I love my husband too much to have a baby

[willyoutakethisrose]

I’m a new user and I’m hoping someone will be able to give me some advice.

I’m 30, my husband is 31. We’ve been together for 10 years and we’re currently trying to work out if we want to have a baby.

The thing that most holds me back is that I worry that my husband and I are too happy to introduce another person to our dynamic. We are an incredibly happy couple - we’re very in love, we have very healthy communication, we’ve been through some extremely difficult times together (serious illness, bereavement at a very young age, moving cities for one of our careers etc.). I don’t mean this to be saccharine but I genuinely don’t know any couple who seems to be as happy or get on as well as we do. Our relationship is the absolute best thing in my life, and I don’t want to do anything to jeopardise that. Every time I think about having a child I just can’t help but feel like this whole new person would ruin it - I don’t know how we would add a new person to our dynamic, I hate the idea that we wouldn’t be able to talk as much, and most importantly (and weirdly, I know) I hate the idea that my husband might love the baby more than me and put the child ahead of me. I also can’t imagine I would feel like that either, which makes me feel I would be a bad mother.

I’m being really honest in my above thoughts because I’d like to know whether anyone else has ever had these fears? All I ever read online is that babies ruin relationships, and when I speak to my friends who have babies they often say that they don’t get to talk about anything apart from the babies, and they never seem to spend any time together any more. One of them told me that I would love my husband more after a baby because “nothing he’s ever done will ever make you as happy as when he brings you a cup of tea after a long night”. That just makes me feel so sad inside that our relationship would be reduced to that.

I’m an only child and I’ve always struggled with the idea of “sharing” love. I think I can only see having a baby as being forced into sharing the love we have for each other, and therefore diminishing it. The very close friends I have spoken to about this laugh and find it insane, which it is, but it doesn’t change that I feel it.

My husband doesn’t really get my line of argument - he thinks if we decide to have a baby it will be fine and he won’t love me any less. He also says that if we had a child our relationship would still be the most important thing to maintain to make a happy, stable home and he thinks it wouldn’t be hard to do that because we’re so strong and happy and have such a good foundation. But everything I read online says it’s so hard to maintain a good marriage when you have a baby…

Any thought on any of the above would be appreciated, even if anyone has any advice on where I can go for more help and clarity with any of these thoughts.

You will have more love for a Child than you’ve ever known , and yes , all parents put their child before their partner , it’s just natural . It you all grow into a happy family unit . Best thing I’ve ever done

Were you over indulged and spoilt as a child.
You husband is not a father figure for you.
You want all his attention but if he really wants a baby he will come to resent your attention seeking behaviour eventually and you may find cracks appearing in your relationship anyway.
I think you shouldn't have a baby as you sould way too self centred to be in charge of another person.

Here is the thing...you won't be "sharing" your love. You will find that a baby comes with its very own love. You'll have more love entirely. And THAT SAID, the ONLY really valid reason to have a child is that you want to, you want to nurture and love a child, to help it grow into a wonderful, honest, caring adult. And you want that overwhelmingly. NOT EVERYONE DOES. Not wanting to do that does not make you a "bad person." Nor does motherhood confer some sort of sainthood.

It sounds as if you already know what you want. Follow your heart, especially if your husband is perfectly fine with your decision. BOTH of you have to be content with it. If not, then you either seek couples counseling, or the relationship will suffer.

LOL, I'm one of those very early feminists, back in the day when "feminism" was all about giving women choices in life. Be a housewife and mother, be a business woman with no children. Balance the two...HAVE A CHOICE. I left the movement when the members started denigrating those who CHOSE to be housewives and mothers exclusively. That's not the attitude I fought so hard for.

@willyoutakethisrose

To say that having children doesn’t impact your relationship is to lie. It does change things, but generally you have a deeper connection even if you don’t get to do xyz as much anymore.

He also says that if we had a child our relationship would still be the most important thing to maintain to make a happy, stable home

Erm no. You won’t get the time for long into the night chats, netflix binges, holidays, hobbies, whatever else that you do to maintain your relationship now. It isn’t like that. Things are mainly centred around the child.

You fumble through the first pregnancy in awe at all the new this and that going on, all the stuff to learn and to buy.

Then the birth happens and your husband will suddenly become family much like the way your parents or siblings are.

It’s a deeper love, you become more deeply connected and you are both invested in bringing up your child together.

If you are still enjoying all the very frequent sex, city breaks, shared hobbies and all that and don’t feel ready for the responsibility of children then don’t have them.

What I will say is that it is another one of those bonding experiences like you’ve described - you’ve been through so much together - and largely it is joyful one, even if you are a bit stressed and sleep deprived at certain stages. It’s like it changes you from two candles to one giant pile of melted wax.

I must tell my DH about that analogy- I’m sure he’ll be thrilled 😂😂

Fantastic. To hell with such a life! 😁

My feelings for having a baby was very similar to yours. I didn’t want children. Although I never felt like I was fully prioritised and didn’t want to add someone else who would have to come first. I was happy with my life. I could be selfish.

i fell pregnant (though I couldn’t have children so got a bit sloppy with contraception) my little girl is now 17 months old.

It is a completely different kind of love. I don’t live my husband any less but she is definitely my first and last thought. It’s been a hard year or so getting used to the new us. Still having some problems. You definitely need to make a conscious effort to make time for each other.

The biggest thing for me is how much I have changed. My friends and family comment all the time about where has the j I know gone? And the truth is I don’t know. I have post natal depression and anxiety which adds other layers into parent hood!

I am a huge over thinker and planner. Another reason i couldn’t imagine being a mum as it isn’t something that can be planned out! Who knows how it will go?!? And that’s scary.

I do not regret having my little girl. But I also think I’d be a different kind of happy if I hadn’t.

I could have written this myself. We are 32, 31, been together just over 10 years, so far the happiest couple we know. We married straight out of uni and stepped into the real world together, we grew together and generally shaped each other as the people we are today. I’m also an only child who has sharing issues.

I’m currently pregnant with my first child. We didn’t want any children for very long, then during Covid we gradually came around the idea of having them. We had a fairytale time just the two of us during lockdown, but that didn’t deter us from wanting to bring children into our lives. We never really ached for children though, we wanted them more for practical reasons like having people to look after and inherit our estate (nothing huge but it’s something that we can’t ignore). We will do our best to be loving and responsible parents, but we don’t feel like the children will be here to share the love we have for each other, we view them more like a new addition to our life, a new project to do together, a new opportunity to grow together.

So far we’ve been having a teenage lifestyle, lounge about play games, go to the west end when something we like comes up, look around different shops with some bubble tea, go to the cinema then have waffles and talk about the film. Time has become a lost concept in our life, I guess we now feel like we need something to positively disturb it a little.

I don’t know how things will change or if they actually will change at all when the child comes, will report back if I can remember to.

The issue is, do you actually want to have children? Are you broody and find babies sweet? You need to work out whether you just don't want them or are fearful of the changes that babies bring.
They certainly are hard work and exhausting and motherhood can be frustrating and tedious at times. But your fears of you not loving your baby more than your husband are unfounded. Both of you should and will probably love your baby more than you do each other. That's what will make you love each other all the more imo. I look at how much my husband adores our children and it's a huge plus point. Yes, we do tend to mostly talk about the kids when we're together... Because we both want to.

Are you generally anxious/worried about big life changes? Is that holding you back? I think that's the thing that you need to establish.

It is FINE to not want kids OP. Seriously, there is nothing wrong with you. You have no idea what your life would be like with children. As others have said, you may have been blessed by happy, healthy, clever little people or you could have a child with problems: moderate, severe, anywhere in between.

There are lots of threads on here from women saying they wish they'd never had children. They are very sad to read because one wonders whether the children do pick up on it on some level.

I bloody hate that women have to justify not wanting children, but men don't. Just live your life. In the now. If it makes you feel uncomfortable constantly having to justify your decision then make something up along the lines of you can't have them. It's nobody's business any way.

I say all that as someone who had to try for quite a few years before finally having a baby. I knew I definitely did want them: you know you don't.

Oh and far from being selfish, it is the opposite because the planet is over-populated anyway.

And also everyone saying that they would push their husband in front of a car for their children just makes me think that it must be that their love transfers from their husband to their children, because how much I love my husband now I can’t imagine ever feeling like that. So that love must have decreased?

No, that isn’t it… it’s just that love for children is bigger. Like you love for husband is a cocker spaniel but for the baby it’s a St Bernard.

Your husband is still the partner you have loved the most in your whole life and you now feel more bonded to them than ever….

But you both have equally just met the most enchanting, interesting, amazing person you have ever met - the baby.

And this type of love just hums through yours and your husband’s life like radio waves that resonate through you both like you have a shared radio station that is always on at full volume.

Oh no I must have missed that part!!

@Usernamel

Before we had kids we went travelling, to museums and art exhibitions, to shows, films and concerts etc

Baby-toddler-young child is a bit of another world.. especially 0-2…however we’ve still kept on doing what we do except kids come with most of the time. Really happy they are cultured and we get to re experience a lot with them.

And have discovered we love theme parks, amusement parks, fairgrounds, rollercoasters 🎢 and the national trust!! 😂

It's just more love! A small person that is part of both of you. A baby isn't going to detract from your relationship - it will enrich it.

The best thing I ever did was to have children.

You don't want a baby - don't have one. Why all the angst?
( worrying your mum will love her grandchild more than you is next level narcissism but irrelevant.)

Hello OP, just reading through your thread, as a single and childfree 30-something, and this post struck a chord with me, as I have felt very similarly about my own mother.
I remember realising as a teen, while Christmas shopping, that I didn’t actually know what my mother liked. She just liked whatever I gave her, because it was from me. That shook me a bit. I loved her, but didn’t really know her.

As an adult now I have a different relationship with my mum, and like you I lost my father young so the dynamic between myself and my mother changed and matured a great deal at that point, but I share your complicated feelings about motherhood.

Unlike you, I am not in a relationship, and I have never really ‘done’ relationships in a big way, I think partly for similar reasons. I just really, really value being my own person and having freedom and autonomy. My mother gave hers up willingly, and was (is!) an amazing wife and mum, but it didn’t set an example I am all that keen to follow.

I don’t really have any insight into your main question re children, except to say that you have already gone a step further than me by accommodating a partner, maybe accommodating a child would work out positively in the same way?

Having said that, I am a big believer in ‘if it aint broke, don’t fix it’. If you love your life, if you and your partner are content, you’re already hugely fortunate and better off than the majority of people (I suspect!). Why play russian roulette with this happy situation? That everyone else is reproducing isn’t enough of a reason, I don’t think.

@ChristmasFanatic

OP I'm a qualified counsellor and what I can say is that you need person centred therapy. You can't get the answer you need here because there is something deeper going on and only you have the answer within you. Person centred counselling asks you the right questions that allows you to hear yourself and discover where your fears are rooted. Once you unravel that, you can begin to rationalise and confidently make your decisions.

If there is one gift you ever give yourself, go on the BACP website and book a person centred counsellor. Trust me.

Sounds like good advice. Pages of other people's thoughts and experiences, whilst interesting and valid, aren't going to unlock the confused, and maybe irrational, thoughts / beliefs you seem to be having.

Have read all the rest of your posts OP and in the kindest possible way I think you need therapy relative to your father dying and your mother now in terms of how

a) her being a SAHM may have damaged her sense of self and how your fear replicating this scenario

b) you may have become more emotionally interlinked with your mother since your father’s death which prevents you from feeling secure with her and separating emotionally embracing adult life fully.

Also the level to which you are emotionally involved with your husband needs to be examined because you are putting so much of your emotional well-being on this relationship so as to make you extremely vulnerable if anything were ever to happen.

Regards this little chestnut….

I have always wanted to be loved and respected for what I bring to the table as a person, not a biological role I can fulfil.

Becoming a mother brings a lot to the table, arguably for many it is the most important and long lasting role they will fulfil in life. It’s not a biological role. People (who purposefully fall pregnant) generally choose to pursue parenthood because they feel they want to dedicate themselves to bringing up another and building their own family. It’s very much a part of identity; it becomes a very big part of who you are as a person because it’s a big and important commitment.

Just as your husband, family and friends may love and respect you for being a great wife and a great <whatever your profession is> they will love and respect you for being a great Mum.

When I look around in society it seems like we don’t value mothers very much, and certainly don’t value or recognise them as women outside of being mothers, and I fear that dynamic would be transferred into my personal relationships with my husband and my family as well.

This is silly, most women I know have good careers, a lot of them ‘big’ careers. But many have gone part time because they want to be with their children when young… you can’t knock it, it’s important to them and it’s what they choose to do.

It’s as big a life change as when you transition from a child to a woman in terms of the changes with your body, how you feel emotionally, physically, spiritually, what you value in life changes….

People may predominantly view me as a mother, but I have no issue with that because that is what I have chosen for myself, it’s what is most important to me, what guides my decision making in life now…. All the other stuff just isn’t on my radar right now and seems minimally important.

I think you should maybe look into why you are so scared to have lice “removed” from you. Sure you can go your whole life feeling like this but surly it must cause some jealousy. You must feel this way for a reason.

Both my pregnancies were unplanned but I decided to become a parent. My partner said to me once, if our child jumped in a pool, I know that we would both jump in to save her.

That is probably the best way I can explain the type of love. It’s unconditional (so it should be) from both parents and because it’s a shared love, there is no need to jealously because personally I want my child to be loved by me, her dad, my family, my mum etc.

But I want to add that there is nothing that ca prepare you for how you will feel or take to parenting and it’s a journey. I had PND and now 12 years later me and my daughter are so close - and we learn a lot about eachother throughout the journey.

I also want to add that maybe there is some fear of the medical process as you mentioned going private etc?

If you don’t want a child, don’t have one. Don’t overthink it either because it’s nothing that you can ever imagine.

I hope you do work through some of these feelings.

You didn't need to say you were an only child. It's very obvious.

Your post reminded me that things are already changing even at this stage. We made plans to visit Japan a month before I conceived, which is not happening now. Also since I got pregnant I’ve been having some discomfort and a very low energy level so everything has been put on hold. I braved the west end a few times for prebooked performances and that was very difficult for me. I don’t want to go out or see people. My mum is arranging to wfh and come help me for the first 6 months, I’d like her to bond with my baby as well. Dh has been very supportive of all of my decisions which helps some. I don’t like to admit it but having children means differently for women and men, it could never be truly fair.

your newly discovered hobbies are so precious, and I would also like to share our hobbies with the children and have them be cultured, so we can raise a couple of people to enjoy hobbies together when we feel like sharing our time with them.

OP, I think you have missed your most fundamental problem.
You don't love your dh more than anyone else in the world.
You love yourself more than anyone else in the world.
You, and your status as most loved, by your mother and husband, that's your number one priority.
So far, it seems, neither you, nor your dh has fully understood that.

Why is that a "problem"? If more women loved themselves and put themselves first, there would be a lot less of us living shit lives, with shit partners, and suffering FOG because of shit parents.

Love has no lid, there is always more than enough, it grows, you don’t share it out. It’s hard to explain but you will know if you really want child rather than feel as if you should because it’s expected or because it’s what people do

It’s really fun, we’ve found the DC like a lot of the same things as us but take a different spin on it. And then entirely different things too which we’ve grown to love.

There’s so many places we wouldn’t have gone except for DC… and even though we are missing out on, like you, Japan, Canada, <insert aspirational destination….

It doesn’t seem to matter that much and I’m actually looking forward to seeing things with the kids when they are mid to late teens and adults and sharing the experience.

First trimester is tiring, second trimester much better, third trimester big, uncomfortable, hot, peeing, tired. Try and get sorted for baby stuff, any house jobs and hospital by 30wks ish just because it’s easier.

I don’t think there’s any ‘feel like sharing your time with them’ anymore, sorry to say but mostly you will be with them and you tend to have to work around them rather than the other way around.

Biggest piece of advice - do not tell the mums at baby groups that your mother is coming to help you for the first six months…. You’ll alienate yourself pretty quick!!

@Usernamel forgot to tag you, see above.

Congratulations on baby and hope you start to feel a bit more energised soon. 💕