I can't tell you how much reading all of your responses has helped me!! I am so enjoying reading about this important decision in your lives and how you all made it and how you all feel about it.
For all those who are questioning whether or not I even WANT kids to begin with: you are right, I'm somewhat struggling with that. I do think I want them eventually, but I ALWAYS saw myself being an older parent (i.e. later 30s).
I have been totally flabbergasted about DH's position on the kids thing because I remember having discussions before we ever got married, where I told him specifically that I wasn't sure I ever wanted kids, or if I did have them, it'd be later in life. I distinctly remember one time having this discussion at a Pizza Hut when a fellow patron's toddler children were screeching like banshees and throwing food at the next table over!! And his response was always "okay", that he didn't feel strongly about kids one way or another.
Then about 3-4 years ago (when he was about 27-28), he went into this crazy baby fever and now is claiming that he doesn't remember me saying anything about possibly not wanting children, and that he doesn't remember telling me that he was neutral either way. He claims he's always really wanted kids, and wanted them young!!! So I'm completely at a loss. He even told me once that he might consider leaving me if I decided I absolutely didn't want kids.
We've been arguing, discussing, bargaining, etc. about having kids ever since. It's kind of gotten to the point where I dread our families/friends asking "so, when are you guys having kids?" because DH always gives me this pointed, blaming look, and then I feel guilty because I'm "holding out" and "denying him children". (Since we've been married nearly 6 years and most of our friends have barely made it to the 2nd year of marriage without a pregnancy, we're an anomaly.)
I am warming up to the idea of kids (as I tell my mother, "it's starting to seem less repugnant"), but I'm still not 100% there yet. Although in the last 6 months I've made a pretty dramatic shift by my standards from "never want kids" to "someday might not be so bad".
For the record, my parents were young when I was born (I'm the eldest); they were married at 19 and had me at 21, and seeing what they had to go through (lack of money, lack of job stability, divorce) always made me nervous about kids.
Plus, my father basically abdicated all parental responsibility to my mother (didn't change diapers, didn't help with anything), which is something I'm worried about with DH. I think once the novelty of a baby wears off, he will leave me to all the dirty work and only start getting involved when he can attend their sporting events. (Which is kind of what he did when we got our dogs... once the novelty wore off, I'm the one who bathes them, feeds them, walks them, administers their medications, takes them to the vet, etc. He does some, but basically I do about 85% of it.)
Also for the record, DH was baby #2 and his parents were both 30 when they had him. His mother died of ovarian cancer at 56 (DH was 26) and he was SUPER close to her, so he feels like if he has kids in his 30s, he won't be around to see them grow up. (His dad is still 100% alive and kicking at 63-- today's his birthday!) So I kind of see his point, but his mom died young by most standards and she didn't manage her health well (she was a 2-pack-a-day smoker who had already had breast cancer; having breast cancer DOUBLES your risk of ovarian cancer and she had stopped seeing a gynecologist YEARS before, so by the time they found the ovarian cancer, it had spread everywhere.) But DH is convinced he'll die young and never see them grow up. Argh!
Anyway, this is so terribly long-winded, so I'll wrap it up. Sorry, this is like therapy! Haha!
The point is that I really appreciate your input, and I really appreciate being validated as far as my personal feelings go. I respect that DH is 100% ready, but I'm just not there yet, and he has to either accept that and wait me out or make some hard decisions regarding his commitment to our marriage and what he wants out of it.
Thank you all again.
MC
