How did you and your partner decide on how many kids you would have?

We were watching the Duggars on TV and the number just came to us.

fred wrote:

We were watching the Duggars on TV and the number just came to us.

So zero?

I kid.

My wife and I did talk about this. I think 3 or 4 kids is what we are shooting for. I have one sibling and she is one of 4.

My Pregnancies weren't easy, so we just had two.

Sometimes your body tells you wrote:

My Pregnancies weren't easy, so we just had two.

My answer as well. Her doctor told her two (plus three more lost) was enough. The Catholic Church still had her brainwashed that she should have more but I got snipped and she was ok with it.

If you have a good relationship it shouldn't be that much of a surprise what each of you want. You can always plan everything so sometimes stuff happens.

Plenty of unwanted children in the world...just adopt one or seven.

We looked at how miserable everyone with kids was and decided on none.

Actually, you were miserable to begin with, kids might have made you happier.

We didn't have a large house and weren't making a ton of dough, so we thought two would be great. Nine years later there was an "oops" that led to me getting snipped and the house getting an addition.

easy, we had sex twice = two kids

We didn't want our first to be an only child, so we decided to have a second.

Two is enough.

"The true cost of raising a child: Don't let news reports and studies scare you."

http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/the-true-cost-of-raising-a-child/17669

After 2 boys, I said "wanna try for a girl"? She said no, get snipped, please. I did, a year later she divorced me.

Anybody want to make babies with a 50 year old, now-unsnipped runner dweeb?

Family is waay more important than running, and I used to be really fast, so I know.

On our second date, I said, "There's something you should know now. I know that I don't want to have kids."

She said, "That's fine. I don't want kids either."

That's been the plan ever since.

I wanted zero. GF ended up pregnant by "accident". That was the first. We broke up, I met the woman of my dreams and married her. I still wanted none, even though I had a son. She wants kids. To be fair to her and let her live her dreams we had a child. So now I have two boys. She wants a girl, once again I'll give her what she wants because she means that much to me. So I'll end up with three, maybe four. But I still wanted none. I love being a dad, but I LOVED not being a dad.

It's not a mutual decision. However many she wants she gets.

well...... wrote:

We didn't want our first to be an only child, so we decided to have a second.

Two is enough.

I agree. And if anybody disagrees, I sincerely hope that they adopt that third or fourth or fifth, as the case may be. Over population is rapidly becoming our biggest problem and getting more severe.

If I was a politician, I'd run on a platform of no tax break for kid #3, losing your tax break on kid #2 if you have a fourth, and losing your tax break on kid #1 if you have a fifth.

I'd also end the wics program for anything past kid #2. It sounds harsh, but harsher would be to continue to overpopulated and leave these kids a hopeless situation.

If everybody chose to adopt after #2, some would choose to have 1 or 0 and the population would very slowly drop over time in a sustainable way. Someday they could then allow 3 to get it back to a flat population curve in a few hundred years.

F You. I need those kids and immigrants to pay for my social security in 25 years or so!

When we had none (for 8 years), we eventually decided that we wanted one.

When we had 1, we decided we wanted another.

When we had 2, we decided we did not want any more.

We were always very close to the same page, so it was a smooth and easy decision-making process.

Wife and I each have 1 sibling, so we both came into it thinking two kids was normal and about right. Had our first at age 30. Kid 1 was born with major disabilities which scared us off from trying again for many years. We did as much testing as we could before feeling comfortable that Kid 1's condition was not hereditary and we were no more likely than average to have it happen again. 6 years later we had Kid 2 - blessedly "normal". In many ways Kid 2 is like an only child and we often wish she had a "typical" sibling to grow up with. But we were getting older, both working not very lucrative careers, with enough financial and other stress due to Kid 1 so we decided it was not to be. I got snipped when Kid 2 was 5.