Anyone intentionally stop at 2 kids and happy with decision?

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 2:54 pm

amother Mustard wrote:

And you know this about families with 2 kids, that it was definitely fertility related?
Please never assume.

I actually use to assume people did it on purpose. I remember meeting a very yeshivish couple who had kids after 8 years of marriage, I was like wow, never thought they were the type to do that. Then, it took me a long time to conceive and I realized many don’t do it on purpose. So, you never truly know why someone can’t or doesn’t want kids.

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 2:59 pm

amother DarkGreen wrote:

I have no fertility or medical issues, but only have two bio kids. I have non-bio kids too and am definitely too overwhelmed to have more. It will never happen. You are wrong to assume medical or fertility. Some people make the choice that they are better parents emotionally and financially with less kids. It may not be the norm in the frum world, but there are plenty out there with this mindset. OP, the decision is yours and your DH’s alone. Hatzlacha but please don’t base your decision on what others do.

Some people don’t get the MO culture. This was a struggle for me when dating. The guys always wanted less, while I wanted as many as G-d gives me. Nothing to do with fertility. It happened ironically that my first was hard to conceive, but my sisters both waited on purpose like 5 years due to feminist reasons, which many MO women do.

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:00 pm

amother DarkGray wrote:

I have no idea who you are and have assumed nothing about you. I was talking about families I know, who have discussed their issues with me.

The couple you spoke to may not be the typical MO couple.

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:03 pm

amother DarkGray wrote:

Um ok, of course. Did you miss the part where I said "just anecdotally" or described it as "a data point." Amother Mocha, by contrast, said that in her MO community it was common to purposely stop at 2 and cited tuition cost as a possible factor. That's another data point. She's not assuming anything about anyone and I'm not assuming anything about anyone either. We are both sharing our experiences of different communities, neither of which preclude other people having totally different experiences.

This is what greatly bothers me, stopping due to finances. Aren’t there organizations that help couples that won’t have more kids due to finances? I’m thinking to connect my husband with them. He doesn’t want so many kids because of finances and his MO.

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:07 pm

amother Currant wrote:

I am MO and as I said above, I have 2 kids. I would say the most common number of kids is 3, followed by 4, there are some with 5 or 6 (and one in my community with 10). There are also those of us with 2 and some with one. I don’t know of a single family with one or 2 that it was intentional. I am not saying that there aren’t any, but if I count off the families I know well with one or 2 kids, they all had a “reason”-either fertility, medical, or mental health related. Now granted, I don’t know everyone, I only know a fraction of them, but the ones I know well, it is the case. But as I said, I don’t know about people I don’t know well, as this is not something you air.

How does the one with 10 kids do it financially?

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:08 pm

amother DarkGray wrote:

10-15 is a pretty high bar. Most yeshivish and JPF families I know do not reach double digits. Personally, even if I had started having kids at age 22, and went through to age 42 without BC, I still probably wouldn't reach double digits just due to nursing clean and a handful of early miscarriages.

If you start at 25 and have one every other year, you can have 10 by 45.

amother

DarkGray

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:17 pm

amother Orange wrote:

If you start at 25 and have one every other year, you can have 10 by 45.

Maybe you could be confident of such a schedule. I couldn't, based on my history. I get pregnant very easily, but they don't all stick and I nurse clean for over a year. Miscarriage rate would probably go up even more with entering my 40's.

amother

DarkGray

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:25 pm

amother Orange wrote:

I also don't like the "only have as many as you can afford" sentiment that a segment of the MO community has.

I believe people should make a decent effort to work and earn, and spend responsibly. If they're doing that, I'm thrilled to see them have as many kids as they can handle and to contribute towards covering their tuition.

I also think we'd do better with more streamlined and affordable schools, even if they send fewer kids to Harvard. But that's just me.

I think there are schools that have experimented with different funding models aimed at affordability and financial diversity, like Yeshivat Heatid and Kohelet. I don't know how it has worked out for them.

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:25 pm

amother DarkGray wrote:

I can’t be confident either unfortunately, unless I fixed the issue of why I couldn’t conceive for close to 2 years, which will hopefully be determined this year iyh.

amother

DarkGray

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:28 pm

amother Orange wrote:

I can’t be confident either unfortunately, unless I fixed the issue of why I couldn’t conceive for close to 2 years, which will hopefully be determined this year iyh.

So sorry to hear, it must be very frustrating. I hope it works out and resolves in the best way.

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:28 pm

amother DarkGray wrote:

Yes, many MO have that, even if they work hard and gave good careers, such as being a doctor or lawyer, which many of them are.

amother

Currant

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 3:51 pm

amother Orange wrote:

Yes, it’s very typical of MO to only have 2 kids. This is why even tho I identify as MO, I probably will send my kids to bais yakov schools. It’s almost not feasible to have 10-15 kids being raised MO due to costs. But, I’m not typical MO, I grew up yeshivish and became MO.

Can I be honest?
I think it is a mistake to send your children to a school with a different haskafa than your home. It can cause cognitive dissonance and can impact someone to going OTD.

amother

Seafoam

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 4:31 pm

amother Orange wrote:

Most yeshivish families don't have 10-15 kids either...

amother

Red

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 4:42 pm

I was my parents least favorite child and when I had my second I was terrified that I was going to treat him like my parents treat me. I still wanted more than one and now that I have two im thinking mabe 3?

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 4:58 pm

amother Currant wrote:

Can I be honest?
I think it is a mistake to send your children to a school with a different haskafa than your home. It can cause cognitive dissonance and can impact someone to going OTD.

I actually know a family that grew up with parents not supportive of kollel, going to bais yakov, tv and stuff, they all ended up marrying kollel guys or going to kollel. So, I think a lot end up drifting more towards the school they attend since those are the ideas they get exposed to.

amother

DarkGray

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 5:09 pm

amother Currant wrote:

Can I be honest?
I think it is a mistake to send your children to a school with a different haskafa than your home. It can cause cognitive dissonance and can impact someone to going OTD.

Very few people do this lehatchila. But sometimes it is the best available option.

Also, what you are describing is much more likely to be a problem if your family is the only one with a differing hashkafah.

If you are sending your child to a school with a very mixed student body, then there doesn't need to be much tension when school hashkafah differs from home hashkafah. In my experience, children who have MO, yeshivish, JPF, and Chabad classmates, won't be freaked out that their parents follow different rabbonim and poskim than their teachers.

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 5:12 pm

amother DarkGray wrote:

Agreed, that’s probably why it works well in oot bais yakov schools. I also know mothers who sent to this specific Oot bais yakov who wear pants or don’t cover hair and their daughters ended up covering hair and dressing fully tznius. Also, I do cover my hair and dress tznius. So, there shouldn’t be any issues. Other than me watching tv and having out of box ideas that don’t fit into bais yakov. Like, I wouldn’t mind sending my daughter to gemera classes.

amother

DarkGray

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 5:15 pm

amother Orange wrote:

Are you on the MO forum? We should talk there sometime. As anon, but still.

amother

Orange

Mon, Oct 23 2023, 5:17 pm

amother DarkGray wrote:

Also, the community I’m thinking of, doesn’t have that many options. There’s one school that’s MO, but doesn’t have girls high school, so by high school the girls either needa go to OO or bais yakov schools (total opposite extremes) and I don’t want my daughters being exposed to OO ideas. Therefore, it’s bais yakov or bais yakov or possibly public school, but want them getting good Jewish educations so it’s bais yakov.