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In my twenties (and always on long term relationships) i was, on both of my ltr -5 and 7 years- TERRIFIED of getting pregnant, always thinkibg about it as my worse nightmare. I thought deep down being a mother wasnt something i want.
Then, after my longest ltr ended in 2012 and i spent 2 intense years single, i met my now fiancee. I was 32. I soon knew i really really wanted kids with him. He was the man i wanted a family with. The difference with the previous ones? Being happy with him was effortless. Our relationship was naturally happy and everything was flowing. I didnt know until him that love could actually be this happy or easy. But it is.
Thankfully he wants kids too. Nothing will make me happier than getting pregnant now .
We are very happy and have a lot of love to give and hopefully we can create a loving environment for a kid and become a loving happy family
I know several couples where one partner is ambivalent and goes along with what the other person wants if they feel strongly about it. In some cases, that has meant that one person really wants a child so they go ahead and have one (or more), and in some cases, one person was absolutely positive they didn't want to be a parent so the couple remained childfree.
OP, it's hard to tell whether you fall into the ambivalent category or not, but I will say that your desire to be a SAHM with a nanny is pretty far out of reality. I mean, even Princess Catherine works in the sense of attending events on behalf of the royal family, she's not at home all day long with a nanny doing all the hands on childcare. If you really don't want to parent a child, then you should not have one. Having said that, I do think it's possible that if you fell in love with someone who absolutely wanted to be a parent, you might end up with a different outlook than you have right now, because you would end up developing a shared vision of your future together that is not necessarily the one you envision now as a single woman.
I'm in my 30's and don't have a burning desire to have kids. But I wonder if I meet a special someone perhaps it could change my mind
What do y'all think? Can your perspective change from the time you are single and not wanting to have kids to falling in love and deciding that all you want is to have a baby with your significant other?
And if yes, is that a short-lived desire that reverts back to not wanting to have kids once the honeymoon period is over?
Yes I think so and even more likely the more you have fallen for him. It doesn't always happen but it seems possible. I don't like kids but I think sometimes about having kids with a certain dude and thought about it in the past with the guy I used to date. Even if you don't like kids, it creates a bond with you and him. Also you could easily care about the kid because the kid is a piece of him.
On the other hand, having a kid with my bf is not something I want because my feelings for him aren't serious enough.
I never wanted kids. I was pretty adamant about it all through my childhood, teen years, and early adulthood. I met and married my husband (@ 23yo) and made it clear I didn't want kids.
When I was 28, I had my first child... on purpose. At 30, I had my second, and at 31 my third.
Around 3-4 years after we got married, I suddenly went from envisioning a child-free life to being unable to envision life without a child. I'm really not sure what happened to this day, and my oldest is now 15 I haven't regretted it (although parents all have their moments ).
So yes, anyone can change their minds about anything, but here is no guarantee one way or another. I was also never going to get married and I faltered on that pretty quickly (to the shock of my family and all my friends). Life is a journey, and it's not scripted ahead of time.
Sorry, biggest pet peeve, here, as mother of an infant. If I heard "Well, you just sleep when HE sleeps," once, I heard it a thousand times during his first month of life.
Um, to be blunt, no. I don't. When he naps, that is the only time I have to clean, do laundry, vacuum, shower myself, make beds, and do all my reading, writing, and studying for my graduate work. I mean, I suppose I COULD have just told my professors, "Hey, those due dates? You're gonna have to be flexible on those for me, because, hey, infant, and I sleep when he sleeps, so it's gonna be hard for me to get the old school work done, meet with research groups, etc." I'm sure it would have gone over well. I'm sure it would have been possible to say, "Well, the laundry will get done sometime, dishes will get washed sometime, food will get cooked sometime, the laundry will get done sometime," and napped when he napped. As long as we were cool with being naked, hungry, having a slovenly kitchen, and everyone covered head-to-toe in unvacuumed dog hair. Every time somebody told me "Oh, rest, the chores will get done," I felt like telling them I assumed that meant they were volunteering to come clean my house while I napped. Nope, I don't nap when he naps. I sleep at night. Between feedings, anyway. Naptime is not rest and recharge time. It is represents valuable and elusive snippets of uninterrupted time to actually GET STUFF DONE.
Anyhow...yes, OP, these sorts of things are the reality of having/raising children. You're either up for it or you aren't. It's okay not to be up for it. It's far better to KNOW that you're not, and choose not to procreate, accordingly, than to embark upon having kids with the hope that you'll have a change of heart.
And FWIW, you'll struggle with the type of sacrifice necessary with having kids at some level whether or not you are 100% invested in having kids. Even parents who are absolutely satisfied with their choices to be parents find various things difficult. Because it IS difficult. For those who want kids, the difficulties are worthwhile tradeoffs. For those who don't, they wouldn't be. But it's not like, because you want kids and are thrilled to be a parent, that makes everything always perfect and easy and in soft, muted blissful watercolors. At all.
Excellent post! Especially as a mother you're not sugar coating parenthood like a lot of mothers seem to do.
Wow, Tabula. I don't know how you do it - study AND have a kid. Kudos to you.
I've seen so many couples go from having a great marriage to arguing and borderline divorce because they have kids and probably don't realize how hard it is. So the mom is doing the housework, studies, looks after kids and has a part time job, so she has no time for the husband who is upset that their sex life became non-existent...
This is my biggest concern with the choice to have kids or not, I do not want my relationship with my future husband neglected. I've witnessed how kids have torn couples/marriages apart because of how drastically the dynamics change once children enter the picture especially if you have more than 1. I totally understand why the mother staying at home with the kids is seen as "ideal" because I really can't imagine working and dealing with that stress only to come home and care for children and still have time to be attentive to your husband.
OP from what you wrote it really sounds like you don't want to be bothered with motherhood. I can understand wanting to be a SAHM but to also include a nanny is pretty much relieving you from motherhood altogether. You'll just be supervising the parenting of the nanny and not being hands on yourself.
However to answer your question, yes it's possible to have a change of heart if you meet the right guy but you have to make sure becoming a parent is still "your" decision and not something you're doing to please the guy and keep him in your life. I know a woman who had kids because it was what her husband wanted and after they divorced she started working all the time because she did not want to deal with her sons and they mostly stayed with their grandmother.
If you do not have kids for you, you will end up resenting them. So you need to decide if you want kids before a man enters the picture that way there is no doubt that it is what you truly want and desire. Because you don't know if the marriage is going to work out, so how would you feel having to raise them on your own and be a single mother. While he goes off and starts a new family with his new wife.
Not all marriages work out and you can't put kids back once they are here so you have to consider every possibility and make sure that under any circumstance, you'll be okay with being a mother. Whether it's a single mother, a mother to a special needs child, or the perfect scenario being a SAHM with your nanny lol. Whatever the scenario it needs to be your choice because ultimately it's going to be you that has to live with it through the good, bad, and the ugly.
This is my biggest concern with the choice to have kids or not, I do not want my relationship with my future husband neglected. I've witnessed how kids have torn couples/marriages apart because of how drastically the dynamics change once children enter the picture especially if you have more than 1. I totally understand why the mother staying at home with the kids is seen as "ideal" because I really can't imagine working and dealing with that stress only to come home and care for children and still have time to be attentive to your husband.
We discussed this at length before we started a family..including laying out a rough plan for ways to be intentional about continuing to make a point to connect with one another and not just take our bond for granted, but to still nurture it.
Especially in the earliest, most helpless stages of a child's life, caring for them and seeing to their needs is a gruelling, completely exhausting, round-the-clock proposition that is dang hard, for both parents (assuming both are taking an active role, at least). There's a stretch, there, where neither parent has a shred of energy left for him or herself alone, never mind any energy whatsoever to focus on a partner. But that level of intensity does level off. Still, I feel that you DO have to be intentional not to take your partner for granted and neglect to nurture the relationship. But that can happen in any long-term relationship/marriage, too, kids or no.
We discussed this at length before we started a family..including laying out a rough plan for ways to be intentional about continuing to make a point to connect with one another and not just take our bond for granted, but to still nurture it.
Especially in the earliest, most helpless stages of a child's life, caring for them and seeing to their needs is a gruelling, completely exhausting, round-the-clock proposition that is dang hard, for both parents (assuming both are taking an active role, at least). There's a stretch, there, where neither parent has a shred of energy left for him or herself alone, never mind any energy whatsoever to focus on a partner. But that level of intensity does level off. Still, I feel that you DO have to be intentional not to take your partner for granted and neglect to nurture the relationship. But that can happen in any long-term relationship/marriage, too, kids or no.
That's awesome you guys sat down and planned together, you can always manage to accomplish the impossible as a team.
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At 30, I had my second, and at 31 my third. 
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