Amy,

I agree with your advice about 99.9% of the time.

...but in this case, the guy asks if he's behaving ethically, and you spend three paragraphs taking the woman's side, attacking guys - who are not the letter writer - saying that they (plural) are pregnant, etc., before getting around to addressing the actual question on the table.

This woman has decided that the guy is a good-enough-to-settle-for beta who can work a career in order to support her kids, and is unwilling to give him even a single child.

She wins the Darwinian lottery, and she's more than willing to cut his own gene line off at the knees.

Is she ETHICALLY wrong?

No. She's got her preferences, and that's fine.

Is he ethically wrong to be pissed?

No, not at all.

He should tell her "having children is a deal breaker for me", give her a while to let it sink in, and then dump her and move on.

When they work this one out, the peace process between Israel and Palestine will be a breeze. You can't compromise on incompatible goals.

LW can give up or get out.

Amy's right. This is something that needs to be brought up way before there's a marriage proposal.

It's interesting that he's assuming that she thinks that he's not good enough. Is there a good reason that she might believe that? Not to trade in stereotypes, but sometimes young women with kids end up with guys who are less than ideal catches. There are only so many desirable men that age who want to get involved with a young woman with two kids.

Kudos for the girlfriend for being upfront and direct about her wishes. She isn't willing to use her BF knowing he wants more kids.

I don't see where the girlfriend pretended to want anything else - did she just spring this on the LW or did they both ignore this very important topic during the early days?

LW, be glad you are in a relationship where your GF is honest with you, and healthy enough to state her wishes. That doesn't happen often enough.

I agree completely with being open and honest about intentions as early as the first date, even if just casually. I'm the oldest of six, which comes up pretty naturally in the "getting to know you" phase of a date.
I've told every date by the second time out that one of my goals was to "beat" my mother by having more children than her. Usually said in such a way that it's taken as a joke by those who want to see it that way. Light enough to not ruin the rest of the evening.
However, my husband asked me right away if I was serious, and said he'd also love to have a big family. Which is why he is my husband, and all the guys who thought I was joking are not.

As for LW, in the GF's case, it's the opposite. She is apparently self aware enough to make that decision, and be upfront about it. That speaks volumes about her character, and I'm betting that this isn't the first time the issue of kids has come up, and LW simply wasn't listening before.

I don't think either one of wrong or right here. They just want different things. She doesn't want anymore kids and he wants to have a child he is biologically linked to. Neither one sounds unreasonable to me and its just poor fortune that they became a couple before realizing this critical difference.

I say that since their difference is over something so major (its not like they're arguing over what color the walls should be painted in their new home) they should both go their separate ways and try to find a partner that lines up with their desires on parenting (I'm sure there are plenty of men who would be fine with just those two children and plenty of women who want to have children in the future).

I liked this. Fantastically put!! I hope it sinks in, because it's advice they both need to hear.

And I agree with you about the woman not being "selfish" but mentally healthy and self-aware. She learned her lessons the hard way.

I want a child who's genetically related to me, who I can raise and form from the start.

It might just be my own experience, but I've heard a lot of guys say things like this. When my boyfriend talks about raising his future children I get the impression that he thinks he's going to raise an army of impeccably trained ninja geniuses. Meanwhile, when I think about having kids, I have PTSD flashbacks to babysitting and think "omg hope I don't mess them up too bad."

"...but in this case, the guy asks if he's behaving ethically, and you spend three paragraphs taking the woman's side, attacking guys - who are not the letter writer - saying that they (plural) are pregnant, etc., before getting around to addressing the actual question on the table."

LW didn't ask if he was behaving ethically; he asked if he was in the wrong. He's not behaving unethically at all, but he IS in the wrong by believing that his girlfriend is "selfish" for not wanting to have his child. The impression I got is that Amy was trying to shed some light on why it's not exactly selfish to not want a child for financial and personal reasons.

In fact, I don't think you can ever say that it's selfish to not want a child. Maybe someone wouldn't want a child BECAUSE they are a self-centered and shallow person, but recognizing that and abstaining from parenthood accordingly actually shows maturity and self-awareness. What *is* selfish would be CREATING A HUMAN BEING that you can't afford, or aren't mentally/emotionally prepared to care for, or for the wrong reasons-like getting someone to marry you. All of which the LW is pointedly not doing. Of course, dating/marrying someone for the sole purpose of trapping them into raising/supporting your kids is selfish too, but there's no indication that that's occurring here.

Also, is anyone else a little put off by LW's attitude towards his girlfriend's kids? I feel like if he and his gf did have another child together there would be a definite sense of "these are my wife's kids who I practiced my babysitting skills on, and this is my REAL child." LW sounds like a good guy, and I doubt he'd show favoritism deliberately, but even if that dynamic exists on an unconscious level it would still be detrimental to the entire family, and maybe the girlfriend senses that and is trying to protect her children from that.

LW, are you nuts? You should be counting your blessings. Without a child of your own you will never end up paying child support when she divorces you. You now have the hot wife, two kids to treat like your own, and you have yourself in a sound financial situation. This is a WIN-WIN so you better think about what it is you are being so stupid about...

"and is unwilling to give him even a single child"

What a weird way to phrase it, like a child that she'd be squeezing out and raising for 18 years is like a tie she picked up for him at Macy's.

Ahhh....the joys of dating a single parent. Twice the work with half the reward!

If you're at all vaguely in your dating prime (still some years of health/looks left, no kids, no serious baggage, and with career prospects) you have much better options. Really.

Assuming the LW isn't bringing some unmentioned liability to the table, I find his expectations eminently more "fair" than his girlfriends.

Sadly for him, romance is not about fair.

The good news is the LW can totally learn from this...next time don't BE the naive gullible fool...instead you wanna DATE the naive gullible fool!

Use whatever tactics your gf used to get you instead of dating single parent men. You're welcome.

Assuming the LW isn't bringing some unmentioned liability to the table

I'm betting that there's some liability. Otherwise where does the sense that he's not good enough come from?

Amy was there anything from this LW that suggested that he's got some baggage?

This woman has decided that the guy is a good-enough-to-settle-for beta who can work a career in order to support her kids, and is unwilling to give him even a single child.

She doesn't owe him a child, even just a teeny, tiny, single child. As if having just one kid is a compromise if one of the parties doesn't want any. There's no way you can know that this woman "settled" for the LW or that she's duped him into supporting her kids, or that there was some kind of bait-and-switch. The only potential misstep from either of them, according to the info we have, is if they just didn't talk about their plans for children and/or assumed the other felt the same way. Kudos to the girlfriend for being the one to bring up kids in the first place, albeit pretty late for the beginning of the kid discussion.

I'm with Shannon in LW's phrasing of his comments about the two girls and his thinking kids are something you can bargain with. Like he could dangle a new house in front of her and she'll change her mind about her well-thought-out, mature reasons for not having more kids. That's just gross. I doubt the LW intends to sound as mercenary as he does when explaining his position.

Bottom line, LW: Danny's right in that you and your girlfriend differ on an extremely major issue. And there's no good way to compromise when one of you wants one kid and the other wants none. If you need a biological child (which is totally valid, by the way), then you and your girlfriend aren't right for each other, and it's not fair to ask her to change her mind when she has clear reasons. If she didn't have kids, it would be worth further discussion, but she does, so you have to deal with it.

"It's always so cute when a man announces "WE'RE having a baby!" -- as if "WE" will be getting huge, bloated, and hormonal, and nuzzling the toilet bowl for nine months. And then there's the really fun part, when WE get strapped to a table"

Nope he doesn't get morning sickness or give birth. But maybe he does rub swollen feet and run out to relieve her cravings at 2 a.m. and learn to cook healthy meals and gain sympathy weight along with her and handle all the housework if she's stuck on bed rest and pay the bills when she can't work as a result and pore over baby books and take birthing classes or. . .

Maybe he walks because the way he sees it, she, not "we," is having a baby and what does that have to do with him.

I think the we should be encouraged.

I do think the kid is a deal breaker for both of them and it's time to say goodbye.

In the LWs defense, she may not have made it clear that she doesnt want more kids until she knew that he was committed. From what I've seen, it's very common for single moms to latch onto a guy hoping they'll support her and her kids. They'll tell them whatever they need to to keep him around, but aren't always honest about their motives. In most cases, trying to have a relationship with a single mother is a losers bet. You're going to be taking care of someone elses kids and so get all of the responsibilities of fatherhood with none of the benefits. Most of the younger single moms I know have ended up with guys who are either losers or significantly older. For a normal guy with prospects, they just have too much baggage.

LW: There is no right and no wrong; however, if not having a child of your own blood is a deal-breaker for you, then the two of you are wrong for each other. I'm sensing a bit of sunk-cost regret from you; I don't know how long you've been together, but that's water under the bridge now. You can't coerce her into changing her mind, and if you try something stupid with birth control you'll regret it for the rest of your life.

You know what you have to do now: break it off. Yes, it will be painful. Yes, you will have a lot of regrets. Yes, a lot your mutual friends will decide that you are the bad guy who wrecked the relationship. Screw all that. You have to stand up for what you really want, and that means doing what's necessary to get out of a relationship that is not taking you where you want to go, and going out and finding a new relationship that will.

Too many times, I've heard of single moms deciding that they are the ones who will run the roost. And that's fine. It's her house. It's her kids. And then she expects the guy to be 'her' boyfriend in a very proprietary, 'like it or lump it' manner.

She lost out on her carefree years because she had two kids and I sympathize.

I wonder if he really has valid reasons to think that she's treating him as a bush leaguer. They are talking matrimony but there are lots of reasons unconnected to love that a woman might agree to that. Particularly single moms. I mean, they were talking about buying a house together...

Walk away, LW

Amy,

Running a little hot today?

If he really thinks she's using him and not putting anywhere near as much into the relationship as she's demanding (and it happens!), then he's being a bit unfairly judged here.

Why is it that single moms can say 'my kids are the most important thing to me' and then use it as an excuse to treat anyone else (particularly their men friends) shabbily because hey, if I treat them as well as my kids, I MUST be taking something away from them.

It doesn't work that way. Love and respect and caring isn't a pie with one or another getting a smaller slice. It seems a common failing among single moms to keep the guy's piece small just so he doesn't get 'unreasonable expectations'.

Does she not want kids or does she not want kids with him?

Amy's right. This is something that needs to be brought up way before there's a marriage proposal.

Quite frankly its a conversation that needed to come up before he met her kids.

Shes not wrong for not wanting more kids.

He isnt wrong for wanting a child of his own.

I do think he is wrong for issuing an ultimatum. Hopefully he just issued it to Amy and not your girlfreind, ultimatums kill relationships

If he wants kids, he should marry someone else. They aren't compatible.

And to the person who said he is getting a good deal because he gets to raise these kids and is off the hook for child support... I doubt it. Bet if they got divorced he'd still have to pay child support, it sometimes happens with stepkids depending on the set up they've got going on, like if he adopts them.

If he's gonna be on the hook for some kids, they may as well be his. I know lots of couples where the woman wanted to adopt, but the man didn't. I realize it is anecdotal but maybe there's something about raising a kid that isnt theirs genetically that men don't like.

The only pro of his situation is that without a child of his own he can get out of the situation more easily when he finds being a step isn't so easy.

NicoleK,

There is no 'easy'

I had a friend in a similar circumstance. He was shacking up with a woman with two kids. Meh on the woman, loved the kids. I told him to run. He didn't. He suffered.

If he's emotionally bonded with the woman and her kids so much so that he's thinking of buying a house with her and wanting her to be the mother of HIS kid, then it really sucks to be him. He isn't seeing all the woeful things that Amy is going on about. He sees someone he loves enough to have a baby with him acting as if she doesn't feel the same way about him.

I know you said 'more easily' but that's like asking if you'd prefer being drawn and quartered or just hanged.

I do think he is wrong for issuing an ultimatum. Hopefully he just issued it to Amy and not your girlfreind, ultimatums kill relationships

I totally agree.

Now...how is what she told him any less of an ultimatum?

She said she didnt want kids and gave a list of reasons, technically, according to the LW's letter to Amy she never said "never"

He on the other hand basically told his girlfriend get pregnat or get get gone with no wiggle room or even discussion between those two choices.

I think there's a difference between issuing an ultimatum and delineating dealbreakers. The difference, I believe, is in intent. An ultimatum is manipulation: holding something over someone's head so he or she does what you want. I don't think LW's girlfriend was saying "If you want to marry me, you have to give up your dream of having a biological child." From LW's description, it was more "If you need a biological child, then I'm not the woman for you." There's a difference between being forthright and being manipulative. To use an example that's come up in Amy's column before: it's the difference between "If you really want to be with me, you'll move to Budapest" and "I need to move to Budapest, and it's up to you if that's a dealbreaker."

On the other hand, it might be him who doesn't want to commit. He knows or suspects that she doesn't want to have kids, and voila, instant escape hatch....

This idea the LW has that she thinks he isn't "good enough" to have a kid with. . . he sounds very self-centered and not a little paranoid. This isn't about him. She has perfectly valid reasons for not wanting more kids, and they'd apply no matter who was asking her to have them. If she really thought he wasn't good enough but someone else was, she wouldn't be planning to marry him--she'd be looking for that someone else.

Of course they need to split up because their goals are incompatible, but beyond that, she should dump him because these character traits of his will poison the relationship sooner than later.

And there's no good way to compromise when one of you wants one kid and the other wants none.

Pretty much what I was going to say NumberSix. LW, neither of you is "right or wrong" (if there's some rule that says committing to a relationship is tacit agreement to produce your own biological children, I'm in big trouble). You've just hit an issue on which there is no way to compromise.

It happens, like if one partner wants to live in the country and the other loves city life. One or the other of you decides you can live with the other's decision, or you break up. That's just the way it is, it's not about fair or right. And yeah, that's a less than fun decision to make. At least she's telling you. Maybe you or her haven't been clear or discussed it before, but better late than never.

I don't want kids - ever - and as Amy recommends, I bring that up very early - first date or (in the case of setups etc) even before. Nicely and casually, but there's no point in me wasting the time of someone looking for a father.

Wow, this is one you don't see everyday. It's actually grotesque....LW was born several decades too late for his wishes. He has such a proprietary attitude over his girlfriend's reproductive features. Thankfully, in this country the girlfriend has the right to refuse. What a wonderful way to build a relationship, the "If you truly loved me, you would...." Sorry LW, you're coming across as a petulant brat. Thankfully, your (for-now) girlfriend has years of parenting practice to develop the wherewithal to hold out against your demands. I imagine you stomping your feet in frustration that SHE'S...JUST...NOT...LISTENING...TO..YOU!!!!!

Saul, you're off the mark. She's not looking for someone to support her and the kids. Go back and read again; she's doing perfectly fine on her own. In fact, she reads more stable than LW. Is he trying to force a permanent connection to this strong woman in utero?

Great comments all, and while I don't agree completely with all of them, I certainly understand them. What I haven't seen discussed here are how long LW and the woman have been together, and how close he and the children have become.

I understand LW's desire for biological children, up to a point. But Miss Alkon's right, too: Pregnancy's a lot to ask of any woman -- I've seen that. But "father" isn't simply something you are by way of biology. It's something you decide to do. I've got both step- and biological children, and they're all flesh and blood to me.

"This woman has decided that the guy is a good-enough-to-settle-for beta who can work a career in order to support her kids, and is unwilling to give him even a single child."

Did you miss the part where he said she's financially stable and owns her own home? She's not asking him to support her and her kids. Even if she was, she doesn't "owe" him a kid.

It never ceases to amaze me how people so incompatible find each other. Highly sexed people marry people who dislike sex; people who want kids end up with those who don't, and so forth.

These things MUST be discussed before you become intimately involved with each other, and certainly not with children.

I'm also bothered by his attitude about "her" kids vs. "their" child. My husband is a stepdad, yet he calls my kids (ages 17 and 21) "our kids". They've been in his life only 3.5 years, but he has bonded with them. Whenever I hear him tell people "we have two kids", it warms my heart.

Perhaps LW's gf is picking up on this too, and it may play a part in her decision.

She doesn't want to procreate with this guy. This guy wants to procreate.

What could be more clear? Move on, letterwriter. And don't for an instant take her back when she comes to you and says, "Oh, okay, if you are going to dump me, let's have a kid."

You would be setting yourself up for 20 years of quiet resentment.

He on the other hand basically told his girlfriend get pregnat or get get gone with no wiggle room or even discussion between those two choices.

What a scurrilous awful miserable cad he is! How DARE he think for even a second that a married couple might actually procreate?

What horrible cheek!

Look, he isn't a bad guy! He's more then willing to tie himself emotionally, sexually and financially to someone, even raising her bastards (to put it into emotional context) but what he wants (not demands, but wants) from the marriage is not an irrational expectation by any means!

Essentially he's ordering a hamburger but she's telling him he's getting one with no bun in the oven. Fine for epicurial oddities like Amy (in both senses of the word) but not so much as a normal expectation.

I'm glad this got out of the way BEFORE a marriage.

And why are we so dismissive of HIS reasons for wanting a kid, from biological imperative, to social expectations, to just the emotional bond and the young childhood years of helping bend a branch to become a tree?

Her reasons are 'valid' but his aren't? Please!

I agree they shouldn't be together but this desperate attempt to make him out to be horrible is just wrong.

elementary:
Nope he doesn't get morning sickness or give birth. But maybe he does rub swollen feet and run out to relieve her cravings at 2 a.m. and learn to cook healthy meals and gain sympathy weight along with her and handle all the housework if she's stuck on bed rest and pay the bills when she can't work as a result and pore over baby books and take birthing classes or. .

Yeah its amazaing how that 9 months of carrying and several hours of giving birth to a child somehow translates into him having no part in raising that child...

@Lovelysoul: "I'm also bothered by his attitude about 'her' kids vs. 'their' child ... Perhaps LW's gf is picking up on this too, and it may play a part in her decision."

Good call, Lovelysoul. People need to understand that if you marry a person with kids, you'd better be prepared to "marry" the kids as well. It can be hard to find your place in the childrens' lives, depending on whether the other parent is still living, how close the children are to him or her, etc., but you've got to figure it out somehow, and you can't allow yourself to elevate any "new" children above the ones you married into, just because they're your flesh and blood.

Flydye, the dude isn't horrible; I think most people can see where he's coming from, but he's not showing his best side here, either.

flydye - a number of us are not saying he's horrible, just that his request to Amy to adjudicate "who is right or wrong here?" is the wrong question. He's looking for a Judge Judy to decide who should cave in. And that's not the way to go.

Of course his reasons are valid - a valid reason for him to find someone who wants kids with him. Asking who the bad guy is is not valid.

(Hey, a grammatically correct "is is"! "That that" and "had had" are ten-a-penny.)

@ lovelysoul and RPM Daddy

Yes, but can you point to anything in the letter except for a desire of a genetic heir of his own to support the conclusion he's going to mistreat the first two? He can have many motives which are don't involve favoritism for wanting his own child.

I actually have a fact that disputes that point: that the single mom was more then willing to marry and buy a house with him. That seems to me to indicate that there isn't a problem except for one.

And I agree. Most people have the 'too bad, so sad' thing of a direct incomptability. A few are acting as if a husband expecting his wife to actually procreate with him is some sort of knuckle dragging form of Neo-Muslim female oppression. To them I say: Get a grip.

This is a very simple case of 2 people's goals not meshing. He needs to move on to someone who does want a child with him, she needs to find a man willing to raise others but not have his own. No need for either of them getting ugly trying to force the other's hand. Move on. Move on. Move on now.

Ltw,

I agree. He shouldn't have asked that question.

This guy seems to be going beyond the call of duty here and I don't think he's getting a whole lot of credit. (Yes, Amy gave him a head nod...eventually...)

Move on, letterwriter. And don't for an instant take her back when she comes to you and says, "Oh, okay, if you are going to dump me, let's have a kid."

You would be setting yourself up for 20 years of quiet resentment.

Oh so true! There is no 'win' here.

'baby vending machine' - love it.

Just this morning, I was reading "Molecular Biology Made Simple and Fun." It seems like every living thing from mindless virus to mindful human, all want the same thing. To inject their replication devices into a host that will one day burst with the genes of the injector. (Oh, that was kind of hot.)

What I didn't read in this heartfelt and touching letter was anything about love. About how it would crush this man to have to leave the woman of dreams if he had to choose between her and venturing out to find a woman who would would have his gene replicant.

I didn't read anything about how amazing are the 2 present girls. In fact, this letter kind of reminded me of when a male lion takes over another pride and kills the current offspring so that the he can promote his own genetic line.

So, with so little love felt in this letter (this feels more like a tit for tat relationship in his mind), I think that he should dump her today and go find the woman who will bear his children.

David,

You do realize that Amy vigorously edits these things before we see them, don't you?

God flydye you take stupid pills this morning? No one suggested he would mistreat her kids. No one has said this guy is wrong for wanting kids, and as far as I can tell I'm the only one who said he was wrong, but only in the way in which he told her. Ultimatums never work

And just because she was willing to buy as house together and move in with him before they had a real conversation about more kids is not proof that she was tryig to pull a bait and switch

I have to agree that there was a lot of bashing in some of the comments here(even more than the last column where a mom screwed her 25 year old daughter's ex, strangely enough). Like others I can understand those comments, too. I will say, though, that I really hate it when women whip out the "carried for 9 months" card. Can a man ever, ever fully understand what that is? No. But do we have to use it like some end-all get-out-of-jail-free card to arguments involving men and children?

Reminds me of the play "What's done in the dark" where a man tells a woman that he is paying thousands of dollars in child support and wonders why 5 and 8 year old children would need that much. He says he thinks that if men pay child support women should have to give receipts to show what they are using all that money for so they know it is going towards the kids. The woman whips out her "carried for 9 months card" like that's that, screw your receipts.

Anyway, I think both sides, the LW and his GF have reasonable terms. LW: time to move on. Do you love her? Yes. Do you love her kids? Yes. But she's not the one for you. Did she outright say "no way no more kids"? No. But should you hang around for X more years while she tries to make up her mind? No. It could be worth it for you if she decides to do it. But it could go the opposite and you've wasted some prime years with no one to blame but yourself.

Why is it that single moms can say 'my kids are the most important thing to me' and then use it as an excuse to treat anyone else (particularly their men friends) shabbily because hey, if I treat them as well as my kids, I MUST be taking something away from them.

@flydye, are you talking about the LW and his girlfriend? I saw nothing in the letter (which I'm aware Amy has edited) to suggest that the girlfriend is treating him shabbily. I think they should both walk away from each other (no way to compromise in this situation) -- but I see no indication that she's using him or being demanding or treating him badly. It's always interesting to see how differently we all interpret these letters.

"kid pro quo"

I love that!

Wow, so many unhinged goddesses here today!

To NumberSix:

>>She doesn't owe him a child, even just a teeny, tiny, single child. As if having just one kid is a compromise if one of the parties doesn't want any.

Guess what? Having a child of his own is the primary reason for a man to get married. No other reason is relevant in 95% of cases. It was this way thousands of years --- man own his wife livelihood and the woman own her husband bearing his children --- as many as he wishes. And it will be this way for a long time to come after the current generation of misandric females goes into history books as a blip of derangement.

To Amy:
>>I wouldn't have a baby for ANYONE.
This explains a lot of dry nonsense in this advice dispensary. A vast ocean of human experience is thus not connected to this fountain of wisdom.

To LW --- run. This case is not about being wrong or right, ethical or not. You want a child. Find a woman who would like the same.

lujlp

God flydye you take stupid pills this morning?

Yes, they make the aftertaste of the morning vodka go away.

No one suggested he would mistreat her kids.

Mmm. Both RPM Daddy and lovelysoul suggested this was some way to 'get one of his own' at a cost to the original two. 'Mistreat' is a little strong, which is why I also used 'favoritism' in the post

as far asI can tell I'm the only one who said he was wrong

I didn't say wrong: I said paint him as a 'self centered and slightly paranoid' who has 'got some baggage'. You know, a 'grotesque' who 'stomps his feet' in a 'childish manner' 'dangling houses for a baby.' A real mercenary scum.

But you know, those stupid pills make you delusional. (Yes this is slightly out of context. I'm still not making this up)

And since we're being technical: He didn't tell her to get out if she didn't start squirting out kids chop chop. He said he was postponing marriage supposedly until they figured this out (Or as some of the letter writers suggested, until he held his breath until his face turned blue)

sofar,

I have one fact which sustantiates that position: the LW specifically wonders if she's treating him that way.

Now you can come down one of two ways: He is a hypersensitive brat or she's actually made him have some doubt about her commitment to the relationship.

It is a personal preference.

I'm about to take this on a slightly bizarre tangent but...
I'd hate for LW to bail on what sounds like an otherwise great relationship solely because he wants biological children and his GF does not (currently)...because infertility is way more common than he probably realizes... and even if he leaves her and meets someone else, there is NO guarantee that he will ever actually have a biological child.
I agree that if a biological child is a deal breaker, it's a deal breaker... but I think he should think long and hard about WHY the biological factor is so important to him.

Instant Family! Just add Daddy!

I don't think either of them is wrong. I think that girlfriend is someone who knows what she wants (or what she doesn't want), and that's good. I also think it's perfectly reasonable that LW wants to start a family including biological children with his future wife.

I wouldn't have married someone who didn't want kids. I guess that makes me an evil control freak obsessed with my husband's reproductive system. This is something we discussed before getting married.

I don't think it is unreasonable for her to not want more kids. I don't think it is unreasonable for him to want them. They both want different things.

It's very sad. But frankly I understand the desire for biological kids. And yes some people are infertile and that sucks, they drew a bad card, but failing to meet your goals together is different than going into a marriage knowing the person doesn't have the same goals as you.

Having a kid, or not, is such a huge part of life that people really need to be on the same page.

With all the women complaining that they can't find a man who wants to settle down and have a family, this guy should be golden.

... and yes of course it sucks when a relationship ends. But it happens to most of us.

The reason this thread is getting more debate is because there's nothing to debate in the other one... pretty much everyone thinks sleeping with your kid's ex is sleazy. No point in expressing outrage when we all agree.

Well said Amy. I don't want kids either. I'm well aware this limits my choices. Especially in late thirties where most women my age are hearing "tick, tick". That's the way it is. I don't complain about it.

Guess what? Having a child of his own is the primary reason for a man to get married. No other reason is relevant in 95% of cases. It was this way thousands of years --- man own his wife livelihood and the woman own her husband bearing his children --- as many as he wishes.

Mere Mortal - "as many as he wishes"? This woman is supporting herself and two kids. She has no reason to subordinate herself to a man's preferences, and she doesn't owe him anything. He can take that or leave it. You seem to be under the impression that she will be the loser here if they break up. I think the guy who believes his gf is being selfish is the one with the problem that needs to be corrected.

If I were him, I'd take it. I don't want my own babies, but I love kids and I'd seriously consider a single mother with reasonably grown up children.

I don't buy the idea that she wasn't aware that he wanted kids of his own. That's just not realistic. He's taking care of her kids, they're talking about buying a house together, and in all that time there was no indication that he wanted kids? Come on. This is a guy who obviously has a strong opinion on the matter and has thought about it. She must have known, or have had enough reason to suspect that she would have asked. What's more likely is that she let him believe what he wanted and then sprang this on him hoping that he'd stay anyway.

If the sexes were reversed here and it was a man with kids who was telling a young women that they could never have children together, I think that the implausibility of him not suspecting and not asking would be evident.

BTW, it isn't the pushing the kid out that is the worst bit, its the contractions.

I think the last two paragraphs of this response are spot on.

But I don't see the need to precede them with quite personal attacks on the author as if it's some kind of idiocy to expect to have children with one's own wife. The very notion that men don't have as much right to want kids with their spouse as women do, because women have to bear the inconvenience of pregnancy or pain of childbirth, is particularly offensive. I bet there are countless divorced dads all over the world who would happily take on this burden in return for the almost automatic right to custody that women get if a relationship breaks down, so please don't make out that men are unfairly privileged here.

But I don't see the need to precede them with quite personal attacks on the author

Hilarious. They're nothing of the sort. They simply explain why a woman might not want to have kids.

The notion that men "don't have as much right to want kids" is just a silly thing to say. You have every right to want to become the next international pop star, let alone a parent. It's best if you find somebody who shares your want.

at Ltw

>>She has no reason to subordinate herself to a man's preferences, and she doesn't owe him anything.
Agreed. I never said she owes him anything.
But then they are not married. Marriage is a different concept from that of partnership,
last fifty years of culture-destructing legislating not withstanding.

>>You seem to be under the impression that she will be the loser here if they break up.
I am not. I think he will be if they stay together.

>>If I were him, I'd take it. I don't want my own babies, but I love kids and I'd seriously consider a single mother with reasonably grown up children.

It is difficult to imagine being a woman if you are a man and the other way around as well.

@Amy

>>"This explains a lot of dry nonsense in this advice dispensary." It explains nothing. I give advice to people with great frequency that has nothing to do with how I live my life.

Ahh, being a goddess makes it difficult to receive an advice!
Amy, saying "I wouldn't have a baby for ANYONE"
makes you far apart from majority of women, so your advice in this respect is bookish. Please, take this into account when dispensing an advice.

>>What should I have said, "Spread your legs and throw away the diaphragm, Bitch, and just deal with not wanting to have your entire life play out as somebody's mommy"?
No. If she does not want his children then she should not marry him, if having his children is his idea of a marriage.

>>Am I "unfair" for not wanting one at all, or is that simply my choice?
No. It is a personal choice. To use term "marriage" when it is not describing the essence of a relationship would be, but you are not doing that.

"They simply explain why a woman might not want to have kids."

These explanations seem pretty trivial and selfish to me. You're scoffing at the author for not taking account of them, when he may simply have believed them too pathetic a set of reasons to give them serious weight (rightly so, in my view).

"You have every right to want to become the next international pop star, let alone a parent. It's best if you find somebody who shares your want."

I strongly agree. Having made this mistake once he'd be dumb to ignore your advice in future. But this is as true for her as for him: if she expects a man who will raise her children as her own AND not want any biological children, she should have spelled this out a little sooner, too. It seems to me the author is far more accommodating than she is, and she far less reasonable. You're treating this as a matter of two people with very different goals not getting along. I'd say it's more like a pretty admirable guy (based on what little we know) finding that the woman to whom he's devoted so much hasn't half the character and selflessness that he has. Let's assign a little blame here! :-)

"Yes, but can you point to anything in the letter except for a desire of a genetic heir of his own to support the conclusion he's going to mistreat the first two?"

I never suggested he would mistreat them, but there is also no mention of him being fond of them. Frankly, even if I wanted more kids badly, I would be hesitant to have them with a man who wasn't bonding well with the ones I already had. It's a recipe for disaster if the guy doesn't show a true interest in the kids that aren't biologically is.

And there's something about these statements that seem loaded with resentment:

"I think she's being selfish, seeing me as good enough to help raise her two girls but not good enough to have a child with. I want a child who's genetically related to me, who I can raise and form from the start."

Maybe it's just me, but the whole "form from the start" thing is troubling. Kids are always forming. They are certainly not formed by age 5 or 10. I took this as meaning he isn't entirely happy with how these kids are "formed" and thinks he'll do better starting with a fresh one that's "his."

If you marry a woman with kids, you marry her kids too. You can't view them as experimental prototypes that didn't turn out well because they lack your genes. It's the folly of new parents who believe "good genes" are going to give them an easy childrearing experience or produce better kids.

I'd feel differently if he'd said anything positive about the girls, but the ommission concerns me.

His choice is to not marry her. To whine that she's being unfair for not wanting another child is ridiculous.

@Amy, exactly. People are freaking out because "OMG, he wants kids of his own, why is that so wrong???" And I think they're missing the point:

The problem here isn't that he wants kids -- but that he seems hellbent on sticking around and trying to change her mind.

I concede that she could have taken the first step and broken up with him, knowing that her goals won't make him happy. But she's laid out her plans and goals as plain as day -- and it seems he's the one who is choosing to stick around.

"You're treating this as a matter of two people with very different goals not getting along. I'd say it's more like a pretty admirable guy (based on what little we know) finding that the woman to whom he's devoted so much hasn't half the character and selflessness that he has."

That is ridiculous. LW never said she mislead him about wanting children, which I think he would've mentioned in the first few sentences ("she told me when we first began dating, she wanted them, but now, she's changed her mind").

No, LW assumed, probably since she already had kids, that she loves kids and wanted more. They both were foolish for not discussing this upfront, but expecially the LW because this is obviously a dealbreaker for him, whereas she might've presumed, since he didn't bring it up (and doesn't seem that fond of her kids), that he wasn't adamant about having kids.

@lovelysoul
>>No, LW assumed, probably since she already had kids, that she loves kids and wanted more.

No, LW assumed that if she wants to marry him, she would like to have his child. Every non-metrosexual man would assume the same.

Things may not play out in "shoulds" in life, but "shoulds" do help us decide what is reasonable and fair to expect.

If a man had written to you saying "My girlfriend attacks me with knives every week and I have asked her to stop, but she has no intention of doing so", you'd be right to tell him to leave her. But you'd be wrong to treat it as simply a case of incompatibility and each not quite being right for the other. The problem is that one partner's behaviour is abhorrent. The woman in this story isn't as bad as a knife-wielding maniac, but she's a selfish and unreasonable person, and her incompatibility with the author is a symptom of that.

"And to the person who said he is getting a good deal because he gets to raise these kids and is off the hook for child support... I doubt it. Bet if they got divorced he'd still have to pay child support, it sometimes happens with stepkids depending on the set up they've got going on, like if he adopts them."

Depending on the jurisdiction, adoption may not even be necessary to be stuck paying child support for her kids. There is a legal principle called in loco parentis, Latin for "in the place of a parent".

I supported my second wife's kids for four years and would have been on the hook for child support until they were 18 or finished university. She wanted to keep the house so badly, I was able to trade the house and taking responsibility for our loans to get out of the support.

BTW, the kids father was supposed to be paying support, but rarely did. Getting support from the bio father would not have affected her ability to bleed me as well.

I certainly don't think the LW is unreasonable for having the hope or expectation of children in a marriage. From my point of view, there's no other good reason for a man to even bother to get married. If I ever had any delusions about getting married again, it would ONLY be so that I could have another biokid and raise him/her in a stable home.

At the risk of sounding ogre-ish, I've been in relationships (short and long term) with single mothers. In no case did I feel remotely about their kids like I do about my own daughter. I realized this with the last single mom I dated, who had twin boys, and decided at that time to only date childless women. Life's been much easier since then.

The LW just needs to realize that he and the girlfriend don't share the same goals in life, and move on. I doubt he'll have much trouble finding a young childless woman who'd like to get married, buy a house in a good school district, and populate it with kids. Women like that are a dime a dozen, at least in my experience, and far less complicated to deal with than a woman who started popping out kids in high school.

There's no way in he'll that she didn't know that he wanted kids. What woman isn't going to ask about that? This whole debate is kind of stupid.

Perhaps she did know he wanted kids, but then realized, maybe due to the terrible economy, or concerns about his character, that it would be an irresponsible thing to do. Sounds like she already had kids under less than ideal circumstances, so she fully understands this. She's built herself up to be able to provide a home for her two kids, but it probably was a struggle.

I mean, we don't know what LW is bringing to the table. He says SHE is financially stable but is he? Does he have a lot of debt, or is he unemployed...maybe he's struggling musician, or unreliable with money.

The girlfriend sites very valid reasons for not having a child, finances being no small matter when there's already two kids to support. To call her "selfish" for thinking ahead is completely unwarranted.

Maybe before calling the whole relationship off, LW could think about ways he could help her feel better about the choice to have a child. Is he willing to pitch in both financially and sharing the bruden of childcare...or will it mostly fall to her?

Also, does he put an inordinate amount of emphasis on her physical appearance? That is one thing she sites - what it will do to her body - and as a petite mom of two, that's no small matter either. My ex made me feel ashamed of my stretch marks and saggy tummy - by comparing me to other, hotter women. I eventually had a tummy tuck, but this isn't something that's affordable to most.

Deep down, she may be worried or insecure about these things. She might, in fact, be willing to have another child if she felt the relationship was more stable.

But the last way you want to have a child is by calling your partner "selfish" for not having one.

There's no way in he'll that she didn't know that he wanted kids. What woman isn't going to ask about that? This whole debate is kind of stupid.

Maybe she did know, but she's not the one writing in with the problem.

1) He can stay and accept that he won't have kids 2) He can leave and find someone who wants them, or 3) He can stay and hope to change her mind, dealing with the consequences if he can't and likely making them both miserable.

Even if she had promised him an SUV full of his own biological children and changed her mind later, these remain his options.

The LW is obviously hooked up with the wrong girl if having his own kid is a deal breaker so he should end the relationship and blame no one as the choice to have a kid or not is a deal-breaker.

It's certainly not a matter of selfishness on either end but more a matter of starting the kid path at very different times in life. She's been walking that responsibility laden path for 10 years already while he has been enjoying the life of a free wheeling single guy. She ain't never had that time to herself and she ain't going back for more now...

But as a Dad... I can say the joy of having kids right from birth was certainly a ride worth taking and I wouldn't have missed it for the world, so I can understand LW's hunger for that experience.

Find a woman that wants what you want. It seems fairly simple to me.

Just to be clear, I don't think the LW is at all unreasonable or selfish for wanting his own kid, or for making that a dealbreaker in the relationship. The red flag is that he sees her refusal as being about him.

Slightly off-topic, I have some advice for the girlfriend: if you're serious about not wanting more kids, do something to make sure it won't happen, like having your tubes tied. One of my neighbors was a divorced mother of three with no intention of having more when we moved here. Nine months after break-up sex with her boyfriend, she became a mother of four.

This letter is a bit depressing. Either he gives up his love, or his future child. Either way, it is very sad.

Said Lovelysoul: "Maybe before calling the whole relationship off, LW could think about ways he could help her feel better about the choice to have a child."

Or maybe he could think about ways he could help himself feel better about the choice not to. Either way might be helpful.

Again, nothing in the letter states how close LW is to his girlfriend's children, but considering that there could be four broken hearts in the future, LW and his girlfriend need to tread very carefully.

And you're right, NicoleK, this is really sad. This is one of the saddest letters I've seen here.

I don't think she's being intentionally unethical here.

And I hate to make assumptions, but lets assume for a moment since they both sound like fairly rational people, that they've been together for awhile and both were dating with the idea they might get married at some point.

Now most people plan on having kids at some point if they intend to marry. She has had kids already, 2 of them, and it doesn't sound like there is a biological father in the picture.

It also sounds like he doesn't mind being a father to them.

But the LW describes her statement as coming out of the blue when the wedding notion came up.

If that is the case, than whatever her intentions were from the get go, if I were that guy I'd be a bit upset myself.

I don't know many men that wouldn't want a son or daughter of their own, a little piece of themselves to leave behind and watch grow up. Perhaps some of it is simple testosterone fueled ego. But so what?

Does she "owe" him a child in the debt collection agency sense of the word? No.

But is it really fair either, to expect a man to spend his life at fatherhood and husbanding and building a household with her, and tell him just when the talk of marriage begins that his genetic line will die with him?

At least she was honest before they married. Hence why I don't think this is something deliberately cruel.

He's at fault too, he should have raised the subject much much sooner, neither one of them are really unreasonable in their life goals, and I don't blame him for his ultimatum. Its a deal breaking situation, and he's handling it rationally. Its to big a deal for him to let go of this particular desire, and if it is to much for her to give him what he wants on this one, they're essentially over.

Better now than later I suppose.

I have to agree with Nicole and RPM though...Its really a very sad thing. Probably the saddest letter I've seen come in here, usually they either irk me with stupidity or make me laugh at the insanity...but this is really just sorrowful.

With all the women complaining that they can't find a man who wants to settle down and have a family, this guy should be golden.

Posted by: NicoleK

Yeah Nicole, but most of those women are crazy, ugly, mean, or offputtingly desperate - or some horrible combo of the four

Plaxo, you ever hear that ols saying biut making assumtions?

I'd be willing to bet the real story is they both circled around each others positions as slowly as possible hoping the other would come around without having to really talk about the issue.

I dont know why people avoid the big conversations, they happen eventually

Just where do we draw the line? If she says yes to 1 more child, who is to say that 2 more years down the line, he begs for another? If she said yes once, is he allowed to hound her into more? At what point does a woman finally draw the line? For this woman, her line is clearly drawn.

LW doesn't exactly say how long they have dated; it could be 3 months, it could be 3 years. Waiting till the marriage proposal to proclaim your intentions on parenthood is kind of odd though, unless LW dated her for only a short time and is still finding out about her. If this is the case, LW should count his blessings and move on to find someone who shares his view on DNA.

It's not as if he has been proclaiming loudly and often to her that he wants children of his own. It really sounds like they *just* got around to discussing this all-important topic. Can't blame her, when she's got her hands full with running a house, working full-time, raising 2 kids, and all that goes with the single mom thing.

You don't have to be crazy to be a psychiatrist, but in the case of having a baby, anyone who hasn't actually gone through pregnancy and childbirth simply does not know what it is like, not even by reading about it. Even surgical birth is like rending a rainbow out of a stormcloud. I laughed at the mack truck visual Amy painted, but a better description is that it's more like squeezing a watermelon out through a straw.

In LW's case, he should stop calling the g/f "selfish". This, truly, sounds like they are not a match, if he really thinks his g/f is selfish to not want a 3rd child, no matter whose DNA it carries. The question of children is a dealbreaker for many. He should lick his wounds and breathe a sigh of relief that he found out before he signed the marriage licence.

LW is among the kajillions of people, men and women alike, who want their own children, children made up of their own DNA, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with this desire. I can say from my own experience, years back when we thought we couldn't have children, and then started the lengthy process of adoption. We were near the end of the mountain of paperwork necessary for adopting when *bingo* i found out i was pregnant... i cannot tell you how ecstatic we were to know that the child that would come into our home would be our own. It's a preference many people have, and it's neither right nor wrong.

Neither one of these people is in the right, nor in the wrong. They have their preferences. LW should take Amy's advice and next time, ask early on in the dating process in order to avoid this heartbreaking scenario.

Amy, saying "I wouldn't have a baby for ANYONE"
makes you far apart from majority of women, so your advice in this respect is bookish. Please, take this into account when dispensing an advice.

By that logic any advice Amy gives a man would be bookish, and advice a non drug user has on drugs would be immiterial, and anyone who hasnt been murdered cant really say if they'd object to experianceing it for themselves.

And really think about what you wrote, you just said a woman who doesnt want to have kids doesnt understand why another woman wouldnt want to have kids.

Do you not see the huge hole in your reasoning there?

These explanations seem pretty trivial and selfish to me.

Right Peter, because possible death, deffinate physical trauma, 20+years of legal responsibility, 25+yrs of finacial responsibility, 6+yrs of regullary sleep deprived nights, thats pretty trivial alright.

You're scoffing at the author for not taking account of them,

Why shouldnt she scoff at the author? The aiuthor scoffed at the reasons

when he may simply have believed them too pathetic a set of reasons to give them serious weight (rightly so, in my view).

Right, because the woman who already had two kids has far less expericnce with the process then the guy who cant have one on his own and has never been around a woman while she is gestating, so why should he even entertain the notion of having real discussion on her points

"But is it really fair either, to expect a man to spend his life at fatherhood and husbanding and building a household with her, and tell him just when the talk of marriage begins that his genetic line will die with him?"

That's a little melodramatic. For one thing, we don't know how long they've been dating, or how serious they were before now.

I'd agree it would be unethical if she had waited until after marriage to tell him this...or dated him for several years pretending she wanted more kids, only to spring it on him later. So, in this particular case the length of time they've been dating really matters.

But these discussions are perfectly normal ones to have when a couple is beginning to consider marriage. Ideally before, but certainly at this time. She has absolutely done the right thing to be upfront and honest with him once talk turned to marriage.

LW actually doesn't say they are engaged to be married, just that they "began making plans" which I take as early discussions. He apparently hasn't proposed, nor has she accepted. That's important to remember.

Depending on how long they've been dating, the girlfriend may not have even realized he was this serious about her. Maybe she didn't think he wanted to marry her - a single mother of two - so her feelings about having kids was irrelevant. A woman isn't mandated to share her procreational plans with every guy she dates.

My guess, based on her age, and his insecurity, is that this hasn't been a long relationship, so he likely hasn't lost a lot of time. He should chalk it up to experience and make sure that he tells future girlfriends that having children is extremely important to him.

Because it's truly not to a lot of men. My husband never wanted kids, and I've dated men who were ambivalent, at best, about it.

If a man had written to you saying "My girlfriend attacks me with knives every week and I have asked her to stop, but she has no intention of doing so", you'd be right to tell him to leave her. But you'd be wrong to treat it as simply a case of incompatibility and each not quite being right for the other. -Peter

What the fuck was THAT?

Not wanting to hav e a third child is like stabbing a guy repeatedly with a knife?

Are you insane?

Oodles of women want to have kids. It's harder to find women who don't.

Posted by: Amy Alkon

Damn near impossible

"Oodles of women want to have kids. It's harder to find women who don't."

Well, except for the women who've already had them. That is more common.

I think most women have a number in their head, sometimes as early as grade school. Some only want 2, some want 4, or 6. Many of my childhood friends actually stuck pretty close to their number.

This has a lot to do with personality. So, a woman who is a 2 kid type person just isn't interested in having a 3rd. She knows her limits.

@lujlp
>>Do you not see the huge hole in your reasoning there?

It would be a hole if bookish knowledge was worth nothing. I don't think so, but I think it has limitations that require additional analysis to make any specific advice relevant.

@Amy
>>FYI to all who think you need to have an experience to advise on it: Humans have the capacity for abstract thought and application of reason to problems that are not their own.

Some things do require experience to dispense advice. For example, an advice on problems with meditation can go beyond bookish stuff only if given by someone experienced in meditation.
Abstract thought is good for well developed theoretical disciplines, like road construction.
And, having a capacity for something is not the same as actual performance of that something.

I found Amy's advice to be sensible mostly in matters of dating.

When Amy states "I wouldn't have a baby for ANYONE" it means that there are blank spots in her world-view that extend far beyond the area defined by "having a vagina."

He's more focused on what he perceives as her rejection of him than he is on her (very logical) reasons for not wanting kids. He's hearing, "Yeah, I was willing to have kids with this/these other losers, but no way I'm having YOUR baby."

I do think they need to re-evalute their relationship and think carefully about whether they should stay together. It could be worth pointing out that having a child with a devoted partner is not the same experience as being a single mother. Then again, she's been a mom since she was 17, and right now she's on track to finally have some adult freedom by the time she's 40.

Tip number 1, if you want to have (new) kids, find a woman who also wants to have (new) kids.

Maybe he feels entitled to something 'in return' because he's willing to be the dad to the struggling single mother. Regardless of the merits of that viewpoint, it isn't going to make her want something she doesn't want. You and her on a pretty different page about something extremely fundamental about what types of relationship you each want. She's not likely to "come round" or "get used to the idea".

It doesn't end after 9 months either ... then it's having her nipples sucked till they're cracked and bleeding, not getting proper sleep, lots of screaming and crying, changing diapers, wiping snotty noses etc. And, a woman in fact risks her life going through the process, and other entertaining possibilities like permanent incontinence.

"And why are we so dismissive of HIS reasons for wanting a kid, from biological imperative, to social expectations, to just the emotional bond and the young childhood years of helping bend a branch to become a tree?"

I'm not at all dismissive of his reasons for wanting a kid. But the simple practical and immovable reality is that no matter how valid his reasons might be, pursuing it with a woman who doesn't want the same thing, is only going to end badly. If you want KFC do you go to Burger King?

Still, I'd like an explination on his reasoning that you as a woman who doenst want kids, doenst really understand(except in a bookish way) why another woman wouldnt want kids.

Still, I'd like an explination on his reasoning that you as a woman who doenst want kids, doenst really understand(except in a bookish way) why another woman wouldnt want kids.

I think you were supposed to forget about that.

See? Polygamy makes sense.

Get married, and then bring in a younger wife too. More parents around to take care of kids, and hubbie is happy, and Wife #1 is happy on not having more kids, and Wife #2 gets the kids she wants.

My advice to this poor guy. He is not wrong for wanting a child of his own but be careful what you wish for.

I have a cousin who had one child from his first marriage who he never got to see. Not his fault, but unfortunate because the first wife has a serious screw loose.
He met a woman had finally gotten a divorce after several years of having kids with a total looser. One of the kids was an adult and the other two were 14 and 12. He asked her to marry him, and the understanding was that they would have one more kid for "both" of them, and he would get his chance to be a parent.
He spent thousands of dollars dealing with the step children. One was in and out of reform school for several years. New baby was fine, and then two years later the wife is diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer. She is treated and OK for a couple of years until the cancer returns in her bones and he spends the next five years being a single parent while the wife and mother sleeps 18 hours a day on powerful pain killers until she finally dies when the kid is 10. (another good example why the five year survival milestone for cancer is a meaningless statistic)
My cousin is now 56 with serious health problems, and the kid is 12, totally undisciplined, who already weighs close to 250 pounds. My cousin is a pushover and has never been tough enough to be a decent parent. After getting what he though he wanted, his life is totally miserable.

Guess what? Having a child of his own is the primary reason for a man to get married. No other reason is relevant in 95% of cases. It was this way thousands of years --- man own his wife livelihood and the woman own her husband bearing his children --- as many as he wishes. And it will be this way for a long time to come after the current generation of misandric females goes into history books as a blip of derangement.

And that matters not one whit if the man who wants lots and lots of kids is with a woman who doesn't want more. I have no idea why you think I'm misandric and unhinged because I said the woman in question doesn't owe her boyfriend a child. I used the genders I did because that's the letter we have. Had we a letter where a woman was writing because her boyfriend with two kids didn't want more, my advice would be exactly the same: he doesn't owe you a child and you're not right for each other if you differ so vastly on this issue. Lobster's KFC/Burger King metaphor is apt: if this guy needs a biological child (which, as I've said before, is totally valid and reasonable), it's not fair of him to demand it from his girlfriend. That's square-peg-into-round-hole territory. If either one of them caves, it'll likely only damage them.

No one, regardless of gender, owes anyone a kid. MonicaP, luj, lovelysoul and others have it right: they should have had the conversation earlier, but the options remain the same. I think LW and his girlfriend actually were acting on the same impulse: I really love this person, so maybe I can change my mind or he/she will. It's understandable to want what you want from the person you want. Unfortunately, those two things don't always go together and it won't work to force them.

The bottom line is it takes two yes's to make a baby, and he's only got one. Move along, nothing to see here.

But THIS:

"No, LW assumed that if she wants to marry him, she would like to have his child. Every non-metrosexual man would assume the same."

Is the biggest pile of bullshit I have ever seen. There are LOTS of men who married women with no intention of ever procreating. Stop being such a neanderthal.

LW is not asking the right question.
Am I in the wrong here, or is she?

He is not wrong for wanting a child of his own begetting. She is not wrong for find 2 children enough.

They are different people with differing goals. It is right that they resolve this before marrying. It seems to me they have incompatible expectations and are only just now figuring that out. Ouch.

They need to have some honest communication about their goals, values and expectations to see if there are other issues (children, religion, financial, etc).

Is this relationship salvageable? I don't know. If both parties are firm in their "rightness" I would guess they are over.

"There are LOTS of men who married women with no intention of ever procreating. Stop being such a neanderthal."

There are lots of four leaf clovers, but as a percentage of the overall clover population, they are relatively few. Same with guys who marry but do not wish to procreate. Yes, they exist. How many are they relative to guys overall? Not many.

@lujlp
>>Still, I'd like an explination on his reasoning that you as a woman who doenst want kids, doenst really understand(except in a bookish way) why another woman wouldnt want kids.

I'd venture an explanation:
it is the same way a person who never had sex cannot give advice of celibacy to the one who had a lot of it. There is a lot the first would have no idea about, so the advice would be bookish at best.
Only more so in case of having a child.
The event changes (in most cases) both mother and father in very profound ways, that are difficult to understand from reading "research" on parenthood.

To LW:

Your basic insight "you are being used" seems to be correct. If she were like Amy, who would not have child at all, then you should not have taken this personally. But she has been quite willing, it seems, to have two children for someone else.
And she is telling you that you are not good for that, but good for providing her with comfort and security of having a man around a house.
Run. No need to suffer this. Your testosterone speaks truth to you.

I'd agree it would be unethical if she had waited until after marriage to tell him this...or dated him for several years pretending she wanted more kids, only to spring it on him later. So, in this particular case the length of time they've been dating really matters.

I think that she must have been playing him. It's not realistic to think that she wouldn't have considered whether he would want children. She'd had two kids by the time she was 22 for gods sake. Her whole life was turned upside down by having kids. There's no way that she didn't think about whether the guy she was having a relationship with was going to want kids!!

Some of the commenters here seem to be going out of their way to spin this situation so that they can blame the man. That's typical whenever a man vs woman scenario comes up. If the roles were reversed and a single father had lead a woman on this way, they'd be bouncing off the walls claiming that he owed her a child because of the time she'd put in with his kids.

That said, Amy is still right. There's no future for these two. The LW has found himself in a situation that seems to be very common with single mothers. He needs to find himself someone who he can have a normal relationship with and she needs to find a man who doesn't want children of his own. Neither of them is wrong, they just want very different things.

"...and not wanting to do that to her body again"...

is what i was refering to when i said that the LW wouldn't know what it's like to go through pregnancy and childbirth. Of course, he can read any one of the kajillions of books on pregnancy and childbirth, but he still wouldn't know what it actually feels like to do it, simply because he has neither the hormones nor the equipment to do it with.

It would be the same as saying to any woman that we will never know what it's like to get kicked in the nuts, simply because we have no nuts.

Two words, LW:

Irreconcilable differences.

I'm no genius at relationships, but shouldn't you have had this discussion when you thought things might get serious? I mean, did you not have any inkling about the children issue going in?

There's no "wrong" here. You can accept her as-is and not have her bear your children, or you can start over with a woman who wants to.

Someone above mentioned "sunk cost". That's what you've got here. Make your decision as though the relationship never happened. Would you get together with this woman knowing what you know now? If you come back with "no", then end it and walk away.

I think that she must have been playing him. It's not realistic to think that she wouldn't have considered whether he would want children.

I think it's more likely that she wasn't really sure about never having another kid. I bet she thought at first that she might change her mind, or at the very least she was not thinking about it at all until LW brought it up. At 27 with two kids already, it's entirely possible she hadn't sat down and actively thought about whether she wanted more kids. There are women with no children that assumed they would want them at some point in the future and didn't decide not to until talking it through with a boyfriend/husband.

I also don't get the sense from the letter that LW was upfront about his need for a kid right from the start. It sounds as if his declaration of no kid=no wedding came after his girlfriend said she was done. He probably didn't think too much about it until he was told he couldn't have it, or he made an (understandable) assumption that a 27-year-old would be open to having another child.

You're trying to create a bad guy where there is probably just a couple who didn't talk through some important stuff.

#6 you're saying the same thing that pita is saying. Whether she thought her attitude would change or not, she still led him on. You don't let someone think that you're going to have a kid with them unless you really mean it.

she still led him on. You don't let someone think that you're going to have a kid with them unless you really mean it.

That's my point, though: it's not clear that she did let him think she would have a kid with him. If neither one of them was fully aware of their feelings on the subject, neither one was going to be the one to bring it up first. There is no indication in the letter that LW told her his stance and she led him on. There is no indication that LW even knew what his stance was until she told him hers. If we're going by your logic, then LW led her on by letting her think he was okay with not having a biological child. Because, from the information we have, that's as likely a scenario. More likely? Neither one led the other on at all because the were still working through their feelings on the subject. There's no indication that LW's girlfriend didn't tell him her stance as soon as she was sure about it. It's unfair to make one of them the bad guy for thinking things through before bringing it up with their partner.

Having a child at a really young age (17) is hard, having two is harder. Dating with kids is a nightmare of a juggling act. Getting to a place where you can overcome all the sexist brainwashing to trust a good man (if you can find one) in your home with your kids is ridiculously complicated. Getting married (with kids) and making all the adjustments that go along with that is even more of a challenge. On average it takes seven years for children to accept the new spouse as "family." Adding another child only complicates things further and the LW's gf knows that all too well. As of now he's just playing with her kids like a fun uncle, at the end of the day she's the one who must support them. It's no wonder she doesn't want more. LW-- You have starry eyes, my friend. Having kids is more than just being the fun bf- get over yourself or go find some bitch who still gets choked up while watching the pampers commercials (bc she's never actually had to change one.)

I think it is pretty hilarious how people are making having a child out to be so traumatic!

Cracked and bleeding nipples? Sounds like someone needs a lactation consultant to get help with a proper latch.

Changing diapers? Hardly the world's worst experience. Especially if she's using pampers. But even cloth... not a big deal.

I'll give you the sleeplessness and the fatigue.

Pregnancy is really not a big deal unless you're one of the unlucky few who gets diabetes or something. Even childbirth, painful though the contractions are, only lasts a day or so, not even, and then it is over.

Having a kid is awesome. However, you have to really like kids because the kid is going to take up a LOT of your time. But the diapers really aren;t a big deal.

I think the "selfish" comment comes from the fact that she expects him to raise her kids, but won't bear and raise one of his. I think the LW feels, perhaps wrongly, that she won't reciprocate.

No, the LW feels 'rightly' that she isn't reciprocating. He gets to raise her kids and....

he gets married (with all the neanderthalic preconceived notions that entails)

and...???

No, it's not owed. He clearly states he thinks he's being used. Maybe. Maybe he's just distraught.

He still shouldn't have asked Amy to referee this

***

Guess what ladies? I don't know what it's like squirting out a kid. But I do know what RAISING a kid is like! It is not a unique female experience, from the diapers, to the vomit, to wanting (not doing) to strangle the little bugger to sleep occasionally because of sleep deprivation.

Now, does the LW? We don't know. YOU don't know. He might have hand raised half a dozen siblings and cousins which is why he loves her kids so much (which is also projection, btw) and wants his own. Or he could be clueless

I don't think it's at all unusual for a guy to want a child that is biologically his. Most men I've dated may be open to adoption but have a clear preference for a biological tie. Is there some sort of predisposition which drives men (more so than women based on my anecdotal evidence which admittedly isn't worth much) to want this tie? Perhaps.

I agree with everyone who has said, they are just two people who want different things and aren't compatible. While I think the first three paragraphs of Amy's response may have come across as overkill, I took it as a method to get him to "walk a mile in another's shoes" before he got too carried away.

The whole idea that people must know exactly what they want right from the beginning of a relationship defeats the whole purpose of dating.

The process of getting to know someone and evaluating the kind of life you would have together is what dating is all about. And this process leads to decisions that may differ based on the partner.

Would this woman be willing to have a child with someone else? Possibly. Perhaps LW doesn't earn very much money - or mismanages the money he makes - and she is rightfully concerned that they would struggle financially, whereas she might not have that concern with someone else.

Maybe he's really strict or too lenient with her kids, and she sees that his style of parenting clashes with hers, and this would be a source of conflict. Or perhaps he occasionally drinks too much or does drugs - things she doesn't like, yet tolerates, but which don't make him ideal father material in her eyes.

All these factors must be weighed, and the time to weigh them is while you're dating. It doesn't sound like either of them made any firm declarations about kids from the start. Either they did not know their feelings or did not express them.

But the bottom line is that, during the dating stage, either partner can change their minds about these matters, or further define their feelings about them. Otherwise, we'd be locked in right from the start without any knowledge of the other person....and when choosing to have/not have a child that is important information.

The girlfriend had her first kid at 17, then another one at 22, yet somehow she managed to become financially stable and buy herself a house. Talk about unusual ... that's probably even more unusual than men who get married not wanting kids!

She must have worked her butt off. Maybe she's had to put off college, god knows she's missed out on a lot of the things other young women get to do before settling down with kids. I'm not sure how long she's been dating this guy, but I sense that he wasn't around during those years when she must have been struggling. He's like, 'What? She already has two kids and did just fine, so what's one more?' But she probably doesn't see it that way. It sounds like she has worked very hard and done the right thing, and is looking forward to a time when she won't have to work so hard. I agree with other commenters that his self-absorbtion and sense of entitlement are creepy. Like if she doesn't want another kid, it's somehow all about him, because she doesn't see him as "good enough." Ick.

Yet he does want kids of his own, so he shouldn't have any trouble finding a woman who also wants to have kids.

The girlfriend might do better to find, say, a divorced guy who also already has kids of his own and doesn't want any more. And maybe wait a few more years to get married. At 5 and 10, her kids are awfully young.

This thread doesn't need anymore comments, but screw it, here goes:

Firstly, I appreciate Amy's thoughts on pregnancy/birth, but after my long pregnancy (it's really more like 10 months, folks) and a drug-free natural birth (ouch!), I will be the first to say that that's the EASY part. Labor only lasts a day. It's the next 20 years that are the hard part.

After becoming a new mom at 35, I *sort of* envy the young mom who has kids who are school age at only 27 years old. She's still young and has lots of time to work on herself now, including seriously beginning a career - which she needs, since she was a teen mom, as Amy pointed out. I do appreciate her decisiveness - that she chooses herself now, and is not one of those many women we hear about who would do anything (including endangering her kids) to keep a man around.

That said, yeah, sucks to be the LW, because obviously they have different goals, and yes, it's a dealbreaker. If this is that important to him, he needs to find someone else. However, before he procreates with ANYBODY, he needs to see that there are some major red flags with his thinking - and here they are:

"I think she's being selfish, seeing me as good enough to help raise her two girls but not good enough to have a child with."

"I told her, if she won't have a baby..."

I find the way he speaks about his girlfriend disconcerting. LW acts as if you just 'have a baby' and that's it. He doesn't seem to be thinking about the years-long commitment it requires to care for a baby and raise a child. And for the record, SHE is the primary person raising her daughters, not he. I am assuming of course that he hasn't been dating her since she was 17. This guy's sense of entitlement seems to gloss over the enormous sense of responsibility that babies require. This includes but is not limited to her leaving her job/career to care for the infant.

My point is, even in the most egalitarian households, Mommy still has to do MOST of the work when it comes to babies and small children. The baby needs HER, physically and emotionally, and if the LW continues to think only of his own needs, he's glossing over a HUGE part of having kids. To suggest she's 'selfish' for not wanting to go through this again is the most egregious part. Dude, it's selfish of YOU to think it's no big deal and she should want to do it just so you can have an 'heir' or whatever. If this kind of attitude comes forward in his personality, then it's no wonder his girlfriend has put the brakes on having more kids.

Now that I'm a mom, I fully embrace the ideology that I don't 'suffer fools.' There is just not enough time in the day to deal with grownups who act like children. Dude, I already have a baby...guess how much I want to change your diaper, too?

PirateJo nailed it while I was busy writing out my novella... :)

lovelysoul, I love your comments and you frequently make me think

Yes, there is a 'but' coming.

In one post (and many more prior) you've projected that he's poor, a loser, bad with money, bad with her kids, not committed to her kids, etc.

None of those, not one is a fact in evidence.

I can just as easily say

"The GF, frazzled to a tee, found a very nice, successful career man who seemed a suitable babysitter and provider. So much so that she felt more then comfortable to whore herself out to him for some vacation time, babysitting and finally having someone to talk to that doesn't speak in textese. Plus she could get rid of that whole 'single teen mom' stigma if he proposed. Let's not forget getting mom off her back and having someone to bring to Thanksgivings.

But she obviously put her foot down quite firmly about letting him 'parent' her girls and AFTER he proposed, she most definitely told him where to shove the baby suggestion (wrapped in as self serving a wrapping as she could 'Babe, if I get preggers, I won't be as hot for you or be able to screw as much. Why ruin a good thing?')

He was a good credit score, an adequate bed mate, and a cheap babysitter."

See what happens when you decide to read things into a letter in an uncharitable manner?

In fact, my 'projection' has a lot more basis in the text of the letter in that he feels taken advantage of.

I don't think so. I don't think she lead him on purposefully (though I have no doubts that she has been VERY chary at letting him be a parent to the girls which might have lead to the rancor he feels regarding 'not being good enough')

Please take this in a genteel manner.

"Please take this in a genteel manner." lol Of course, flydye.

Yes, it is a projection - there is a lot of projection going on here - but my goal was actually to give the LW some hope. If there is a chance to salvage this relationship, it will obviously only work if she DOES decide to have a child with him.

Only two scenarios exist: Either she is simply done having kids and it has nothing to do with him, or she's specifically afraid to have kids with him.

As unfortunate as that may seem, the latter scenario actually gives him some hope - some actions he might could take to make her feel more secure in the choice to have another child.

She cites financial reasons, so that is why I projected that he may have a lesser income. He says she is "financially stable" but never mentions his own situation, which is a little odd to me. Most guys don't describe their girlfriend as "financially stable" - at least it's not usually one of the first attributes that come to mind.

Is she going to have to leave her job to care for this infant? As Pirate Jo says, she's probably worked her butt off as a single mom to get where she is. It's no small matter to take time off, especially if she is the major breadwinner.

She's also probably scared he'll leave, like the last baby daddy(s) apparently did, and she'll be stuck with a third child to care for alone.

These are valid fears that surely play a part in her decision, and, if so, they might could still work this out. Rather than give her ultimatums, and before ending the relationship, he should sit down and really communicate with her about the issues she raised, and see if there are any ways he could alleviate her concerns.

Finances can be improved. Time alone together can be arranged (he should point out that her eldest daughter will soon be of age to babysit). The wear and tear to her body can ultimately be fixed (they could start a plastic surgery fund! lol)

None of these things may change her mind, but at least he'll have given it a shot, and it's far better than calling her selfish and trying to guilt her into having a kid.

Also: it's not exactly unreasonable that a parent of a 10 and 5 year old would not want more kids. Most "normal" married couples with elementary-school age children are not contemplating having another baby in a couple years. Yes it happens, but I suspect that's more often due to "oops" pregnancies than deliberate family planning.

Even if LW and his gf got married and made a baby tomorrow, there'd still be an 11 year difference between the oldest and youngest kid, and probably more like 13-14 years when you consider that they're just starting to plan the wedding. That means that LW and is gf are going to be nursing an infant while the oldest daughter is navigating middle school, toilet-training a preschooler while she's applying college, etc. It's definitely a more challenging preposition for raising kids, which is why most people don't choose to space out their family this way.

And ultimately the existing children have to take priority over hypothetical ones, period. I think we all agree that it would be unconscionable for the girlfriend to deliberately have another baby if it meant having to go on welfare, for instance. It doesn't sound like that's the case here, but there probably would be some financial tradeoffs: maybe she can afford to send two kids to private school, but three means that they're stuck at substandard public schools. Having another kid also entails sacrifices of time, energy, attention, etc to the other two, as well as to her husband. Again, it sounds like LW's girlfriend has intelligently and rationally assessed her own limits, and I'd hardly call that selfish.

I'm actually hoping what you say is true: that he is a loser, that he brought up marriage before she's ready, that she has serious misgivings, that he isn't good with her children.

Because the alternative: that they are a wonderful, loving couple who both love the kids already out and are going to seperate over this simple thing is too awful to contemplate.

One question that needs to be asked, is if someone really loves you, your happiness becomes as important as their own. If the woman in question has been informed as to how much this man wants a child, I think she would be willing to do that if she really loves him. The fact that she doesn't sets off all sorts of alarm bells in my head.

At least one thing, and probably many more are more important to this woman than what her fiancee wants. They have no business getting married. The love and commitment just isn't there. This is the equivalent of a business decision for her.

On the plus side, at least she did not wait until after marriage for him to find this out. I have one friend who is a very passionate sportsman.

His sport of choice is solitary and very boring to watch, but doesn't take up a great deal of time, maybe two evenings a week and an average of one weekend a month. He is a very good, nationally ranked competitor.

The first thing my friend's wife wanted him to do (after they were married) was to give it up. He did not.

I participate in the same sport and my husband wants me to go and do it as much as I want to. He doesn't come with me often as it is kind of like being married to a marathoner and not running yourself, but he encourages me, and doesn't nag or whine at me about it.

This is one of the reasons that we are still happily married. He is not threatened by me having a passion and an outside interest that he does not share.

If the woman in question has been informed as to how much this man wants a child, I think she would be willing to do that if she really loves him. The fact that she doesn't sets off all sorts of alarm bells in my head.

We could easily reverse this and say, if he understood how much she didn't want more children, he would do what it took to make her happy. That thinking doesn't apply here. My husband relented on us getting a rocking chair for the living room because I really wanted one. He doesn't like it, but he loves me. A baby is not a rocking chair.

I think your second anecdote illustrates things perfectly. Parenthood isn't something she can leave him to to enjoy by himself. This would be more like your friend demanding his wife join him in his sport all day every day -- and carry the equipment for both of them. If she's not equally passionate, it's not going to work.

"Yes, it is a projection - there is a lot of projection going on here"

I know, sigh. I've been trying very hard not to project my own experiences here, because if I did, what I'd write would be very different.

"but my goal was actually to give the LW some hope. If there is a chance to salvage this relationship, it will obviously only work if she DOES decide to have a child with him."

Unfortunately, I don't see much hope here. It sounds like the issue is a dealbreaker for both of them, and if one of them gives in, they will wind up resenting the other one for the rest of the relationship. In the long run, it will be better if they go their separate ways now.

As for some of the statements made by the LW... pain and hurt always look for some way to rationalize their existence. For some reason, it's easier to be in pain if you can make yourself believe that the other person hurt you intentionally. It's like the letter we had last week where the LW's girlfriend was bad-mouthing him around town after they broke up. This LW needs to not go there. Instead, he needs to move on with his life.

@MonicaP
To have a child or not are not equivalent to each other.
To reverse the situation, we have to imagine her wanting a child and him saying "no way".

------------------
@Shannon and lovelysoul

All given above reasons for her not wanting another baby are good and fine. The problem is not that she does not want his child, but that she does not want his child AND wants him to marry her.

That's selfish.

To have a child or not are not equivalent to each other.
To reverse the situation, we have to imagine her wanting a child and him saying "no way".

Of course they are. They both have very strong visions of what their future hold, and hers does not include another child. He doesn't get "dibs" just because what he wants is considered socially positive. Her wanting a child and him saying "no way" isn't a reverse of the situation: It's the same situation.

She not being selfish at all. She told him her plans before they were married. Now he gets to decide just how much he wants this baby. His options are still wide open.

To add:

If this disagreement were over anything but a child, I doubt this would have generated over a hundred comments.

At its core, this is a disagreement about life goals. If one of his life goals were to build a special room onto the house for the herd of goats he wants to house there and she balked, saying she didn't want to take care of goats, no one would think she was selfish.

It's only because we're talking about a baby that many people are getting smothered by the warm-fuzzies.

He doesn't say she's the one pushing for marriage. They are not even engaged yet. It sounds as if they began talking about marriage, and she was open and honest that she doesn't want another child, and she gave very valid reasons.

At that point, he might've said, "Oh well, it's not that important to me," (as I'm sure she would've liked) but instead, he responded that it was an absolute dealbreaker, and he won't marry her unless she agrees to have a child.

We don't really know how she responded to this. We only know that LW wants to know who is right, and the answer is really that they both are. Neither of them is wrong. It just is what it is.

I would've liked to have another child, but my new husband never wanted kids, and he told me this early in our dating. I could've coaxed him, and a I tried a little bit, but I could tell that although he might've done it for me, he really didn't want to...and that's not a good way to bring a child into the world.

So, I had a choice to make, and I decided that I loved him enough to stay in the relationship anyway. There were too many other positive aspects to consider.

I accompanied him to his vasectomy about a year after we started dating, and he was so relieved to no longer worry about us getting pregnant.

You can't force someone to want a child, and it's a very bad idea to try. If they're just kind of on the fence, then maybe you can pull them one way or another, but if they are strongly opposed, it will be a disaster.

but instead, he responded that it was an absolute dealbreaker, and he won't marry her unless she agrees to have a child.

(Carefully removing the negative ions...)

Translation: "My image of marriage involves us having children together."

I've read the LW's words over a few times and nowhere do i see where he says how long they actually dated before the marriage question was popped.

"We began planning to get married, but then she said......." translation: when he proposed, that's when they disussed children, and that's when she told him that she doesn't want more kids. She didn't say she doesn't want *his* kids, she was being general. She doesn't want more kids, period, and she is entitled to make that decision for herself. Nowhere did he say she made him wait any amount of time to discuss, nor did she lead him on, nor did she leave him oblivious to what her opinion on the matter is.

This is not a good guy / bad guy kind of issue, nor is it an issue of selfishness. It simply is an issue of 2 people wanting different things, and this is one of those dealbreaker issues that would cause those 2 people who otherwise love each other to rethink their positions.

@MonicaP
>>If one of his life goals were to build a special room onto the house for the herd of goats he wants to house there and she balked, saying she didn't want to take care of goats, no one would think she was selfish.

There is one problem with this line of thinking:
marriage as institution is neutral and not specific as far as herds of goats are concerned. On the other hand, having children is at the core of the idea of marriage.

It is interesting how women making comments on this topic tend to make it a life-goal issue, while pretending to ignore the core idea of marriage.

Maybe my idea of it is stone-age, but what is your idea of marriage?
What is it for a man in a marriage without common child as opposed to a partnership/room-sharing?

On the other hand, having children is at the core of the idea of marriage.

When my husband married me, he married ME. Not the potential contents of my uterus. Our marriage tells the world that we intend to spend our lives together as partners. We do intend to have a child, but if we do not, we are equally married.

We're seeing an increasingly varied choice in life arrangements. People are getting married with no intention of having children. I know a couple that are not married but live together and have two children, and are raising them in a fairly traditional arrangement, minus the wedding bands. It's dangerous to assume that marriage means the same thing to everyone.

It's also important to note that this couple is not married. They were talking about marriage. She said she does not want children. He is now free to find someone who does want children. Before she said, "I do," she told him without ambiguity that her vision of marriage does not meet his. I don't see how she could have been more fair. Does simply talking about marriage require her to have children with him?

"Maybe my idea of it is stone-age, but what is your idea of marriage? What is it for a man in a marriage without common child as opposed to a partnership/room-sharing?"

As I just got married, fully knowing we won't have kids, I'll answer. Marriage is about loving another person, and sharing all aspects of your lives together. This *may* involve children, or (in our case) step-children, but it could also involve living in Paris or whatever else either of you dream of doing.

My mother remarried when she was in her late 60s to a guy she dated as a teen. They have no children together, but she has said these have been the best 12 years of her life. They read, walk, volunteer, and do just about everything together. Mostly, they make each other laugh and support each other, through good times and bad. They are happier together than they'd be apart.

Even with marriages where children have been born, there has to be something MORE than that to hold the couple together. Children grow up and leave home. They should not be the main purpose of being or staying married.

"It was this way thousands of years --- man own his wife livelihood and the woman own her husband bearing his children --- as many as he wishes. And it will be this way for a long time to come after the current generation of misandric females goes into history books as a blip of derangement."

And here you are, caught in the blip, shit out of luck. LOL.

If the woman in question has been informed as to how much this man wants a child, I think she would be willing to do that if she really loves him. The fact that she doesn't sets off all sorts of alarm bells in my head.

Good Grilled Cheesus, the "if you really love me, you'd..." argument. That's not love and commitment, Isabel, that's scorekeeping. They can really, really love each other and still not want the same things. Like I said earlier, sometimes you don't get the things you want from the person you want. Which means that person isn't right for you and you'll do better to find someone who is rather than trying to shove a square peg into a round hole, breeding resentment from the both of you.

The love and commitment just isn't there. This is the equivalent of a business decision for her.

Why? Because she laid out well-thought reasons for not wanting to have a child? The "business decision" tactic is probably more conducive to calm discussions than is letting things get emotionally fraught, especially considering this is an emotional subject to begin with. Being able to calmly articulate what you can and can't do in a relationship is not cold, it's adult.

@lovelysoul

Thanks for the response. I know more than one couple who got married (not the first time) in their 50s and 60s. But that's so old-time!
What you describe as possible reasons for marriage can be addressed by living together as partners --- no need to accept all the legal consequences of a marriage.

@Lizzie
No worries. The blip has very sparse geographic distribution, so I got lucky with having it stone-age way.

"Maybe my idea of it is stone-age, but what is your idea of marriage? What is it for a man in a marriage without common child as opposed to a partnership/room-sharing?"

Marriage as an institution has changed and been used for different purposes throughout history. I think it would be difficult to really say what the "traditional" requirements or expectations of a marriage are or should be. I am pretty sure Amy linked to a book by Stephanie Coontz (sp?) at some point here that was about how we are nostalgic for types of families and marriages that never really existed or only very briefly.

Marriage now has two roles. One is legal - for taxes, insurance benefits, legal rights, etc. The other is social - to signify that you consider yourselves to be committed to one another in a particular one. This may or may not include having biological children

"What you describe as possible reasons for marriage can be addressed by living together as partners --- no need to accept all the legal consequences of a marriage."

Of course, but people can have children without getting married too. The legal consequences would be similar.

Some people like the idea of marriage. Others don't. Sure, I could've lived with my boyfriend, but I personally prefer what seems (at least to me) to be the stronger commitment of making it legal.

It also sets an example for my children, and defines their new stepdad as a more permanent part of the family, not just some guy I live with that I might break up with tomorrow.

I told her, if she won't have a baby, I won't take the next step and get married -Feeling Used(LW)

but instead, he responded that it was an absolute dealbreaker, and he won't marry her unless she agrees to have a child.- lovelysoul

(Carefully removing the negative ions...)
Translation: "My image of marriage involves us having children together." - flydye

Gee which one was closer to the original statement of the LW????

You know flydye when you have to compeltely rewrite what the LW wrote in order for the LW's (new rainbow and bubblegum encrusted) ultimatum to match up with the argument you pulled out of your ass, it kinda means you lost the debate

We have two people with very different life goals. One is a single mom who has a 10 year old and a 5 year old. According to the LW this single mom is financially stable and owns her own home. Another thing is for the last 10 years she has had not in school for the last 10 years and now her youngest is about to go to Kindergarten. She is looking at less childcare expense and children you can reason with. I am sure the thought of going back to night feedings and diapers is a nightmare to her. She has every right to make the decision the baby assembly line is closed.

The LW has every right to want a child genetically related to him. He needs to find someone who has that goal as well. He needs to quit trying to coerce his girlfriend into being a breeding machine for him. If he has told her she is being selfish and is using marriage and buying a house together as a manipulation for her to open up the factory to a third baby he is not ready to be in a grown up relationship let alone be a father.

"@Lizzie
No worries. The blip has very sparse geographic distribution, so I got lucky with having it stone-age way."

Suuuuuuure. You're puffing out your chest about misandry on the internet because you're so content in the stone age. Better drop that laptop and get busy sharpening your spear.

Yes, luljp (hangs head in shame) Misquoting is a terrible thing. Adding or removing ideas that aren't actually there.

He on the other hand basically told his girlfriend get pregnat (sic) or get get (sic) gone with no wiggle room or even discussion between those two choices.

Why...you said that, lujlp. How surprising.

I am making arguments, not personal conflicts.

Now, IMO, if you strip out the hurt and the selfish comment, what we have is a guy who wants to marry a girl and wants to have a baby with her. HIS view of their marriage. I do not consider that 'making stuff up' but you disagree. That's fine.

Continue at leisure.

It's funny, people are always writing books about how the traditional family never existed before the 50s, but how come there are so many books written before the 50s describing that model?

The Anne of Green Gables series features the men in the fields and the women at home, and later, Anne's husband is a doctor and she is a housewife.

Pa Ingalls was out in the fields, and hunting, and Ma was mostly at home, though she did help out when the locusts came. He also would go off East and take jobs for extended periods leaving his family behind.

Marmee March was a housewife who did volunteer work. Father was a chaplain who went off to war, and then he came back and worked while Marmee was still a housewife. John Brooke worked while Meg stayed home.

Gerald O'Hara worked outside the home while Ellen ran the home and did volunteer work like nursing the local poor. Frank Kennedy was appalled when Scarlett wanted to work outside the home (this was written in the 30s).

Austen's characters all live in nuclear families unless a parent is dead.

Which isn't to say that everyone did it, or everyone should, just that the nuclear model was hardly uncommon before the 50s.

flydye, I stand by comment, he never said "My image of marriage involves us having children together." as though they were have a calm rational discussion

He said "if she won't have a baby,"
get pregnant

"I won't take the next step and get married and purchase a house together"
get gone

He issued an ultimatum

Yes, he did. And I think that is reasonable. Sadly, their life goals don't match, and if having a child is very important to him he needs to be with someone else.

Nope. He spoke passionately. no arguing.

And did he storm out of the relationship? No...

Did he cut off all conversation with her and abandon her? No data.

Nope. He went online and asked an Advice Goddess if she is in the wrong (i.e. selfish) or if HE is!

He's a brute. I shall defend him no more.

If you dont get pernant this relasionship stops

I dont know, sounds like an ultimatum to me

@Kathryn

>>Marriage now has two roles. One is legal - for taxes, insurance benefits, legal rights, etc. The other is social - to signify that you consider yourselves to be committed to one another in a particular one.

None of these two roles do much for a man.
From legal standpoint, modern marriage is a punishment to a man. And social status? Unless society looks down on non-married men, status of being married does not do much for a man. Only very traditional societies have that outlook.

So, the question remains open: what positive for a modern man that modern marriage brings that is not his own children?

------------------------------
Re: Marriage as an institution has changed and been used for different purposes throughout history.

Some details did change, but the core --- being a harmonious way to have own children --- remains the same through out ages and places
(please, do not bring up as an example some wierd Amazon tribes -- I'm talking about civilized societies)

"It's funny, people are always writing books about how the traditional family never existed before the 50s, but how come there are so many books written before the 50s describing that model?"

Well, in pretentious-intellectual circles, it's been fashionable for decades now to diss the nuclear family. So you get a lot of silliness wherein they state that just because everyone's life wasn't like June and Ward Cleaver's, then it was totally worthless. Obviously that's a strawman argument. The nuclear family is a pretty good structure. Obviously it's not ideal, but it works better than a lot of other things that society is experimenting with today.

(Note that in this definition of "nuclear family", I'm leaving aside the question of whether it occurs in the context of marriage. Not all nuclear families occur within that context, nor do all married people form nuclear families.)

But another reason that our self-appointed betters run down the nuclear family is because they see it as a threat to their authority. They would prefer a family structure that makes the masses easier to dictate to. When you examine the family structures that they advocate, most of them boil down to forms of tribalism, with themselves as the tribal leaders.

I have to admit, although I think Amy's advice to the letter-writer is spot on, every time I hear a woman joking about how men are cute and naive to say "we" about a child . . . . I think "Well, I guess he could leave and you could try raising the kid on your own. Might want to talk to a few single mothers about how much fun that is, though."

Maybe I'm misjudging, but I think it would be a LOT harder for my wife to raise our kids without me. And yes, even the pregnancy would have been a LOT harder without me. Could she do it? Probably. People "can" do a lot things that they would never actually choose to do if they had options.

On the other hand, most women who say that are genuinely joking. It might not be the nicest joke in the world, but it's not a declaration, either.

Some details did change, but the core --- being a harmonious way to have own children --- remains the same through out ages and places
(please, do not bring up as an example some wierd Amazon tribes -- I'm talking about civilized societies)

first off marrige is a throwback to primite tribes as a way to insure heirs and inheritence

Second marrige has nothing to do with guys wanting kids - that is a biological feature most members of every species has hardwired into their DNA

third in modern society you can buy an egg from one woman, grow it in a second, hire a third to watch it while you go out on the town and have a three way with ladies number four and five

fourth in modern society with our fancy newfangled laws you can make your cats the heir of your estate if you wanted.

I dont believe in marrige, I dont want kids either. And on the one in ten billion chance I meet someone so perfect but who has marrige as her deal breaker that I agree to it, I'd still never have kids, even with her.

somethings are just plain non negiotable - no matter how much you care for the other person and their needs and wants

what positive for a modern man that modern marriage brings that is not his own children?

Perhaps you should ask the many men who get married despite the knowledge that they will have no children, like lovelysoul's husband. They are doing it, so there must be some value there, even if you do not see it.

It's hard to believe from many of the comments on this blog, but not all men are worried about getting fucked over by the money-grubbing harpies out to steal their wallets. A lot of men are sentimental and like the idea of building a legally and socially recognized life with the woman they love.

They don't have to get married. They want to.

@lujlp

>>first off marrige is a throwback to primite tribes as a way to insure heirs and inheritence

O Goddess, you are angry!
"Primite tribes" had no concept of inheritence and thus of "heirs".

>>third in modern society you can buy an egg from one woman, grow it in a second, hire a third to watch it while you go out on the town and have a three way with ladies number four and five

Well, there are still many stone-age retards like me who prefer it the Aphrodita way and are too stubborn to be re-educated. So, please be kind to us, O Goddess of non-negotiable ways and means!

Exactly, Monica. In our case, there's no other motivation than that we love each other and want to be there for one another. I don't understand why Mere Mortal can't get that this is enough for many men. To each his own, but to suggest there are no positives for others just because one can't see making that choice themselves is very narrowminded.

For one thing, if marriage is just about having children, what happens once the kids are gone?

Sadly, you see this very often. Couples break up once the kids grow out of the cute early stages and reach the teen years because what held the marriage together was not true love but some sort deal to procreate.

I actually think more women do this than men. From what I've seen, most men marry for love, not just to have a kid.

But, at any rate, if you can't see any positives to being married other than that it makes it "easier" to have children, then you're going to be pretty unhappy once that goal has been accomplished, and as an almost-empty-nester, let me assure you that the time goes quickly.

One day, it'll just be you and your wife, and if you're not in love with her, and can't see how cool it is to be together just for its own sake, the relationship will fail.

I do have to agree with those who say that if a man doesn't want kids, there's no sensible reason for him to get married. (Not that this stopped me from doing so--twice.)

@lovelysoul
>>For one thing, if marriage is just about having children, what happens once the kids are gone?

In archaic societies (those that value nuclear family more than gossips about pea-brained "stars"),
grandchildren come in.

I do have to agree with those who say that if a man doesn't want kids, there's no sensible reason for him to get married.

No one ever said love was sensible.

In archaic societies (those that value nuclear family more than gossips about pea-brained "stars"),
grandchildren come in.

Not a slam dunk in modern societies. Even if your kids do have kids, the odds are fair that they will live thousands of miles away and you will see them only over Skype. My own parents had three kids. My brother's children are the only ones they lived long enough to see, and his kids live in a different state.

@Amy
>>Um...what about the newlyweds thing?

The first clue to the puzzle is that among statements

>>Must love dogs. Must want kids. Need to be horsewhipped daily.

one does not belong with the other two.

one does not belong with the other two.

Yeah. Dogs are optional for me.

I liked being married. I suppose that the companionship aspect could be had without marriage, but chalk it up to either low self-esteem or common sense (whichever camp you fall in), when just living with a guy I personally would always have a nagging feeling, "What if he doesn't intend to stick around". Which is not to say that a married man can't bail, but at least you know it wasn't his original intention.

Also, people treat you differently. Even older couples treat you more as a peer. It's like joining a secret club.

It's also a bit like adoption. I think I've made that analogy here before. Sure, you could have a kid live with you, and love that kid and cherish it and not adopt it. You could say to the kid, "We don't need societal conventions like adoption, it is just a piece of paper. I don't need a piece of paper to prove I love you. I don't need to adopt you. We don't need to get the government involved in our family life." I'm pretty sure the kid wouldn't buy it, though.

It lets your family know that you are making this person a part of the family, a part of the tribe. Most cultures have some sort of ritual for joining a tribe or family.

Call me a romantic, but I do believe in the power of ritual, and of the effect of acts of power on the lives of people. But then, I'm whimsical that way. My ring isn't just a piece of jewelry, its a magically charged talisman, as is the knotted cord that bound our hands together.

Also, sometimes its funny that people jump through all these legal hoops to get all the legal benefits of marriage... visiting rights, inheritance, etc. when why don't they just sign the paper?

"You could say to the kid, "We don't need societal conventions like adoption, it is just a piece of paper. I don't need a piece of paper to prove I love you. I don't need to adopt you. We don't need to get the government involved in our family life." I'm pretty sure the kid wouldn't buy it, though."

That's really a great analogy. Being adopted myself, it resonates. I'd have been rather crushed if that was the view my parent's took. It is more than just a piece of paper. Making it legal is a declaration that this is meant to be permanent, not temporary.

@ Mere Mortal
I was responding to the question about what my idea of marriage is. I think that marriage is a legal and social construct. What men get out of it if they don't have a common child may be legal rights (access to insurance benefits, ability to make decisions about a hospitalized spouse, etc.) or it may be a social benefit (wanting to signify their commitment or have the neighbours/their family recognize their relationship.) If they don't need either of those things it is perfectly reasonable to live together without getting married - or to not live together and not get married but be in a relationship.

Look, I wanted to get married to my husband largely for the social recognition. I trust him and if he said he was committed to me I didn't need a piece of paper to prove it. However, I wanted the ability to introduce him as my husband. I wanted that social recognition as a unit. I wanted my family not to disown me when I had kids with him...

@Don I agree with you 100%. Every single day I am thankful I do not have to raise my kids by myself.

The power of ritual: oh yeah, that's like when you get married, and suddenly the sex stops. Huh. Go figure.

Sorry to hear that Bluejean.

Time to stir up the hornets nest here.

The woman in question had her first kid when she was (apparently) 17 and a second when she was 22.
Do both children have the same father? She is obviously single now, so what gives? Where is the dad or dads? Why is she looking for a dad for the kids? Where are the sperm donor(s)? I am sure he or them are bums but apparently bum(s) that she was willing to have unprotected sex with.
I can understand one "accidental" kid the one when she was 17, but didn't she learn anything from the first pregnancy?
Were the two kids both "baby traps" gone wrong or is this woman a "get drunk and screw" type of slut or just a complete idiot about human reproduction?
She doesn't want any more kids? Fine, get your tubes tied, (like four years ago) and the issue is off the table for good.

Then, next time she finds a man, she might want to marry, lay it out so he can run if that is not when he is looking for, before it gets serious.

That's one scenario, but I've got an anecdote that tells a different story.

Stupid teens having unprotected sex get knocked up at 17. The two of them decide to make a go of it together. They even get married, and a few years later decide to have a second child so the siblings are close together. Then things fall apart and they go their seperate ways. Now you've got a single, 27-year old woman with two kids. (Except in the true-to-life story I know, she got knocked up at 16, they got married at 19, had a second kid at 21 and they split when she was 23.)

I appreciate stirring up an already busy hornet's nest for fun, but re-reading, there is nothing in the original letter that confirms the kids were raised throughout their entire life by the single mom. All we know for sure is that at 27, she's single with two kids. And there's a very high probability that the first child, at least, was conceived "by accident" since it happened at 17.

Yea, horsewhips tend to leave welts, there too narrow, a heavy flogger works better

"Whether she thought her attitude would change or not, she still led him on. You don't let someone think that you're going to have a kid with them unless you really mean it."

To be fair, when I was 27, I honestly didn't know if I wanted a kid or not, and I could not have "known" if you had put a gun to my head and said I must decide there and then. And I was dating someone at the time who didn't really know either (and in the end, after years together, she decided she didn't want kids and I was trending towards wanting one, and it was one of those irreconcilable points of divergence that fueled the end of that relationship). Only by the time I was in my early 30s did I even decide and 'know' that yes, I wanted a child, and it took years to reach that decision (and incidentally, I just recently became a father, now in my mid-30s). I don't think you can always 'know'. My sister at 29 was convinced she would "never, ever" want a child, and had one less than two years later. A (male) colleague of mine once recounted to me how he had never really wanted kids, and all of a sudden when he hit 30 it was like some instinct kicked in, and suddenly he really wanted one.

I suspect many people in their 20s honestly don't know, and I think it's absolutely not the sort of thing where you should try "force" a definite opinion before you actually "know". When you know, and the time is right, then you will know. If it means some relationships must have sad endings due to diverging goals, that is still better than someone having a child they never wanted, or not having children they did want. I had a trainwreck of a relationship back then, and maybe LW will too, but just a few years later I met a wonderful woman, we were immediately on the same page about what we wanted, and we recently had our first baby together :)

It's quite possible neither of them were that sure, and as the marriage approached their feelings on the issue solidified. If she was leading him on she would not likely have brought it up before they actually got married, unless she felt guilty or something.

Having just been through the process of our first pregnancy with my wife, I also think the LW is being very naive about how hectic pregnancy actually is. I must admit just a few years ago I was just as clueless, and going through the process has been a huge education for me - I have a much better appreciation for just what women go through and the risks they are taking when they get pregnant, and one day when LW goes through the process with someone (hopefully someone who wants to have a kid with him), he will realize how naive and demanding he was being. Bluejean used the analogy of a kick in the nuts ... sure a woman will never know how what that feels like, but they can capable of appreciating that it is no doubt very painful and unpleasant.

As for the drivel about "bookish" advice, what rubbish. What's next, saying a doctor cannot treat cancer unless he has had cancer? A vet can't treat a dog unless he has been a dog? Rationality, reason, information, science ... those are reasonably ultimate sources of advice.

One question that needs to be asked, is if someone really loves you, your happiness becomes as important as their own. If the woman in question has been informed as to how much this man wants a child, I think she would be willing to do that if she really loves him. The fact that she doesn't sets off all sorts of alarm bells in my head.

Eewww, Isabel. That attitude sets alarm bells off in *my* head. "If you really loved me" covers putting up with your partner's bad taste in music or habit of always losing their keys. You know, stuff you can compromise on or let slide because the relationship is more important than minor annoyances. Having a child together, if you don't want one is not one of those things you do just to prove you love someone.

I still love my ex-gf and vice versa. We care about and look after each other, three years after we broke up. But we're not together for good reasons (no, nothing to do with children). I don't love her any less just because we couldn't agree about our future together. If anything, that we still care minus sex and intimacy is better proof of love than one of us being a doormat.

@Amy
>>>>I think she would be willing to do that if she really loves him.
>>Ridiculous.

What is ridiculous is how big of a deal modern feminas make out of such natural thing as having a baby. I suspect that in 90% of cases they convince themselves that it is a big problem --- to have a child --- so it becomes one. Little they know that not having a baby is a bigger problem.

Even more ridiculous is calling "love" something that expresses itself as
"...I refused to leave. But, I'm not going to change my life in the way I would if I had a child."
One expects such attitude towards a pet dog, not a man.

@Amy
>>This is not because I'm somehow dense about what it entails but because I realize exactly what it does.

It is not akin to a little girl watching a grown up woman having an all-consuming orgasm and thinking to herself, "It is a kind of torture! I'm not going to have it --- ever, because now I realize exactly what it does"?

*****@Amy
>>This is not because I'm somehow dense about what it entails but because I realize exactly what it does.*****

EXACTLY.

*****It is not akin to a little girl watching a grown up woman having an all-consuming orgasm and thinking to herself, "It is a kind of torture! I'm not going to have it --- ever, because now I realize exactly what it does"?*****

Mere Mortal has to be a man. One who expects the wimminfolk to stay home, barefoot and pregnant.

As a friend of mine says, "I don't have to walk a mile in your shoes to know your laces are untied".

Um, it's not a big secret what having children does to your life and finances. It consumes them.

Amen, Amy. This 'Mere Mortal' person is bound and determined to think that breeding works out beautifully for everyone who does it and that it is a miraculous and joyful experience for all involved. Volumes of evidence to the contrary are not going to convince him.

I would be a debt slave if I had kids. I also think most of the work involved with parenthood seems boring and stressful. I know a lot of those folks experience moments of transcendent joy from it, but each person has to work out whether it's worth it to them or not.

For me, it is not. Parenthood holds zero appeal for me, and I'm completely unapologetic about that fact. As Crid once put it, 'It's not like we're running out of people. When it comes to the human population, our problem is not that we are understaffed.'

(When is Crid coming back, by the way? Have you spoken with him lately?)

"What is ridiculous is how big of a deal modern feminas make out of such natural thing as having a baby. "

This isn't exactly unique to women. In fact, I'd say that it's more typical for the woman to want a baby whereas the man is uninterested. Just two weeks ago Amy had a column from a man who broke up with his girlfriend after realizing that he was uninterested in having kids. Would you have said that he should have sucked it up and had the kid anyway because it's no big deal? Should every man everywhere? Do you scoff at the men who complain about getting tricked into "accidental" pregnancies because after all, a baby is no big deal?

Here's another way of looking at it: LW sounds like a decent guy. He deserves (and probably wants) a woman who is wildly enthusiastic about bearing his children, not just one who grudgingly tolerates it for the sake of holding the relationship together. His unborn child(ren) absolutely deserve the same. This isn't something you can compromise on.

Interesting. No one here seems to have paid much attention to what single moms actually do in real life. Why is she financially stable? Only by hard work, or one of the great majority outside the ghetto who actually receive child support checks on a regular basis? Add that to a job, and she can afford a house, as any woman with two or three pay checks can do.

Another thing, a large percentage of single moms openly announce their first priority is their children. This is obviously what she thinks. She has her kids; to hell with him.

So, why does she want to marry a man whose baby she doesn't want to have? My bet is she figures with those child support checks and his pay check she will, after the hook is well set, quit work and stay home and he will have nothing to say about it.

Do I know this for sure? Of course not, but that's my bet. To find out what is happening, find which way the money flows.

Run! There is no future for you, except making her future better. Clank! Drag!

I have an aquaintance - a friend of a friend - who recently became pregnant. She is in her early 30s and sleeps around, so she wasn't even sure whose kid it was at first (until they told her the number of weeks). She's also a terrible mother to the 4 yr old daughter she already has - always out partying while leaving her with sitters. Plus, she's barely scraping by financially.

Yet, none of this stopped her current baby daddy from pressuring her to keep "his child". Oh, of course, he loves her, and it's his flesh and blood, fruit of his loins...blah, blah, blah.

She almost did it "for him", but luckily came to her senses and aborted. I hate abortion, but, in her case, it was a relief to know she did it. The poor child would've had about a million strikes against him/her.

Mere Mortal is only thinking from the guy's perspective, not about what is best for the child, who should be both loved and WANTED.

I know it's overused, but... "Run, Forrest, run!!!"

Can we use your content if we also place a link to you on our site?

It's simple. If he wants kids he needs to find someone else to marry and that means letting the current girlfriend go. There's nothing mean about that. It would be unfair to her for him to marry her. He'd be resentful and miserable.

Let her go nicely and go back to the fishing pond.

I completely admit and these are my sentiments absolutely. We had high hopes when the republicans won the house in nov and now all we see is posturing. We are disgusted and fighting furious. We need to choose people in 2012 who will do what they say and stand up for the american taxpayers!

"It's always so cute when a man announces "WE'RE having a baby!"

Considering he's on the hook for 18 years of child support no matter what her decision is on keeping the kid, I'd say the "we" is pretty accurate from a financial standpoint.

My analogy is not perfect so I don't need lectures on not offending others. Just see if it has ONE point.
You have legs that don't work.
You can, with herculean effort, get in and out of the chair/bed/bath.
I also have legs that don't work. BUT I also have arms that don't work.