I know when I first started dating my wife (now ex, but that is not the story) I didn't want kids. She seemed to accept that and we married not really worrying about it. Later she brought up the question and I was more amenable to the idea. Now I have two wonderful, though expensive, kids in college that are so perfect that I know what we did was as wonderful a thing as I ever could.

So I agree, let the relationship build and the answer will present itself in a way that will be right whichever way you decide.

Up until about age 24, I was assuming I wanted the typical family, wife, kids, etc, because of societal infulences. Then I started to question it, and finally realized I have no desire at all to have children.
I was lucky enough to meet a girl who agreed with me, and at age 29 I got a vasectomy. That was 2 years before we were even married. I'm 33 now, we still have no regrets, and it's actually even easier once the decision is 'permanent'. Plus there are never anymore worries on 'late' days...

the men that i've met who don't want kids always say "where are all the women who don't want kids!? there aren't as many of them as there are of us!" and the women i've met who don't want kids (and yes i know a lot of them, including myself) always say the same about the men, how it's so hard to find men who don't want kids.

so i think the moral of the story is that someone would make a bundle off an online dating site that specialized in "child-free by choice."

patent pending.

oops. the first time i read over this i missed dan's advice about not telling women that you date that you don't want kids. that is BS that people "can't possibly know for sure" that we don't ever want kids. that is incredibly condescending and insulting to those of us who do know for sure. whether absolutes are a "good idea" or not, some of us DO know absolutely that we not only don't want kids "in the near future" but that we never ever want them. and if a person knows that they don't ever want kids, they need to tell anyone they get seriously involved with because if they want to have kids they might not choose to "waste time" in a relationship where there aren't going to be any kids. women especially, because we only have a limited number of years that we are fertile.

and while i'm on the topic, i also wasn't thrilled about dan's presumption that women who don't want kids are usually more all about our careers. could you spread a few more stereotypes about us?

Ok, I think ya'll are a little off the mark with this one. The answer to do all women want children is no. Not all women do. My 31 year old sister decided a long time ago that there were enough parentless kids in this world that deserved good homes and she couldn't see bringing another child into the world when there were plenty that needed good homes. My Oldest daughter figured out that by the time my youngest child was 18 She would be 27. She says she doesn't want kids. Shes helped me raise mine and shes done. I believe her. Shes like her aunt. If she does anything it will be adopt. But, thats them. A man doesn't have to follow through with them on that. My sister would like to adopt but shes already 31 and will admit that it may take her to 40 and by then she won't want one. And lets not forget there are always people like Oprah who just don't want any period.

Hi Jen. Thanks for the great comments but you are making certain presumptions yourself when you assume that Dan wrote this post. :-)

The comment that I made was how can any of us REALLY know what we'll want in 5 years, kids or otherwise. I don't know about you but my life and my life's desires change dramatically every 3-5 years.

Neither of us said in this article NOT to tell your partner that you don't want kids. We simply said not to use such a firm ultimatum and to use softer words.

We try to stay away from the words NEVER and ALWAYS... Those are very big words and it's simply impossible to use them with certainty. Fact is, you never know what life will throw your way!

Also, most of the women that I know who do not have kids, and there are few, are corporate women at high career levels or are unable to have children. I'm sure there are others, but I've not met any of them...

jennifer

I would caution against making too soft a declaration of not wanting children. While "No way in hell!" is overly harsh, "At this point in my life I don’t believe that I want children" is overly wishy-washy: it could easily be interpreted as meaning "I want to wait a few years first" instead of "I have decided not to ever have children". And while I firmly agree that a man may change his mind, given how my own paternal instinct turned on like a lightswitch when I was about 26, it's unfair to falsely raise a woman's hopes if the man feels sure he's never going to want children.

Many women have told me over the years that their feelings about relationships are, more or less, that any day spent with a man who isn't Mr. Right is a day stolen from them (or at least wasted) that they could have spent looking for Mr. Right or with Mr. Right. By making unclear the depths of a man's choice not to have children, he risks making her feel that she has wasted her time with him, and making her very angry with him for doing so.

I also feel it's bad advice to both genders to say that a man could spend a few happy years in a relationship with a woman who wants children eventually, and that they could then break up and she could go find someone who wants children and he could go find someone who doesn't. Women in their 30's who want children and aren't married face having to find a man who wants children FAST and marry him and, depending on how late in their 30's, possibily have children right away. This is not only emotionally difficult for the woman, but also scary to the men: I have a number of male friends in their 30's who find it genuinely disturbing that women are telling them outright "if you love me you have six months to propose, the engagement can not be more than a year, and we will start trying to have children immediately after the wedding, and you will have an income that can support three people and a house and car." In most cases this is scaring the guys away, but the women are not doing this because they're evil, they're just laying out what they believe to be necessary in order for them to have kids when they're young enough for it to still be relatively easy. But to the guys, it represents a shocking shift from the idea that he meets a woman, dates her for a couple years, maybe they have a leisurely engagement, get married, spend a few years together to build up the relationship more and work on his career, then talk about having kids when conditions are right... to suddenly he's being told that he will now have to make instant commitment and he's only wanted as sperm donor and paycheck and she owns him for the next 25 years, or bug off.

Conversely, a man in his 30's who doesn't want kids has a problem too. First, most of the best women, who have the best personalities and looks, are "taken" since their 20's. Single guys I know in their 30's tell me they get a lot of first dates with never-married women who are obnoxious or demanding or clingy or severely obese, or more often some combination of the above. Then of course, there are also a lot of previously-married (or previously long-term-relationshiped) women in their 30's. They tend to divide mostly into those who have children (in which case if the man doesn't want children he's not interested) and those who are in a rush to have children, as described above. So, he's forced into a desperate search for either that one special woman who somehow all the other guys have been too stupid to snap up, or that one special woman who some other guy was stupid enough to let go. Either way, he's better off letting it be known up front in his search that he doesn't ever want kids, because that helps him eliminate most of the women he's not interested in up front and concentrate on the smaller pool of women he might be interested in. Even then, the guys I've known who don't want children have told me that they still get dates with women who proceed to spend the whole first date trying to convince them that they should want children after all.

I'm 30 and I don't want children. See... we do exist!

Overall, I feel that if you know 100% what you want you should go for it and be honest about it up front. If you want kids, then say so. If you don't, then let him/her go to find their own happiness.
In my own personal situation, which maybe some can shed light on, I'm currently kind of searching for reasons as to why I really want kids. I've had dreams of being a mom since I was little and saved my old toys for year, with a little help from mom, however, as I've gotten older I don't really have any good reasons except that I like kids and mom would like a grandkid. Those reasons to me just aren't good enough, yet because I'm with someone who not only already has kids from a previous marriage, has since had a vasectomy, and boldly stated that he doesn't want kids anymore, I'm constantly tormented by the possibility of regret in the future, should I end up marrying this person. Its almost as if because I don't know what I want, I distance myself at times from him and am angry that he has kids to love and I don't. I know that he's mentioned having me in his children's lives and as crappy as this sounds, I feel that if I can't have kids, I don't want to be around any children, including his, until I get over it.
Yet, I do love him and on my own biblical standards I'm perplexed because the bible talks about no greater love being that than to lay your life down for someone else. My life would be my children for this man and as much as that hurts to think of, I want to do whats right. Love means loving unconditionally,even if I don't get my way,though I'm having trouble even typing that.. I know that passively and aggressively being angry with him to expect me to love his kids when he won't give me a single one, isn't right either and selfishness isn't what my faith is founded by. In fact, its far from it.
I actually did like the advice given as far as just taking things day by day and not focusing so much on long term when your with someone. If I graduate college and still want children and end up leaving this man, it still won't mean it was a wasted or bad relationship. I'll have been just happy that I was able to know him and love him in my life.
I just wish I could figure out why I'm so upset over something I don't understand!! HELP!
-Natalie

I'm 22 and I can honestly say that I never want children. I'm sorry because I know that I'm using extreme words that lock my view in place but if I was not so averted to surgery I'd undergo a vasectomy in an instant. I've known that I have not wanted children since I was old enough to have any kind of subjective thoughts on the matter.