Athol Kay

This is exactly why I think men shouldn’t have a vasectomy – essentially you put yourself into a situation where if the woman in your life wants a baby, you can’t even supply the fantasy of providing her with one, let alone an actual baby.

If she really wants a baby, she’ll find a way to have one. Nature finds a way. The outcomes if she goes that route are leaving him and finding a man that will get in a relationship with her, or getting pregnant to someone else and trying to hold the the relationship with him together. Either outcome I think is bad for the man.

In short, when a woman needs a man, a man with a vasectomy can’t always be one.

  hubman

Whoa, Athol, men shouldn’t have vasectomies? So after 15 years of marriage and 2 kids, if was inappropriate for me to get one, just in case Veronica and I split someday and my fictional second wife wants to have kids? That’s nonsense…

Anyway, Vixen, I think the woman knew who she was marrying, vasectomy and all, and is wrong to try to convince him to have a reversal. They should have worked this out *before* they got married.

My sister and BIL had similar discussions before they’re got married. He’s almost 50 with 2 grown kids, she *really* wanted to have a baby and told him “If you don’t want to have a kid with me, we need to call off the wedding”. BTW, she is about 4 months pregnant now, so you know how he answered :-)

  PC

Wow! This is striking very close to home, in so many ways. I almost feel as if you’re talking about us.

But I like what you said here, “There have been several times in my life that I have wanted something badly enough that I would have done whatever it took to make happen. And believed if I wanted it badly enough a- ‘no’ would change to a maybe or even better, a YES.”

I know this is what you want, Sweetie. So, I’ve already looked into the procedure. It’s not free, though and is going to cost you us. ;)

We can talk more offline. No need to do a public survey. And definitely no need to go to Slacker and Steve, unless we can both be on the air with them.

Honestly, I wish they could simply harvest sperm to make this happen. That’s the real question to ask. Then we could have the baby and still have fun. Unless, the new baby is some sort of kickoff to a 24/7 cuckhold sort of relationship. Is that what you’re indicating? I noticed you’ve started doing more vibrator reviews. Goodnight, we’ve got one for every day of the month now.

And if this is the direction you’re going, maybe we should start conducting interviews for possible snipped replacements– or girls. What do you think? You know me. I like to plan things.

I’m gonna go ahead and post that ad in Craigslist so we can start looking at folks. If there are any of your readers interested in auditioning for the role, shoot me an email.

I love you Babe, so we’ll make sure you’re well taken care of. :)

  Westcoast Weirdo

I think he’s 100% in the right here, having told her no before they were married. Having said that, I do feel for her as well. But she can’t fault him, can’t blame him. She *knew* how he felt and needs to move on to another man who wants a baby as well, or be content with him w/o a baby.
It has nothing to do with vasectomies. Or men having them done. He got it done because he knew *he* was done.
Sucks for her, but she put herself in this position.

  Westcoast Weirdo

P.S.- could that ass be any more rounder??! (Or perfect??)

  Haiku Master

The Haiku Contest theme this week is also “marriage”. And I have to go to a wedding soon. Too many coincidences!

  Michelle

I see her side of it, I really do. But I’m in his position right now so I REALLY see his side. I have two kids, my boyfriend doesn’t have children of his own. If we can’t resolve that, we won’t get married. I don’t ever want to be the one to take that dream (of having children) away from him.

  Vixen

Athol- I agree with part of what you were saying. I’m not sure about having a vasectomy *never* being a good idea. As in Hubmans case, and many other men I know, I think it’s a good one. It’s my favorite form of bc. :)

But there are so many men in their 20′s having them, SINGLE men who decide they don’t want children and I just think that is WAY too young to make a decision like that, that effects a major life decision for the rest of your life.

In the case of Jim, I hear about/know of this happening quite often. I’m not sure immediately following a divorce is the best time to rush into a decision like a vasectomy.

  Vixen

Hubman- I agree, I think they should have. But I’ve been in Angela’s position before and having the ‘hope’ gets your through each day. Probably wrong for her to bank on ‘hope’ but…. And from what it sounds with Angela and Jim. She does love him. It’s not like she’s going to leave him for another man to have a baby. She just really was hoping to have a baby with the man she married and is in love with.

  Vixen

PC- *shaking head*

As appealing as the 24/7 cuckhold thing sounds to get a baby out of the deal….I’m going to have to think on this. ;) Although you as my 24/7 cuckhold slave is extremely tempting.

*evil grin*

Now, about the harvesting sperm. THAT I think is an awesome idea! If they could figure out a way to retrieve the sperm w/o having to go through the risks of reversing a procedure I think they would make *MANY people very happy.

Um. And no need for a CL ad. I’m good I think for right now. I’ll let you know when/if that changes. ;)

  Vixen

Michelle- I think that is very mature of you. What you said about not wanting to take having a child of his own away from him. I hope you guys can work it out.

I guess in the back of my mind, even if he decided he was happiest staying in the relationship, would he *at some point* become unhappy about the child thing again? Hmm…

  Big Geek

That is a controversial question. Sort of it boils down to she did marry him knowing that he was fixed. Knowing that he was disinclined towards children and from an experiential point of view not some imagined selfish I like my life and kids will kill it stand point. But there is in most women some undeniable urge to have a child. It is similar to being horny, just this urge that will not be ignored and will not go away and can not be sated any other way. Its a tough place for sure. It would seem to be up to her to decide just how deep this urge is for her and where she is in her life, age and profession and the like. If she needs this child to “be” then perhaps dissolution is the path. If their marriage is strong and meaningful and fulfilling to her then perhaps not. Perhaps there are alternatives. I suspect that it is the pregnancy that she wants to participate in. Perhaps she could be a surrogate mother for some less fortunate couple so that she could participate in that experience. just a thought.

  TUG

They never should have been married. She’s 100% wrong to expect him to change his mind. He was honest with her and she wasn’t honest with him. Unless she changes her mind soon it will destroy their marriage.

Reverse surgery, harvesting or adoption isn’t the point. He doesn’t and didn’t want more kids. No point in discussing different ways to make it happen.

Sorry, I just don’t have any sympathy for her with this one. She basically lied to him before they got married and now she gets upset that he doesn’t believe in the lie?

Do I understand her urge/need to have kids? Of course, but she entered a relationship knowing that wasn’t going to happen. Now she has thrown a doubt into the relationship that will always be present in their marriage.

  PateInduced

I am sure you are ecstatic, if PC’s post is new information. Nothing like crashing through the china cabinet–what I do best, also. [Picture foot-in-mouth]

My situation is a twist on this topic. I’m on numero uno marriage, had 2.5 children (not funny, tragic) and waited for years to get clipped. I am at a disadvantage, but would not hesitate to reverse the procedure for a spouse with no biological children. It’s completely different if she has some and I have some, already.

The “no means maybe means yes” mindset is a given in any spousal relationship, albeit, pretty serious in this matter. Children ain’t furniture.

In retrospect, our birth control choices were really FU. K was not on the pill. BC was condoms. I hated them. No spontaneous love, and inconvenient as H. When K nearly died from the miscarriage of her last pregnancy, it really traumatized me.

After that, near-celibacy was my solution to BC. She insisted on keeping the door open for another child, in case our first surviving child “should die”. Her biggest fear was dying alone–assuming I kick the bucket any moment. She admitted selfishness.

The choice for the procedure was jointly agreed to, far later than it should have been. Men, never let your partner join you in the surgery, if they have a morbid sense of humor!

pi

  Honey

I get where she is coming from *BUT* she knew from the beginning that he wasn’t on board for this idea for various reasons. Yes, it’s a hard lesson to learn but one we all have to learn at some point in our lives that no matter how much you want something, you can’t change another person. It’s always nice to think that ‘maybe once we’re married, he’ll change his mind’ but it doesn’t always happen that way. Yes, sometimes a person does change their mind but I think, she should realize that she should want him to change his mind because HE wants it too not because he feels sorry for her. Having him do something, especially something this significant, because he feels sorry for her can only breed resentment later on for her and the child possibly. And that is no way to live.

  figleaf

When I got my vasectomy, at age 21, I wrote in the (paper-based) house journal where I stayed that I knew what I was doing in the sense that a) I didn’t want to be an accidental father, b) I figured if I ever did want to be a father it ought to be, and would be, about as much effort and expense to have a reversal as it would be to adopt, and c) if I wasn’t able to get a working reversal and I still wanted kids then I’d be happy with adoption.

20 odd years later, well after I was married and my partner and I decided we’d like children, that’s pretty much what I did. Except my reversal worked just fine.

There’s a story about why my reversal went fine, and it’s even relevant to this discussion. :-)

Turns out, as of 10 years ago anyway, the *surgical* success rate for reversals was approaching 80% — I don’t know what it is today. The reason you keep hearing 25-50% success rates, according to my urologist, is that most men get vasectomies in their late 30s and so those who seek reversals tend to be after second marriages when they’re in their mid-to-late 40s or even even early 50s. And, he said, when their partners are in their late 30s to mid-40s. So, he said, when you calculate the success rate you have to include not just the surgical success rate but the regular *conception* rate for older couples.

My urologist had been hemming and hawing at me about success rates until he met my partner, who at the time was under 35. The second he saw her his tune totally changed — he said, if I recall exactly “I’m not going to say this will be a slam dunk but…” he was pretty confident.

One early miscarriage and two healthy pregnancies later I had all his hard work undone with a second vasectomy. I couldn’t be happier.

So.

A couple of points.

1) “No” doesn’t necessarily mean “never,” but you better no go into a relationship, especially with someone who’s surgically sterile, got children, and says they’re not interested thinking maybe you’ll change his or her mind.

2) And even if you do change their mind you better not assume its going to work the way you want — as you very brilliantly put it, Vixen, babies don’t fix relationships, and while children can be wonderful they’re not housepets, fashion accessories, or anti-depressants.

3) Also, not to put too fine a point on it, after roughly 200 months they’re 19 and forging their own ways in the world so no matter how wonderful they’re not a permanent cure for anything in one’s *personal* life.

4) I have a lot of friends who’ve had children and who’ve adopted and some who’ve done both. So far anyway I’ve never seen a parent who’s seriously said they were sorry they’d adopted. I’ve never seen a parent with both who couldn’t, and didn’t, love their adopted child as much as they did their biological ones.

And this one’s a biggie!

5) I really appreciated the way you discussed the way some women think of having babies — as *their* ambition, one that their partner can lump or like but otherwise isn’t really material to. I think it’s great when women without partners choose to have kids anyway — I know some great women who are raising great kids with no partners at all. But *if* there’s going to be a man in your life it’s not ethical, moral, or (way more important) practical partnership-wise to see him as an obstacle to *your* project instead of as, you know, a *partner* in what having kids is really about: deciding to launch the next generation making sure they’re ready to enter adulthood as happy, healthy, and able to shoulder their share of the weight of the world.

Anyway, sermon mode off, it sounds like your friends have a lot to talk about. Including about whether they should really be together. But also about whether she really needs to have a biological child, whether it has to be his biological offspring as well as hers, how old they are (and thus how realistic is it that they could conceive anyway) and… well, a whole lot more.

I think your post was just amazingly thoughtful, Vixen.

Oh, and @Athol: “when a woman needs a man, a man with a vasectomy can’t always be one.” Huh? There’s more to being a man than being a sperm donor. There’s more to being a lover or life partner than being a sperm donor. And there’s *way* more to being a father than whichever lovin’ spoonful contributes the necessary DNA.

figleaf

  PC

Well, I’m not necessarily advocating being 24/7 cuckold. I actually enjoy our “time” together. If you know what I mean.

I just don’t want to reverse the procedure and then get clipped again. And I really don’t want to be one of those families with 14+ kids. I don’t care how many times people try to tell me about how the older kids provide so much help.

Just want to be clear on that. :)

  Mabel

I assume this is just a faint wish she has, much the same way I wish my partner would let me get a goddamn dog already. I love him more than I love my desire for a dog, but the second we find a cure for allergies …. oh boy. So I have no reason that this is the same for her. She wishes it would happen but accepts that it won’t.

That said, I feel like tossing this out there because I had to bite my tongue at work today about this very topic and now I can unleash it. If she’s seriously considering leaving (what I have no reason to assume is not) a great relationship with a great man, then I hope she does, and quickly. Not because I want her to have the kids she wants, quite the opposite. But because women who cast aside real men in real relationships and hurt real feelings in order to fulfill a fantasy of motherhood don’t deserve either partners or children. When a daydream becomes more important to you than the life you are currently living, that’s time to see a therapist, not procreate.

Which is to say, screw you, Big Geek. Yes, I love the life I created for myself and yes, children would screw that up in ways I’m sure I haven’t even yet considered. That makes me selfish? In a bad way? Care to explain why it’s “selfish” to realize that I’m happy enough just the way things are and I don’t need a child to add anything I don’t know I’m missing?

  Mr. Upton Ogood

A wise man once said “Women think that they can change their man and will be disappointed. Men think that their woman won’t ever change and will, likewise, be disappointed”.

Ok..so if it wasn’t a wise man, then maybe it was me. I don’t remember for I was drinkin’ at the time.

Anyhow…I held off getting my family tree pruned until I was in my late 40′s and only did it (even then) out of a sense of self-defense. (I won’t say how many, but “Father to his nation” isn’t a new sobriquet). I only did it because she was chicken and, besides, it was reversible.

The question, however, is: who had the unreasonable expectation..and that, pretty much, is obvious. The ultimate, or penultimate, question becomes, “Ok..so now what?”. And, that, is a killer.

But that’s not even why I’m commenting. When I poked a icon, I went back a year to your question: If your lover is going to cheat on you, would you prefer it to be an old lover of hers a (new) stranger?

My take: (FWIW..in excess of a day late and a dollar short) I’d rather the old lover as, by now I know, I’ve already “beaten” him. If she’s going back, it’s just a reminiscence. The new guy would scare the hell out of me.

There ya go.

Mr. Upton Ogood, of the famous East-coast Ogoods, but not to be confused with the East-coast Osgoods or the terrible good Verri-Goods

  southerngirl

I feel for her (sometimes we girls tend to think with our hearts…sucks, I know). But I would like to think she isn’t trying to manipuate him so much as feeling that a baby would represent all the good things between him. however, if he is not on board with that, then she should let it go. Very tough.

xo

  Vixen

Southerngirl- I happen to know for a fact that she is *not* trying to manipulate him. She really would just like a baby bwtn the two of them.

And from what I understand, if he absolutely won’t come on board with her, she will let it go. At the end of the day, as much as she might love a baby, with him as the father….she truly loves him. And that will be enough for her if that is what his final decision is. She was just hoping to sway that decision if she could. ;)

  Vixen

Thank you all for your different inputs and opinions on the matter, as well as sharing your personal experiences.

As I just mentioned to Southerngirl, Angela truly does love Bill. She wasn’t trying to manipulate him. While she may have been wishing/hoping she could convince him of a different answer, she does love him and at the end of the day if the answer is no, the answer is no and she will be ok with that.

  Vixen

Figleaf- thanks for stopping by. :)

You brought up some brilliant points and I appreciate the insight on your own experience, as well as the information regarding reversals.

  Vixen

PC- seriously….you could even fathom me as a mother to 14 kids? 3 is pushing it as it is. *snort*

;)

I knew what you meant. *muah*

  Vixen

TUG- PC bringing up harvesting was more in reference to a situation bwtn him and I. Not advice for this other couple. :)