Conflicted
Me: Sometimes I think that we’re a little conflicted about the number of children we plan1 to have.
-Silence-
Me: Or maybe it is just me.
Josh: I think that it is probably just you.
Me: How many children do you want?
Josh: 2 to 12.
Me: Oh! So you’re not conflicted at all, you know that anywhere between 2 & 12 is fine.
Josh: Exactly.
How many children do/did you plan to have?
1. I really do mean “plan”. If it were simply a matter of hoping, then I would hope that we could care for every child who needs care. But perhaps this needs its own post?
We are planning on 2-3. David is an only child and thought 1, but I had always hoped for 3, so 2 is the compromise, but if we have 2 girls, we will probably try to adopt a little boy.
I wish for a big family. I think 4 kids would be a minimum for a “big” family.
I have no upper limit, but we are starting at 25 years old and hopefully we’ll space kids a little bit so I think we won’t go beyond 8 or 10. It sounds crazy though!! 
Oh and my husband thinks 4 is enough, but I think he may change his mind once he sees how awesome kids are 
We started our marriage planning for 3-4. Than it became a solid 4. Then we started NFP, and I began to bounce all over the place with numbers! I think my husband is around 4+ (he worries about paying for school and such), but I’m hovering around a 6. I’m sure our thoughts will be all over the place once we finally start, and I really want to be completely open to life (perhaps not even NFP one day?!), so I’m fine with those numbers continuing to fluctuate. I think it’s great that your husband is so open!
Originally I wanted five, sounded like a good number, and my husband wanted two. He still is at two and now I’m at three. I came down in my number because:
(1) I don’t want to work full-time ever again and the more kids we have the more money we will need for education, etc.
(2) I don’t want to buy a bigger house for more kids because we have a very low, low mortgage payment which allows me to work part-time.
So basically I lowered my number so I can be the primary caregiver for those little ones. But if we won the lottery, I saw seven!
I love how you are both so reasonable and pro-children!
How many children do/did you plan to have?
As many as the Holy Spirit leads us to have. We don’t currently feel led. But we’ll see how we feel next month. Which is how we approach it every month. We now have four.
How’s that answer??
Very good.
I know I *should* say as many as God wants to give us. But, if I’m being totally honest, I know I’d lost my mind if I had more than 4. Ask me again when/if I get to 4.
2 or 4. My mother convinced me that kids come best in even numbers, so everyone has a “buddy” and no one feels like the odd one out. Two seems too small but four is expensive!
I would love at least 4, my husband likes 5, but I’m with the even number thing so maybe it’ll be 6.
I really don’t care though. Right now I just want 1 :/
If it were only about what we want…
Can’t get too caught up in planning, though I think it’s good to have some ideas. My dad always said he wanted two; my mom said she wanted 4. They had 6. My dad says they both got what they wanted!
At least 2, because we’d like to try for 1 of each. If we have 2 of the same sex, then I’d probably try for one more, or maybe adopt. I’d really like no more than 4, if I have a choice. (Are You listening, God?
)
“Are You listening, God?” Haha! I share that feeling!
We just had our first 7 weeks ago and we didn’t ‘plan’ him. We are currently not using NFP but not trying. The number we always say is 12, but we’d be happy with any number. If Dominic is our only one though we might have to adopt…we don’t want to havE an only child.
Guess we’ll see what God says!
I think that for some people (though I don’t know how many) planning to not plan is really best.
I’m neither married nor engaged, so I hope it’s okay that I chime in here. I’m one of nine children, in a yours-mine-ours-and-theirs kind of family, due to each of my parents having a son from a previous marriage, three children “together”, and four Chinese adoptions. All but my two older brothers were homeschooled, and my mother didn’t work outside the home after her third pregnancy. It wasn’t because my father was bringing home cloudy-with-a-chance-of-meatballs size bacon, either – he’s the pastor of a rural non-denominational church in central Texas. I’ve seen the good, the bad, and the downright ugly of large families, and I still want no less than four biological children, and as many adopted children as my future husband and I can bring home.
Yes, my family rarely eats out. I didn’t get the newest clothes. I had to babysit and work a job in high school to pay for extra ballet lessons. My parents weren’t able to cut a hefty tuition check when I started my collegiate career. They help when they can, but it’s still “send tuition money or pay for wheelchair and surgery” sometimes. And I know that’s not for everyone – I’m certainly not a EVERYONE MUST BE THE DUGGARS….EXCEPT CATHOLIC…AND TRADITIONALISTS….ALSO DAVE RAMSEY FTW type of person. God calls each family to what is right for them – and for some that’s 2, 10, 20, or no children. But for me personally, I feel that what I gained in love, in friendships with my siblings and parents, in work ethic, in a heart for pure and undefiled religion, in learning to love life for what it is and what we can do for the world, not what we get in return – I wouldn’t trade that for two siblings and a paid-off college education in this or any other lifetime. Time will tell if that’s what God has in store for my future family.
Thank you for your note. I often worry that I’m maiming my children by not being able to give them everything they could use. They’ve always been happy about another baby, but I don’t know how they’ll take this one. We made it clear that we wanted to stop with a dozen.
My husband has always maintained that the best gift you can give your child is another sibling. I hope he’s right.
I agree with your husband. I think that it is important to find ways to really parent one’s children, and not let them “get lost in the crowd” but honestly, I’d much rather have my youngest sister (also a surprise when my mom was in her early 40s) than have had more attention from my parents.
“God calls each family to what is right for them – and for some that’s 2, 10, 20, or no children” Couldn’t agree more!
How many I would like to have: 2-4.
How many I will have: only God knows.
Only God knows, indeed.
Sadly, some people have fertility problems who really want a lot of children. I am not one of those.
We both agreed over the years that an even dozen would be great, and we’ve loved being the amazing young-looking couple with so many well-behaved children. We always felt like we were letting God take control of that aspect of our marriage, and yet, concluded that once we reached that, we should start using our God-given reason and not be excessive. After all, the older kids will begin leaving and we wouldn’t want the youngest one(s) not to be as familiar with the oldest siblings.
Surely, we reasoned, we could keep our hands off each other for a week or 2 every cycle? Right?
God is laughing at us, I think.
I think that God’s laughter is that of the kindest of parents who delight in their children’s very small view of the world.
We have 2, which my husband thinks is a good number. My preferred number is “a whole bunch,” but he is right that kids are expensive…especially because living where the jobs are means the cost of living is really high… The current compromize is to get a dog, and to keep up the VERY careful charting, because we are lucky enough to not have any trouble conceiving! But I can’t help feeling like it’s such a shame to let all that fertility go to waste… :-p
It is a shame when reality interferes with dreams. ::sigh::
I totally agree. The shame, that we’ve experienced, is not being able to completely give ourselves to each other when *both* of us are the most eager for each other. Our argument each month has been “this is what we are SUPPOSED to be doing!”
Well….we are very good at persuading ourselves. Let’s hope we can be good at persuading ourselves to accept cheerfully this new life He’s given us!
Please…pray for us.
I’d love to have 5 children. My husband would like, “as many as we can afford.”
We both agree we will welcome however many God gives us.
“we will welcome however many God gives us”
Always a good perspective!
Hmm. On the one hand we recognize that we can’t really plan, because who knows what the future holds. I mean, I would like a big family, but maybe financially we won’t be able to afford it, or maybe we’ll have three kids and I’ll decide that I have all I can handle or who knows. So on the one hand, we take it month by month, or even day by day, and on the ore hand we’ve tentatively set the number at four.
Makes sense to me!
My husband originally said 2 but if we go over, it has to be an even number. I’ll have whatever God gives me’. I’m not the most fertile person so even one would be amazing. But I do love the idea of a big family
I think that it is interesting that so many people are attached to the idea of even numbers. Not that it is a bad thing, I’d just not encountered it before this post.
I didn’t have a pre-set # in mind, and we agreed to accept whatever God gives. After having 5 children in 7 years, I took an NFP class and we haven’t felt called to throw out the charts yet. I totally get it that God’s plan for the number of children (spacing, etc) is different for everyone. I’m thankful my husband and I agree on this issue. If you trust God’s will, you can’t go wrong. How to trust His will? Follow the Church’s teachings on the subject, pray about it, and He’ll let you know one way or another.
I think I love you.
Thanks for your encouraging comment!
I suddenly remembered something said to us when we were engaged (1990). A father of 9 children (soon to be 10) asked us where we would be going for our honeymoon. We told him that it depended on what phase I was in whether we would dally on our drive to graduate school or head straight there.
His reply: “Phase one, phase two–it’s all the same. God will provide.”
Pingback: Large Families
Pingback: Family Planning for Pairing Children | There Is No Wealth But Life