Would you have had kids if you couldn't

Avatar for cindytree
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-28-2003
Would you have had kids if you couldn't
1589
Wed, 09-03-2003 - 3:31pm
Would you still have had children if you knew you might not be able to pay for their college education? I'm not talking about providing food and shelter and needs of minor children and paying bills in general. Just about paying their way through college.

I guess I'm still astounded at the attitude that surfaced at another thread implying that if they couldn't pay for college, they wouldn't have had children. Of course, I'm a lazy, selfish mom at home who isn't working while some of my kids are in school so maybe my opinion doesn't count. Maybe I SHOULD take up scrapbooking to make my existence more worthwhile! lol

In any case, it is an interesting question considering that, under that reasoning, Oprah Winfrey shouldn't have been born. Give me time and I can come up with a whole list of highly successful and respected people who have impacted us in positive ways that wouldn't have been born had their parents decided that because they couldn't pay for college, they wouldn't have children.

How has the college issue influenced your decision to have children, if at all? Do you think it is an important criteria in the decision?

Cindy

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 7:54pm
"Part of your theory here seems to be that if you are meant to be, then you'll be together 5 hrs from now and can get married then. But, if its meant to be, then just do it. If its meant to be, waiting doesn't make it more so. "

Waiting does not make it more so but waiting does give someone the chance to find out if it was meant to be. Many people who thought it was meant to be are no longer together 5 years later (as the unanswered prayers post shows).

Avatar for virgogirl914
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-25-2003
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 8:02pm
Are you contending that you've never made a poor choice in your life? Yeah. . .right.

Was the timing of my relationship difficult. . .yes. I don't see anywhere that I've sugar coated my experience. I've been brutally open and honest here, which is much more than I can say for lots of posters. . . .

You may view the beginnings of my relationship as 'wrong' but it was not illegal.

I never claimed to be a child development expert, but was clarifying why I brought up Erikson's theories.

To be honest with you. . .with regards to your contempt of me and my husband. . . it's not that we were sleeping with anything and everything. . .we fell in love, we let our hormones take over. . .he had huge problems with his parents. . .I attempted to provide him with a safe haven rather than seeing him on the street for what *I* thought would be a short stay. . .I was wrong on that count. But loving him was not and is not wrong.

And I have a serious question for you. . .your hatred of me for my relationship is based on what? The age difference or the fact that I dared to have pre-marital sex. Would you go on and on about how he was a 'child' if I'd been younger than him? or if I'd been 18 to his 17 when we first consumated our relationship?



iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 8:18pm
Oh come ON. Who really knows who they are at 18? I didnt start really feeling like I *knew* who I was till about 30. And as far as what they wanted to do with their lives-why does that have to be cast in stone at 18? I went back to college at 35 to start a new career.

The whole point of this argument is that the MAJORITY of 18 yo's out there are not ready for marriage. They are still teenagers. Considering it as a valid life choice for your teenager is doing nothing more than setting them up to consider it a valid choice themselves! You *say* you wouldnt encourage your dd to do it, but you also say you consider it a *valid* choice. Which makes absolutely no sense.

dj

Dj

"Now when I need help, I look in the mirror" ~Kanye West~

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 8:22pm
No, it IS the point. An 18 yo ISNT mature *enough*. Simply by the fact that they HAVENT gained any experience as far as being able to take care of themselves, much less a child. Most of us look back on 18 and realize we thought we knew it all, when we really didnt know much. No, I dont look back on 30 in the same way as I did my teenage years. And yes, in this society, 18 IS teenage years.

dj

Dj

"Now when I need help, I look in the mirror" ~Kanye West~

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 8:30pm
No, SHAME ON YOU! This post doesn't really deserve a response, but I can't resist.

<>

Oh yeah, right. My kids are not pigs to the slaughter becasue they attend daycare.

<>

Sorry, I didn't make any "mistakes." It IS the right decision to put them in daycare ... kinda hard to give them a place to sleep and food to eat if I don't.

<>

THAT IS BULLCHIT. I didn't choose to get divorced. My stbxh chose to be a b@stard and boink another woman. HE made that decision not I.


<>

I'd love to see some statistical correlation between WOHPs and guns at school. But, alas, I won't, because it doesn't exist.

f<>

Sorry, God isn't necessarily first in my life. And my marriage wasn't first either, which is part of why it failed. My children ARE first.

Hollie, who doesn't know why she lets trolls get to her





Avatar for cyndiluwho
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 8:36pm
I'd give my dd a retainer to a good lawyer as a wedding present, lol. My mother told me "It's not to late to tear up that marriage license" after we were married. Should have listened. Would have saved myself a lot of grief.
iVillage Member
Registered: 12-12-2002
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 8:45pm
>>>No, it IS the point. An 18 yo ISNT mature *enough*. Simply by the fact that they HAVENT gained any experience as far as being able to take care of themselves, much less a child. Most of us look back on 18 and realize we thought we knew it all, when we really didnt know much. No, I dont look back on 30 in the same way as I did my teenage years. And yes, in this society, 18 IS teenage years.<<<


*I* was mature "enough" to be married at 18. *I* was mature enough to have children at 19 and again at 21. *I* knew EXACTLY who I was at 18, and it holds true today as well. So, to say that "an 18 yo ISNT mature *enough*" is not 100% correct. THAT is the point that a lot of us are trying to make!

Okmrsmommy-36, CPmom to DD-16 and DS-14

Avatar for virgogirl914
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-25-2003
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 8:48pm
See. . .I don't get how you can live within your own skin and have no clue who you are until your 30's.

I turned 34 yesterday and I've know for a LONG time who I was. . .and what I wanted (generally speaking) out of life. I'm not talking about anything being set in stone. . .but I don't think it's out of the realm of reality for someone to have a general idea of what they want out of life by their late teens/early 20's.

And whether or not YOU see early marriage as a valid choice. . it is a legal choice and therefore a valid choice. It may or may not be what you or I want for our children, but it is no less valid than marrying late, never marrying, delaying college, going to college early, joining the military, or any of a multitude of other legal, valid choices.

All choices in life come with consequences that must be weighed in making the decision. . .marrying early is no different.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 8:49pm
<>

I certainly knew how to take care of myself at 18. I hadn't *actually* lived on my own, but I had been independent enough to know *how* to do it. I had gained plenty of experience in that realm by that age.

Hollie

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 09-15-2003 - 8:51pm
Hell, I'm 32 and I don't know who I am. And it has nothing to do with age or maturity. It has to do with life coming up and biting me on the ass. I knew who I was 3 years ago. I knew who I was 13 years ago.

And you know, its not so much that I dont' know who I am now, as it is that I am becoming someone new. That happens to many of us, all the time across the world. Whether we knew who we were at 18 or not has nothing to do with whether we know who we are now.

Hollie

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