Dear Lori and Jeff,

When my wife and I got married two years ago, we kind of swept the kid conversation under the rug. We are both in our early thirties and neither one of us were really sure what we wanted so we just didn’t really talk about it. Recently my wife’s sister had her first baby and now my wife is pushing for us to start a family. She says she’s ready for a new experience and is trying to convince me it will give us a new purpose to bond over. I disagree. We love each other, but we’ve had a lot of friction in our relationship, especially over the last year. I don’t believe we’re in a solid enough place to take on more responsibility and strongly believe we need more time to strengthen our marriage and actually enjoy each other. She seems to be getting increasingly more anxious and says she biologically doesn’t have that kind of time. How do we resolve this?

Signed, Not Kid Ready

Dear NKR,

Lori and Jeff: Instead of allowing the conversation to become stuck on all of the facts and figures of why you should or shouldn’t conceive, you need to work on understanding the emotional drivers that are truly anchoring you both into your respective positions.

Lori: Ultimately, the decisions of whether and when to have kids should be fully focused on the experience of the child you're contemplating bringing into the world rather than the needs and pleasures of the parent. Having a baby before both parents are fully on board poses a few significant risks. The most worrisome is the potential for that child to feel an undercurrent of being unwanted by a parent. Additionally, the possibility of relationship erosion can’t be minimized. The stress of becoming new parents is a powerful force that can easily break wide open any small fissures that already exist in the marriage. With an added dynamic of pressuring a partner to become a parent, and subsequently reorienting their entire life, you're creating an invitation for resentment.

To your wife I ask: What is your “why” for wanting children now? Whenever there is a sudden sense of urgency, it’s important to understand where that impulse is stemming from. Decisions made from a centered and aware space are typically rooted in a grounded energy. So experiencing an anxious or frenetic air around this topic is a signal to slow down and seek clarity. Is this choice being driven by fear (of missing out, being left behind by female friends and relatives, not having a purpose, direction, fulfillment) or love and wisdom? If both partners aren’t ready to welcome and embrace parenthood, you have a few choices. If resources permit, consider freezing your eggs to minimize your stress of conceiving while providing ample time for both of you to be ready for kids. Another option is to agree to commit the next year to building your relationship and addressing any remaining non-kid bucket list items. Nurture your connection and enjoy each other with the goal of creating more readiness for kids without regrets while still staying within a reasonable timeline.

Jeff: Men will never fully understand the maternal drive to have children and the anxiety associated with physiologically running out of time. But we can still have a valid sense of whether or not our relationship has the strength of foundation to support the added layers of kids. The most important thing to contemplate is if you would commit to the process of having kids if you felt the relationship was in a better place. Or would you find other reasons to kick the can down the road that don’t fully represent your truth about whether or not you want to be a parent.

If you believe that your wife is being swayed in the direction of having a kid because she’s running out of time and it’s what everyone else is doing, it’s easy to jump to judgment that those are invalid reasons for making such a disruptive decision. Decide what you truly want and figure out how you can voice that perspective without guilt or regret. If you want children and think doing some work on the marriage would reduce the friction and create a better situation for starting a family, then propose a six-month pause and commit to doing couples counseling. If you don’t, have the courage to stand up for your beliefs and accept the repercussions of your truth.

Lori and Jeff: You both need to be crystal clear about why you’d choose to take this life altering step (or not) and ensure that having kids isn’t an attempt to soothe discontent, fear or insecurity about the marriage. Becoming parents creates a complex shift in a relationship. There are, of course, the joys of bringing a new life into the world and starting to build a family, but the pressure and stress it can create requires a strong bond. And ultimately, the most important consideration needs to be whether your child would feel that they are loved or feel like a burden.