For those of you who have fallen accidentally or accidentally on purpose pregnant, what effect has it had on your relationship?

[DarrellRivers]

i am interested in your stories, postitive and negative.
for those of you whose DPs have wanted a certain number of children, and then through whatever circumstances, more children than expected arrive.
We have 2 lovely children and i would love a 3rd. DP feels we can only afford 2. I respect his decision on this but we are due another chat re this in a few months, and I would love to hear some stories about expectations being altered by real life circumstances , and I suppose stories from both good and bad sides of the coin would be helpful in discussing this decision with 2 v different viewpoints.
Thanks in advance

This is a fascinating thread for me. Rarely post but this is exactly what I am going through/feel at mo. I would LOVE a third child - the thought of never having another just seems so sad and I don't feel like I am done. But my dh is adamant he doesn't want another and is a bit of a stubborn bugger. I don't feel anyone is 'wrong' or 'right' in wanting/not wanting another child but I would love to know how I could get him to change his mind without it damaging our relationship...

when dp and i got engaged 10 years ago when we were 21(still not married!!) it caused a bigisg argument that he wanyed 4 children and i didnt want any. in the end i agreed to wait until i was 30 as there was so much i wanted to do.
however i somehow got pregnant (at 22)on the pill and was really upset.i felt like it was the end of the world but dp was pleased as was both of our families. i couldnt bring myself to ask for a termination and remember sitting at some traffic lights with tears rolling down my face!

roll on 7 years as ds1 has just turned 8 and i wouldnt be with out him whatsoever. we just had ds2 who is 6 months (it took me that long to be ready for another as had eclampsia with ds1 and was completley put off pregnancy.)im even thinking abiut maybe a ds3 ina year or so much to dps excitment.

so in my situation is was the man who wanted children and not me!! god that was a long post

Um, the pill is not, and never has been 100% effective. The only 100% effective birth control is abstinence.

The pill is 92 to 99.7% effective. The lower end is more real world effectiveness, the upper end is theoretical, or very cautious people (always take the pill at the same time of the day, use condoms if they think they've thrown up a pill, or if they take antibiotics).

Buktus, that was the type of thing I was thinking of.

yes if a man is 100% certain that he NEVER EVER wants kids maybe he should have the snip. But then how many people can say they are 100% sure about something.

I was thinking more of scenarios when the man (or woman) says 'I don't want kids now '. They may have a million reasons. they may just be unsure about how their feelings will change. But having the snip is fairly drastic. If you were a 28yr old man and said 'I dont' want kids' how could you be sure you'd feel like that at 40?

And on another point, not everyone is fully informed re contraception as has been said. This applies to men too, I wonder how many men and told or believe that the pill is 100%?

After all there are obviuosly women who think it is and proceed to get 'accidentally' pregnant. Hell i thought it was more effective than it really is myself.

So maybe the men who don't want to get the snip are just normal everyday blokes who belive their partners 100% when they say, 'no need to worry dear i'm on the pill'.

My Dh was told to get the snip by ex (by her friend actually) as it would be dangerous for her to have anymore kids - they have 2. She then kicked him out and after moving etc he met me and we got married (and have been for nearly 11 years - far longer than they were). We now have 2 with another on the way. Our 3rd was not planned 'til next year (due to Dh and work and my weight issues and sciatica, but am following the slimming world plan in the hope that I willnot gain more excessive weight, and at leat I know I am eating healthily) but I was ill and on antibiotics etc... DH is chuffed to bits, I am still getting my head around it all, not gutted but feel a bit cheated. Also my M was not impressed and that was quite hurtful. Have not told any other family or friends as can't face similar reaction. So the only pressure is my hesitant reaction (but I will be fine when it arrives I'm sure) and my unwillingness to tell, while he is bursting with glee. Have to tell my sisters and best friend next week after scan - have promised.
My midwife very helpfully said that the best contraception is to take the pill and hold it between your knees at all times.

Obviously he did not get the snip! Doh!

Mine had the snip after 4 and 5 arrived, i'm a little sad but can see you have to stop at some point.
I still feel hard done by though.

Mine had the snip after 4 and 5 arrived, i'm a little sad but can see you have to stop at some point.
I still feel hard done by though.

Mine had the snip after 4 and 5 arrived, i'm a little sad but can see you have to stop at some point.
I still feel hard done by though.

i fell preganat accidentally 2 weeks after our wedding. cant call ds1 a honeymoon babe as we were away 5 days. i suddenly went from single girl to married, to mother in 9 months and i dont think really our relationship has ever recoverd. my step son lived with us and our relationship didnt really develop as i became obsessed with ds1 to the complete exclusion of all. we decided to have the 2nd and feel preg the first month. so in 4 years its been a culture shock. dh has off course been a parent for much longer than me and had already done the marriage bit. i still struggle with the dh/dw bit. i struggled i suspose not being in charge of my life. if we had waited a bit longer befoe reproducing maybe our relationship would have been different. only thing as dh now has three dss he is talking about another. me i dont know as i would be 37-38.

Made me laugh..
"My midwife very helpfully said that the best contraception is to take the pill and hold it between your knees at all times."

hey bananaloaf i got pg on honeymoon as i was too distracted over wedding and going away on surprise trip to maldives that i forgot to pack my pills! was a massive shock and dh said baby would ruin everything but as we were married seemed very wrong to not have it. now dd is one and having her is such a joy i thank god every day we had her - but i don't think i ever have really got used to being a wife and mother so quickly. i get really depressed sometimes as i had not acheived a career before the baby came and now it will be so much harder to do as i will never be able to 100% devote myself to it. dp has a good career but it is so demanding he can not spend much time with dd and he always swore he would be a more hands on dad than his very job orientated father. a lot of difficult life phases still to get through before we think about number 2. the next one will be planned!!.

We have 2 ds' and i would love a 3rd (i think), but we are just getting to the stage where we are financially better off and i have a part time job and i know all that would change if we did have another. I could not deceive hd into thinking that i 'accidently' got pregnant. My sister did this with her second ds (she put pin holes in the condoms) and her dh was convinced that she was having an affair as it caused all kinds of problems.

Darryll - we only ever discussed having two children. Lo and behold I conceived very easily, had easy pregnancies and produced a matching pair - DS 6 and DD 3.

The trouble is, that after DS (i.e. even before DD), I started yearning for three; visualising three; enviously gazing at women with three children etc. Whenever I thought of the kids, I started to imagine three.

I mentioned this to DH and he said "you must be joking!!!". So I didn't mention it for another two years, but my broodiness got worse. As soon as I gave birth to DD, I wanted to get PG again.

About 18 months ago we had a "talk" and I told him that if he didn't let me have another baby, I would regret it for the rest of my life, probably resenting him as well. I explained that I'd been thinking about it for over two years and the yearning wouldn't go away.

He was pursuaded and it took us a few months for me to conceive. Then I miscarried and we had to start again, and it took me even longer to conceive. But DH is very supportive now and has been since he realised how desperately I wanted a third child.

I think its best to be honest rather than get PG accidently on purpose, as that may make DH/DP mistrust you or feel he's been tricked.

In practical terms it is not ideal for us having a third, but like I said, I think I would always regret it if we hadn't tried, and would always feel there was a little person missing.

BTW the little person is due in March

Good luck with it Darryll

i feel like you fox,about having a third. partner just says no,point blank. ive tried to tell him what you told yours.he just gets cross. oh well

Echoing the sentiments on here about trust and definitely a two-person decision if possible

Thanks for all your stories and words of wisdom.
Currently we have decided that not a third child at present but DH and I have discussed it sensibly and definitely it is now a 'who knows in the future'
I feel happy with this , and feel the pressure is off both of us for now so we will enjoy our 2 children at present, live our lives a bit, and see what the future holds.

That sounds like a good approach - enjoy your two lovely children