What made you decide your family was complete?

[Kitty 34]

In other words, what made you stop having more kids? Was it age? Was it medical reasons or did you get your boy and girl or whatever you wanted??

My DH would have gone for a 4th one in a heart beat but after three wonderful boys and the fact I was 35 and DH was 37, we finally decided that we were content with our three sons.

What helped decide that your family was complete? :thewave:

 

[jel0511]

2 strokes at 35 did the trick for me. We have a DD 7 and DS 4, so no real need for more. we'll get a dog instead.

 

[kaseyC]

It was age for us. We did not have our first DD until I was 30 and I was 38 when I had our last DD. Also after the third we realized we were out numbered and that is not good place to be with our wild bunch!

 

[Barb D]

I always wanted 4, but I had a very difficult pregnancy (at 38) with number 3, and decided to stop there. Now I've had a hysterectomy, so that's definitely it for us.

 

[NMAmy]

DD was so perfect, I knew I didn't need anymore. (Although some days I might tell you that she's such a terror, I knew I couldn't handle more than 1!)

 

[bicker]

What made you decide your family was complete?

We got married.

 

[chi_girl]

Not on topic, but we haven't stopped yet. My DH and I both come from large Catholic families (DH is one of 9 kids and I am one of 7 kids) and we are planning on following the family tradition. We are on baby #3, and plan at least 2 more. We are both rather young (24 and 25), so we have at least 10 more baby years.

Michele

 

[Bob Slydell]

We're still debating whether or not to have a third (DS2 is 7 months old).

 

[Towncrier]

My wife had such a hard time leaving our 2yo with relatives when DD Sarah was born. Add to that the fact that Sarah had to stay in the hospital for several days in order to get her bilirubin values down and you have one depressed mommy who was torn between her desire to stay in the hospital with her newborn and her desire to go home to take care of her firstborn.

She told me that she never wanted to go through that again. And when Sarah refused to sleep through the night for the first 7 months of her life, I agreed with Sue. Sleep deprivation will do that to you.

So although I always thought that we would have three children, we stopped at two.

 

[disneymom3]

Well, at the time we thought I had MS and I was on a very intense drug on which you were not supposed to get preg or it would cause spontaneous abortion. I also had two boys quite close in age and at the time felt like I was certainly done. Now, it turns out I didn't have MS but in the meantime DH has had something rather permanent done about it, so here we are. I adore my three and there are days I would not go back to the baby days for anything, but there are also days I wish I had had one more. Really wanted a girl for DDs sake though and there is no guarantee so we may be safer this way. DH has brought up adoption a lot recently so when we are more financially stable, we may decide to do that.

 

[aimee11621]

$

 

[disykat]

We were considering adopting a girl from China. We went through some pretty serious inlaw difficulties with dh's parents, interferring with our relationship - so we were in marriage counseling instead. By the time things were back to square our boys were in school and it felt too much like starting over. If we had been younger, we would have done it in a heartbeat. I still sort of mourn that opportunity.

 

[Nutsy]

an ectopic pregnancy put a stop to mine

 

[HOGFAN]

2 here, 1 of each. I have always believed that you shouldnt have more than what you can afford to send to college.

 

[Stitchfans]

It was age for us too. It was a second marriage for both of us, and neither one of us were spring chicks. We were both 37.

 

[binny]

we thought we were done after 2, God had other plans for us. 11 months later along came #3.

We just feel like we're done.

 

[MaryAnnDVC]

I always wanted 4, but stopped at 3.

We had both genders...2 girls and a boy.

We had our first at age 30.

Our kids kept getting bigger with each pregnancy...10 lbs 1 oz, 10 lbs 5 ozs and then 11 lbs 5 ozs. I was afraid of how big #4 would be.

I was EXHAUSTED throughout my 3rd pregnancy...that's probably the biggest determining factor.

 

[froglady]

Age. I had DD at 32, and DS at 42. Thank God I wasn't able to have another at 52!

 

[ahutton]

we thought we were done after 2, God had other plans for us.

We were in that boat too. We also had each pregnancy become more difficult, and each delivery LOTS more difficult. After the emergency CSection and DS being in NICU we decided that we would not go through this again. We're blessed with 3 wonderful kids (DD, DD and DS), and DH did the permanent stop so we didn't have any more God intervening surprises!

 

[cabmom]

We are now complete with boy #4. He is 1 month old today! Their gender never mattered to me, we always said 4 kids.
I am 37, husband is 34.

Marilynn