what are the odds?

[metaphortunate]

I know seven het couples, including the one I form a part of, that got together and got serious despite both of them knowing at the time that one half of the couple wanted to have children, or at least a child, and one half strongly did not.

All seven of those het couples currently have one child, and I happen to know that at least one of the others is currently working on a second.

Possibly there are tons and tons of couples who get together despite this discrepancy and many of them end up with no kids but it just happens that the seven that I know all went the other way.

In four of them the guy was the one who wanted a child, in three it was the girl.

I don't know any of the people in the other couples well enough to ask them if they got pressured. (I feel like you would have to know someone really fucking well to ask that question. Or, not at all. I've had some hella deep conversations with people I knew I would never meet again.) I know that I was never pressured, that I changed my mind, and didn't tell Mr. E until it was almost too late, because it's such a difficult thing to change your mind about. I wonder how it went for other people.

I'm sure a lot of people get together but don't get serious because they don't agree on this issue. I wonder whether there is any correlation between getting serious and secret doubts about one's position. At the time we started getting serious, I didn't have conscious doubts. Still, I'd never seriously considered getting my tubes tied. In retrospect, I wonder about that. My brain does a lot of shit it doesn't feel the need to let me in on.

I don't have any conclusions, but I think about it a lot.

Have a couple of links:

"No Children", by the Mountain Goats.

"The Ghost Ship that Didn't Carry Us", by Cheryl Strayed.

Comments

[rosefox]

I have always been adamant about not wanting to be pregnant. Never never never never never. For a long time I thought I'd like to foster kids, though (mostly thanks to Dean Koontz's Lightning, oddly enough), and I especially adore teenagers. Josh likewise adamantly does not want to be party to procreation, but he likes kids, especially young kids, and is really good with them.

When we got together, we decided not to have kids because we were both so firmly against going about it the inexpensive way and the expensive ways felt like way too much work (plus we weren't sure a queer poly couple would be approved for adopting/fostering). So... that was that! But that meant we were in the perfect position to say "Sure!" to Xtina moving in with us and eventually having a baby, because now she can deal with all the hassle and costs and biology that we remain opposed to, and we can get to be parents.

It's not so much that our minds have changed as that we didn't see a way for parenting to happen given prior constraints, and then new options appeared.

[metaphortunate]

I hope it all goes as smoothly and easily as possible!

Can I ask how old Xtina is? I will not take offense if the answer is "no".

[rosefox]

She's 34, same age as me. Josh will be 41 in January.

[jrtom]

I'm not sure what you mean by "she can deal with all the hassle and costs" in combination with "we can get to be parents".

I'm not being snarky, I really mean that I'm confused.

Being a parent, as I am familiar with it, entails hassle and costs. Perhaps you mean "Xtina pays for all kid-related expenses", but having a kid will impact everyone in the household, even if you're not responsible for her at all (and if that latter is what you mean, then I don't know what you mean by "be[ing a] parent", and I would be curious to hear more.

[rosefox]

Oh, not the hassle and costs of being parents, we'll share those. Just the getting-pregnant bits.

[jrtom]

Ah, thanks for clarifying. That makes more sense to me. :)

Good luck to you all, in any event.

[I would like to apologize for my lack of close parenthesis in my previous comment. Here, have one: ) :) ]