I am one of those older mom's that said "My kid will never do that!" when I saw kid's acting up in public. Boy, have I had to eat my words!! I feel I am pretty good at parenting, I am a SAHM and spend quite a bit of time trying to make a decent human being out of my DS, but he has had his moments, like most normal kids. Before I had DS, I would look at my sister's kids and think they were out of hand sometimes. But now that we have DS, I admire the way they have handled things, because I now now how hard it is. I guess I just thought kids should ALWAYS be well-behaved and that was that-LOL! I just wanted to add that I admire your sister having 4 kids and it still SANE-LOL! My sister has 3 kids pretty close in age and although they are really well-behaved most of the time-they are kids and are much louder than I like-but, I only have the one, and boy, are we sometimes glad to go back to our quiet house with just the 3 of us! And I can tell my DS needs to get away from the caos also, since he is not used to all the commotion. I said all that to say, if you do decide to have little kiddies, maybe one DS or DD is the answer-much easier in my opinion (except for the lack of sleep I'v had to endure).

Yes, I regret it. My husband is 10 years older than me and had two children from a previuos marriage. We didn't discuss having children before we married which was a mistake. He told me that if I wanted any I had to have one in the first year we were married because he wasn't going to put off retiring to raise a kid. So, I decided I would quit taking the pill about 6 months after we were married. When I told him of my decision he went out of his way to talk me out of it. Saying mean things, like how my body would look afterward and that he wasn't sure if he would still be attracted to me. Also how we would have to work opposite shifts and would never see each other because he wasn't having his kid in day care. I was really hurt by what he said and decided if he could be so mean to me he really didn't want another child and it wasn't fair to the child to have a dad that didn't want him/her. I do not get along with his, now grown, kids. His son is now in prison and his daughter has 3 kids of her own by two different men. I see my own mom needing my help and know that when I am her age there will be no one to help me. I have told him I am resentful of him for this but he says he made the right decision. At this point I do not feel loved by him. Not only for this reason but this reason is a big part of it. I really do not even want to be married to him anymore. I know I have made my own bed and now must lie in it.

That's why the criteria for retiring is entirely different than those for working and commuting. When I used to live 12 miles outside of Manhattan and commute, it usually took an hour by train and ferry or train and subway, and about an hour and 20 by car at rush hours. But one summer Friday night my car service took 3.5 hours, and one New Year's Eve DH drove us home from Lincoln Center in under 30minutes ( a record! but still not great for people who travel 12 miles in most of the country!) In a similar vein, somewhat facetiously, I told DH we should look for a home in a bad school district. What do we need with schools? ( I know I know, it drives home values and is also a social obligation). Jojo - If you are reading, I think you first suggested Winter Park. If we end up wanting to be on a lake, what did you think of Windermere? I know you lived there at one time? It doesn't seem to have a downtown and a lot of the housing stock is a little OTT stylistically, but curious what your thoughts were. It came up when I was looking for lakefront.

I always knew I wanted to have children. I'm an only child and I used to beg my parents for a brother or sister. My father was one of 10 and my mother one of 6, so perhaps that's why they only had 1! I also knew I would never have just one child. I would have been very disappointed if I had not had grandchildren. It's a lovely thing to see ones own children being wonderful parents. I adore my grandchildren but I told DD that while we would enjoy babysitting from time to time, I did not want a regularly scheduled time - far too confining. But a call to see if we'd be willing to take them? Absolutely! I think I'm getting the younger next week while they take the elder to college! One of my grandchildren is adopted and I love him just as much as the others. My late husband had an adopted younger sister and so it seemed very natural to us both. He's a very dear boy. Having said I didn't want a regular time, I did agree to help DD when her eldest started 1st grade (he did Kindergarten at his nursery school). She asked me if I would come over the first two weeks of school, when school got out and just be sure DGS got organized and did his homework. By this time, her husband was a SAHF but he is so severely ADHD that he would not be good at doing this. I was glad to help her out and did so. After two weeks, she said that DGS liked me being there and would I be willing to continue? My husband had died the year before and I was pretty much at loose ends, so I said yes. I did this Mon-Thurs until 2nd son finished 5th grade. We all enjoyed the time together. DD and I have very similar parenting styles, and similar philosophies about homework being the responsibility of the student, not the parent. I was just there if they had a question, to sign that I'd seen their homework/graded work etc. I taught them to look things up, first on my iPhone and later on my iPad. I often took a book to read. If they had trouble, I helped them figure it out. If they wanted to be quizzed, I quizzed them. I don't know if I would have done this if DH had still been alive. Actually, I know it would have been DH who would have done this - he was a teacher and would have loved it. But I very much enjoyed the bond that we got from this. I was not tied down in any way - if I were sick, the weather was horrid, or was going to be out-of-town, I was under no obligation. I also rent a house for 4 weeks each summer and DD's boys are always there the entire 4 weeks. When they were young, there was a babysitter along as well - I was not missing my beach time to stay home with napping children! Parents were there, too, for varying times. It's been very special for me and when I come back home, I go into "boy-withdrawal"! I'm quite comfortable being alone, but I sure enjoy their company and all their friends in and out all the time. I love that I can do this for them. I have a couple of friends whose children will never have children. They are greatly disappointed as they had looked forward to doing various thing with grands. They certainly respect their children's decisions, but are sorry that this is what they want.