts his partner. Because that's what relationships are (or should be) like.

I see it as similar to having a friend who has HIV or another STD and plans to have sex with his/her partner without protection and without telling him/her. I would tell the partner. And I believe that having an unwanted child is equally serious, if not more so.

If it is that essential to a person to not have a child both should take reasonable precautions to prevent it. Any sex can result in pregnancy no matter what precautions you take.

This is a basic fact one that all the trust in the world cannot change.

But I wouldn't stay friends with someone who would do this and I would be vocal about why. I would also be shocked that someone who knows me well would think I would condone it (that's essentially what telling you implies).

Does your friend know what a self-righteous prick you have turned into? That she can't trust you to keep her confidence?
Because it really isn't your business to intervene. It might, perhaps have been a moral dilemma if her partner had been your best friend or your brother or something (though it would be unlikely, in that case, that she would be confiding in you.)

I don't think her plan is a very good one, and it is a bit unethical, but it may not work, anyway (a woman can't be sure she is fertile until she starts trying) and then no harm will have been done. Are you getting all butthurt because you are terrified that some bitch of a woman will trap you into an unplanned pregnancy? Is this that Man Thing that hates and fears and resents the idea of women being the ones who get to make the choices about reproduction?

You never know what is going on in a relationship.

For this reason alone I would stay out of it. Make your objections known to your friend, if you have to, but leave it at that. Nothing good will come of your interfering.

so would those saying butt out advise the same if the man in the marriage confessed to sticking pins in his condoms?

yes, tell the husband

You breaching your close friend's confidence would surely be against your strict moral code, no? I know I can tell my best friend my deepest, darkest secrets, and although she may not always approve (and has not in fact ) I know that she would never betray my confidence or let me down. I can trust her implicitly. Friends who only like you for your good bits are not real friends at all.

so would those saying butt out advise the same if the man in the marriage confessed to sticking pins in his condoms?

Imagine you were in a loving relationship and your partner told you he'd had the snip so you were tricked into getting pregnant. Same thing.

Joysmum: it isn't, quite, because a woman in those circumstances does have the option of terminating the pregnancy as well as dumping the decietful man.

No one is saying that it's great to trick a man into becoming a father against his wishes, just that it is not up to the OP to stick his beak in. And, in fact, for him to go blundering in telling tales to a man he barely knows would make the situation a lot worse for his former friend. Of course, his motivation may be to punish the 'uppity' woman in the first place, both for making a unilateral decision about pregancy (which isn't great, fair enough) and for not choosing him as her partner when she had the chance.