OT: I need help, men

DannyinJapan

DannyinJapan

Joined
Oct 9, 2003
Messages
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I have a lot of bad memories from my childhood. My parents fought 24 hours a day.
I dont make much money and I dont know if I ever will.
Training in budo is a large part of my life and it takes up basically a whole day out of every week.

Where is this going?

Everybody in our life, including Takako, wants us to have a baby.
I have terrible misgivings about it. It is, to me, the heaviest burden and a responsibility you can never be free of.
I am afraid. My sister had an autisitc baby.
I know that everybody says they love their kids more than anything in their lives. I understand that.
I dont have any NOW though, so why should I make huge sacrifices for children that dont exist?

I need somebody to consider my thoughts and offer me some new possible ways of thinking.
 
Danny

IMHO, don't let economic worries stop you from having children. They are the greatest gift you can ever receive. Everyone get by somehow, and you will too.

Your children are your legacy. I say have them now while you are still young enough to enjoy them.

Just some comments from a sentimental Dad. Take them for what they cost you.

Semp
 
I'll give my view but don't read this unless you want a dead honest blunt answer. You should never ask a question you don't want an answer to.




Kids aren't for everyone, but it *is* an expectation...especially in the culture you married into. Folks don't generally get married just to make sure they have a date every Friday night for the rest of their lives. *You* need to decide if kids are something you are prepared to deal with for every day of the rest of your life. You probably should have talked about this with your wife before you married her. If you don't agree 100%, one of you is going to be miserable. If you dig deep and are prepared for it, go for it. If not and she is, hard news...cut her loose and let her find someone with similar goals so you can both be happy in the future.

I say this with 100% honesty Danny...wishing for the best for you, her and especially the kids.
 
Danny,

Wow - this is a very hard and easy question. First it is easy as children are a precious gift that truly does change your life in aspects you can not begin to understand - as it is very personal and different for each of us.

Second it is hard, as it does change the dynamics of the relationship - depending on the relationship that one has with their significant other or spouse. Before, you have a child - you must talk with yourself and truly understand - do you want to be a parent to a child - one has to be totally honest with yourself. Then talk with your spouse and have an honest discussion about having a child (the responsibility and joy, the expense - need more space, how to deal with time - personal time and time with your spouse to remain a couple, is there family around to help, etc.) - do not be swayed - discuss honestly and openly. When you are ready you will know and if you have to ask the question - you may know the answer but are afraid to discuss.
 
DannyinJapan said:
I have a lot of bad memories from my childhood. My parents fought 24 hours a day.
I dont make much money and I dont know if I ever will.
Training in budo is a large part of my life and it takes up basically a whole day out of every week.

Where is this going?

Everybody in our life, including Takako, wants us to have a baby.
I have terrible misgivings about it. It is, to me, the heaviest burden and a responsibility you can never be free of.
I am afraid. My sister had an autisitc baby.
I know that everybody says they love their kids more than anything in their lives. I understand that.
I dont have any NOW though, so why should I make huge sacrifices for children that dont exist?

I need somebody to consider my thoughts and offer me some new possible ways of thinking.
Click to expand...

Danny,

I have nothing new to share with you.

My wife and I have been married seven years now, two years ago I finally folded against her desire to have a baby.

I love Katie (my daughter) very much. But like you I'm out of the house a great deal, I work 50-60 hours a week, I also part-timed at a gun shop for gun money until Katie was 3 months old, that had been a three year gig for another 10 hours a week. Like those in the retail industry I don't get weekends off, I don't get a normal predictable day off. I was suppose to be off tomorrow, and it got changed Tuesday and I'm off today.

My sister is at best a basket case, she has three children and is one of those unfortuneates that just can't really seem to control either herself or her children.

I was... a hand full... as a child.

After a miscarriage (which the doctor told me that she personally thought that most women had at least one of, even if they didn't know it, and that at least 25% of pregnancies in her opinion ended in the same manner, but they happened so early in term that they were often take for late & heavy periods) we had a good one which turned out to be Katie.

While I wouldn't recommend having a child to keep a marriage, I don't think I'd be married today without us having one. I learned too much about my wife from the stress, things that I don't like, that I don't know if she kept covered like a veneer, or just like stress fractures, but they are there.

Money is tight, I don't think I've spent much here in awhile, Uncle Bill probably has lost my address already.

i don't know about japan, but here although most stores sell formula at a loss, it's still expensive.

I don't think it's a burden that I'll ever be able to put down. My father died when I was young, there are patterns of behavior that i've never observed, so I'll have to wing it when the time comes. Hell I worry about her when she's at day care :)

If there is anything in particular you want to discuss or know about, this forum is the most diverse, and perverse group I've been associated with. I'm glad there isn't a group photo with me in it. But if I can't help, one of them can.

Just one more thing, most of us sacriface in one way or another for others on almost a daily basis. Most of us are the better half of Humanity, in our own ways we want a better world for us all.
 
I think this is the root cause of your misgivings. My dad grew up in that situation, and when he got married to me mum, he kept asking her and himself: when are we gonna fight? When will the other shoe (inevitably) drop?

You can be different, but you may've not seen a good example of this given your childhood. I'm surprised you don't have anxiety, that usually comes with the teritory.

You might consider talking to an American threapist about these issues. My wife was in a similar mental situation from her childhood, too.

If ye can confront the past and come to grips with it, perhaps you can see another way, and Takako can help you as friend and partner.

My wife I think wanted kids from day one, but money and situations didn't allow fer it. 10 years later (15 total as we were engaged for 5), we had our first child. What a blessing. I had the same fears as you, wondered also if I/we was/were up to the task.

Gotta go 2 work, so more later,

Keith
 
Dear Danny,

I saw in one of your posts in another thread that you are a Christian, so I will offer counsel on that basis.

I think you will find a blessing in Psalm 127 and 128. Ask yourself, would God give something to one of his children that he calls a reward, and make it be a curse?

We have 4 children, and had simliar fears, and were actually waiting until we were "ready" when God sent our first despite our efforts to wait. It is hard work, but you know about that already, being a dedicated martial artist.Aren't the rewards of your trainig worth the effort? So will the rewards of your labors as a parent be so, if you do well. The fact that you are soberly considering this, and not carelessly, mindlessly, just having children is a sign that you take the responsibility seriously.

I don't make much money either, and wonder if I ever will. If there is anything you can do to improve that, without compromising your principles, I would try to do so. If you cannot, my wife and I have found that we have been provided for.

I think I have seen that you do some creative work yourself, like the stone khukuri? Children are a great work, and they must be approached in a similar fashion. Patient, careful, attentive effort will fashion them into people that will bless you and others. Mistakes will happen, but can be overcome. However, careless workmanship will reveal itself, just as it will in a knife. To be fair though, no parent, even the best, can gaurantee the outcome. Sometimes the stone or the metal has a mind and temperment of its own! :)

My wife and I will keep you and your wife in our prayers.

Danny, I have enjoyed reading a lot of what you have written here, and think, with God's grace, you will do well.

Tom
 
Children are the greatest joy, the greatest sorrow, and the greatest responsibility you will ever encounter.

They will open up a huge part of your heart that you never knew was there, and you will love them like you never knew you could love anything. Mine bring me a sense of completeness. Being a father is the only thing I'm 100% sure that I'm supposed to be doing. Nothing at all can compare to the wonderful feelings I get just from a smile, or an "I love you, Daddy."

They will wound you deeply, and make you amazingly vulnerable. That huge part of your heart that I mentioned earlier is subject to any number of fears of disaster, disease, crime, or even minor hurts. It breaks my heart any time my children are hurt, sick, or even get their feelings hurt. My heart bleeds any time I here one of those terrible news stories about kids being hurt, assaulted, or killed. Those could easily be my kids on the news, and that's a very weak and vulnerable position to be in.

Being a father is the most important thing you will ever attempt to do. You have an enormous affect on everything your child will be. They depend on you for everything for the first few years, and learn how to be a person from you. Your kids will learn how a man treats his wife, and how a wife treats her husband by watching and listening to you and your wife. They will most likely use what they learned to select a mate and they will most likely have a similar relationship to you and your wife. They can't help it. You will program them to certain behaviors. Everything, and I mean everything they believe and use on a daily basis has its grounding in you. You are the beginning of everything they know, and they will carry the things you do and say with them for the rest of their lives.

Time is love for children. They love and depend on their parents, and want to be with them as much as possible. Quality time, while important, is absolutely no substitute for quantity time. The time I have for my personal use has dried up almost completely since we had our first child. It is my choice, because I know that each time I read a book to my son, or play with my daughter could be the last time we see each other. They will remember that time for the rest of their lives, and that is so much more important and long-lasting than whether or not I finish a project, or read a book for myself, or play that video game, or watch that tv show. I think about my kids saying "the last time I saw my dad, he was doing ...." If the dots don't have something meaningful in them, I don't give it any of my valuable time. Your priorities will and must change.

If you are ok with all that, and it's ok not to be, then maybe you are ready.
 
You are never really "ready" to have a baby. If you are waiting for the perfect circumstances, odds are that it ain't gonna happen.

Do you plan on living the rest of your life in Japan? Do you plan on living the rest of your life with Takako? You have to do what is best for your marriage as a whole, if you are going to spend the rest of your life together.

My other tidbit of advice is don't let people outside of your marriage make your decision for you. It's ultimately another Spirit driven decision that makes dodging that shinai look easy.

David
 
I have terrible misgivings about it.

If this is the case DON'T. You are not ready. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with NOT having kids. Seems the world is not suffering from underpopulation yet.
 
The guys here have given you great advice.

My Grandfather Gabriel had a saying that goes something like this: “In the greatest of pleasures, God put the greatest of responsibilities”.

Think it over carefully… and if you decide you don’t want children, there is no shame about it (remember, having then is not mandatory). If you decide to have them, they will change your life forever. They will become you top priority, your greatest burden, your greatest responsibility, and ultimately your greatest joy.
 
I have been married for near 20 happy years I believe due in large part to not having any children.

The world is terribly overpopulated and screw recycling and planting a tree the single greatest thing you can do to save the world is not to reproduce.

I like kids and everybody always says it's a shame I don't have any but I see so many relationships either screwed up because of kids or dissolve after the kids go because that is all there was. I also see a tremendous amount of people struggling to raise kids right but are unwilling or unable economically to make the sacrifice to have one parent quit work and I feel is is very difficult to raise a healthy person without 1 parent home. I also see people constantly torn between kids and work and good people with very very bad kids.

I also do not know you but I'll tell you that if the conflict you grew up with in any way rubbed on you that you should be very careful about not transmitting it to any potential children.

If you have doubts I'd say don't do it. Try volunteering with kids or working with them. The kids already exsisting by and large don't get enough attention.
 
Thought alot about replying to this. It's a very personal thing, but then you asked. Just to give you some idea of my background. I'm 44 have a 2.75 year old, he will be three in August. I would like more, working, er playing on that. ;)

Here is the tough love stuff. these are not reasons, just excuses, read on.

->I have a lot of bad memories from my childhood. My parents fought 24 hours a day.

OK, this is a good learning experience, it was a mistake on your parents part, learn from it do not repeat it. (That does not mean you won't ever fight, humans are humans it happens) Don't stress over it.

->I dont make much money and I dont know if I ever will.

That has never stopped a sizeable percentage of the population. There is a good chance many of the people on this list where born of parents who had to struggle to make ends meet. Being rich is nice most of us are not.

->Training in budo is a large part of my life and it takes up basically a whole day out of every week.

That's ok, everybody needs a outlet. You will be surprised how much you would like to spend time with your little one. At least once they start doing more then sleeping, eating and pooping.

->Where is this going?

Guess we may find out in a few months. :)

->Everybody in our life, including Takako, wants us to have a baby.

Well, forget everbody else but Takako, it's your lives, no one else's.

->I have terrible misgivings about it.

That's good you are not going into this with blinders on. But here is something to think about. You will never be truly ready.

->It is, to me, the heaviest burden and a responsibility
you can never be free of.

It is a great resonsibility but worth it, did you ever hear "he ain't heavy he's my brother"? When it's yours you will be surprised how light it is, besides it's not something you want to be free of. To qoute another saying, "be nice to your kids they will pick your nursing home" :)

->I am afraid. My sister had an autisitc baby.

That can be tough, bad things can happen. I'll bet it does not change the way she loves her child.

->I know that everybody says they love their kids more than anything in their lives. I understand that.
I dont have any NOW though, so why should I make huge sacrifices for children that dont exist?

You will answer that your self the first time your child goes through a complete kata that you taught him/her

->I need somebody to consider my thoughts and offer me some new possible ways of thinking. :)

Hope I did a little.
 
Danny?

Man...I got uncomfortable just clicking on "send reply."

Uh...hmmm...

I have two daughters, your age, maybe older. We are close, although far away. I "co-parented" (what a stupid term) when they were little. My ex didn't like sick people, so when they had colds or flu or a temperature "just because", I was the up-all-night-parent. My Dad died when I was in high school, so I didn't know exactly how to go about the business of parenting.

er.. so what..?

It is a responsibility and a concern that you will ACTIVELY have for the next 20 some years of your life, and a concern on different levels for the entire REST of your life. The physical, spiritual, emotional, psychological, educational, social........on and on and on.....well-being of the kid(s) will be an every day, perhaps every second at times, part of your life.

Then...as you brought up in another post...you are mixing ethnicities. Where are you going to be living? From what I know of Japan, racially mixed children are not always well-received. I may be working with old information, but at one time....even the sex of a child was tremendously important in Japanese society. Male=good, female=not good. I'm recalling studies about the disproportion of terminated pregnancies after amniocentesis was developed in Japan, because of the cultural emphasis on male children. My information may be out of date. dunno.

Then...sheez, Danny. From what I've seen of the many topics we've discussed here, you have some reconciling of life issues you want to deal with...serious issues. Those issues won't go away with the birth of a child that other people are pressuring you to have.

It is your life choice, the child's life foundation, and nobody else's business...BUT, if you have questions so profound that you ask the Cantina...however brilliant most of us are...maybe you've answered your own question....at least for now.

My very best wishes in all things,


Kis
 
Danny--if you don't want kids, don't have 'em. It's actually pretty simple. My wife and I have been married for eleven years now, and we don't have kids. I grew up in a family where it was expected that I would have children. When I was growing up, it was always "When you have kids..." not, "If you have kids" My wife and I decided that we didn't want children. She's a teacher's aid in a severely handicapped class, and I teach at the local community college, so we both get enough exposure to kids. I will say that our families had trouble dealing with it. My wife's parents we as far as to suggest that if we weren't having children, there was no reason to get married. Hmmmm....what about the fact that we love each other? If you want kids, go for it, but if you are having any doubts, don't risk it. There are enough unwanted children in the world already. Hell, there are enough children in the world period. At 6.2 billion plus people on the planet, I think it's time to rethink the biblical injunction to be fruitul and multiply.

--Josh
 
DIJ

I offer up this POV perhaps it is to much, or not enough. I do hope it helps you see inside of you.


Background
My Mother left my Father in the night when I was two. He was and is (sad to say) a pathological liar. Mom was drunk allot and I ended up with the Grandparents. When she did remarry I wondered why my step Dad stayed with her she was so mean to him, when my Brother came and a year later my Sister I was a teenager.
I saw there quality of life go down the slope , a slope I did not want to be on.

Step to my second marriage
The lady friend I am living with (at the time) was unable to have a child so her first marriage was annulled by the church, so I think we are quite safe. Reality is we were able to have a child after a lot of practice. She was 41 at the time so we had some tests done to make sure (as we could) that the child was going to be healthy. She is a high Tec pediatric nurse so she had some of her own fears, and I had made up my mind that I did not really think I was cut out for being a parent ,I had no experience where a child made things better, over population, low income, no time yada yada yada. So if there was something wrong we might have done something.

My son is now 12. There has not been a day, hour even a second that I have regretted the path I have shared with him. I had no idea what was going to happen and little role model to look to. So I just had to step up and remember the hypocritical and wrong paths that I saw as a child, and pick another. As I had this little sprit looking to me as if I knew the way (and often showing the way!), I had to fake it ,make the right choice even if I did know from experience what was right. I knew what was wrong.
I am divorced from his mom for ~ 6 years now , I am sorry I waited that long , for my Son's sake as well as my own. She has a house down the street we share him 1/2 time week to week. He has the ability to see how the choices we make effect the quality of our life, and is wiser for it. He has more of his moms time now that she has had to step up.

So look inside your self what is your deepest fear (in regards to your question) ? I wanted a steady date & some one I could talk with , and I did not want anyone to get in the way. As it turned out my Son could carry on a conversation better at 5 then my wife could. I used to race bikes , now I ride to work and on the way ride with my Son to school. There a fine lady that my Son approves of that is trying to be steady with me as well, so it all works out, but only if we Work it out.
 
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