OT - What are your thoughts on family size?

I was an only child, and my DH had 3 younger brothers. I never had a particular problem being an only kid -- I'm kind of solitary by nature and I value my alone time. I wanted at least one kid, but I was not opposed to having 2. DH liked having brothers, and he said he thought that 2 kids sounded manageable. We decided early on that we would have 1 at some point, and then decide about expanding our family more when we got our "parenting legs".

We got pregnant by surprise a couple of years ago -- we had been planning to try in a few months, but we thought it would be more difficult with my PCOS and I had been on birth control. We have one DD, who will be 2 in a few months. Now that we have the one, we've discussed the possibility of having another, but neither of us is in a huge hurry. We're tabling the discussion until after I'm cleared for pregnancy after my WLS. I'll be 33-34 by that point, and (hopefully) still able to get pregnant. But even if we decide not to have more, I'm very happy with the one we have now, and I'm not feeling any particular urge to have another yet.

 Good luck with whatever you and your DH decide!

Hi Jules,
I always wanted to have a family, at least 2 kids but my hubby was dead set against it. We were married for 20 yrs and were a couple for 25 yrs and he never waivered on it.
My hubby passed away last year at age 39 and I am now involved with a man who loves kids. He has 2 grown kids, 21 and 25. He knows how much I always wanted a family of my own and we are deciding if this is something we want to do. I guess we had better decide soon as i was 40 in august. We are planning on moving back to the Uk next year so at least a high risk post DS pregnancy won't cost us an arm and a leg!!
I think in my heart that we will at least try and have one, I have always had the desire to be a Mom and moving back to the Uk will give me the financial resources and family support to make this dream come true.

I agree with whoever posted that if you are feeling so conflicted about this then you are probably not done!! Your head can tell you one thing but your heart will not shut up if it wants something!!
I wish you all the best with whatever you decide to do sweetie

Yorkie xx

Better get going on that right away! I had my wonderful daughter at 41. (after 2 sons) No regrets at all and wished I had tryed for more but we were living in Greece and I was worried about high risk health care there. .

 Aww, that's great! I really hope it works out for you two.

Thanks for your help!

Jules

The definition of "family" is very fluid anymore.  Certainly in my case.

I have two biological children who are now 25 (son) and almost 28 (married daughter).  Their father had three older kids (two biological and one "legal" because he was married to the mother when she gave birth to someone else's child).  When we were married, we had joint custody of his son; the older girls had been given up for adoption to a relative, but stayed in touch occasionally.  His son's mother had another child when the son was 13, with no father identified.  His son's mother died last year, when her daughter was 17.  My children and I are in touch with all of these children, whom we consider part of our extended family, even the ones who are unrelated by blood at all (the oldest and youngest "sisters" who are half sisters to my kids' half siblings).  I try to be a mother figure to both my ex-stepson and his sister, since they are motherless and in the girl's case, orphaned.  The older girls have kids of their own, and we stay in touch on FaceBook.

My husband has two daughters, both married.  They both lived with us for a while after they were 18, but not at the same time (they are 5 years apart).  One lives nearby and we see them occasionally, but are not real close, though we are working through the issues that led to this situation, slowly.  The other is estranged from us entirely right now, due to what we see as her being in a psychologically abusive marriage with a real jerk, and our refusal to financially or emotionally support them and their unacceptable life style.  She is now pregnant, and we hear he isn't happy about it, so we expect things to change at some point.  Maintaining an open mind and heart is difficult, but we are managing.

My husband was often asked whether he wanted to keep trying for a son after his two daughters were born.  Besides the fact that the marriage was shaky, and that his then-wife had had 13 miscarriages, he always insisted that he never wanted a son, because girls were enough trouble.  My son was 12 when we got together, and did not want him as a father -- he maintained a romantic and unrealistic image of his superficially loving substance abusing father.  My son is still at home at age 25, and they have only recently begun to really establish a close relationship.

My husband and my daughter are very very close -- perhaps closer than he is with his own daughters.  She had him and me walk her down the aisle when she got married, even though her bio dad came to the wedding.

My husband jokingly refers to my son as "the son I never wanted" -- but it has been a very special thing to watch him over the years gently establish himself as the father figure my son never had (nor knew he wanted), and to see the respect and love grow between them.

So family size is a weird concept to me.  I have two bio kids; we (DH and I) have four kids; I have an extended family of somewhere between six and eight kids.  I'm an ex-step-grandma to several children, about to be an (estranged) step-grandma to another baby.  I care about them all.

 Wow, Diana, I had to make a flow chart to follow all of that! LOL

I think it's great that your DH is so close to your daughter and that everyone seems to get along with everyone else. I hope that your husband's daughter can come to her senses soon. I can't even imagine how hard it would be to see one of your children going through such an ordeal.

Your son reminds me a lot of my brother. He is 29 and still living at home with my parents. He doesn't even have any plans on moving out. Since he is the baby of the family, my mom isn't exactly pushing him out of the house. It's a tough situation because he has extreme shyness, to the point of never leaving the house except to go to work for my dad's business. He is on the computer 24/7. I really worry about him. He's never even had a girlfriend.

Anyway, sorry for getting off track. I thank you for sharing your story!

Jules

Ideally I would like to have two when it comes time for me to have children.

I am an only child and know what it is like growing up alone. It has benefits but I think that knowing someone will be there with you when you no longer have your parents outweighs those benefits.

I grew up in a large family, being the baby out of five kids. Sometimes step-brothers came to live with us too, so that bumped it up to seven kids. While my mother worked two and three jobs just to keep us fed and clothed, it never was enough; especially with an alcoholic father whose friends and good time were more important, so he drank his paycheck away. We were poor...very poor and I remember what that felt like as a kid growing up wearing my brothers sweaters, not having school lunch, let alone workbook money and my name was always on the chalkboard for not having the funds...in other words, the humiliation was always present. Mind you, this was a time way before free lunches, etc. It was rough growing up poor, and it shaped my view on the size of my family and how I would be as a parent, and what I wanted for my children.

When our relationship turned into a serious keeper, DH and I discussed what we wanted out of life, whi*****luded the size of our future family. Well don't you know he grew up with similar cir****tance as I did. We wanted two kids and that's what we had...two beautiful daughters. The main reason we decided on two is because we wanted to be sure we could provide for our kids; we didn't want them to lack for anything. We also wanted to have them while we were young and our empty nest in the future when they left home we wouldn't be too old to enjoy our lives again. It worked perfectly for us...our daughters are living their lives with wonderful childhood memories. It's my one truly proud accomplishment.

Silly, isn't it? All that from not having enough food to eat, pay for school workbooks, and wearing hand me down boys clothing.

I really enjoy huge families. I am one of 8, my grandmother one of 13, my father one of 8, my mother one of 5. I have 195 cousins as a result. Its pretty insane during family gatherings and since everyone had soooo many children I can't even name them all! Even with all these people we are surprisingly close knit. Almost all of us will show up to weddings, funerals and other family events. One of my Aunts (grandmothers sister) was recently diagnosed with ovarian cancer and everyone showed up at the hospital to visit her.

Having a huge family has a lot of positives but it can also be pretty intense. I have always been under a tremendous amount of pressure to get married and have children and at my age most of my other cousins have at least one if not 3. Every time I see my grandmother (which is often) I hear at least some comment about how I need to have kids and how she is going to die before I have kids and how can I do that to her blah blah. For a long time I didn't think I wanted any children. Being raised in a household that is kinda like a zoo, as we all fondly call it can make anyone question having children. I decided that I want 2 possibly 3 but that's it. I love my family but I don't want to go through what my mother does. I don't know how she manages to function sometimes. In fact, one of the reasons I had my DS was to help with my PCOS issues so that I might be able to conceive. So far it isn't working but I am only 5 months out and this month I really feel like I might get my period. My breasts are swollen, I am having cramps, mood swings, breaking out etc. so hopefully it comes. That said, now that I have my career and my DS I am not sure I am with the right person and I turn 30 in a week (Nov 12) and so I have had quite a few freak out moments including getting pregnant and being a single mother which is also scary.

Anyway I have gone waaaay off topic now so I will end it by saying I don't think there is a perfect number. The last 3 pregnancies (and 2 children one miscarriage) my mother had were when she was on birth control but now none of us can imagine our lives without them. In fact I am super close to my youngest sister (she is 15) and we talk and text multiple times a day. I think the perfect family size is just something that happens.