My wife and I (I’m also female) met on a dating site. I had “doesn’t have kids and doesn’t want any” selected for the “kids info section” on my profile. We fell madly in love and got married a year later.
Before meeting her I had always said I didn’t want kids. Friends kept telling me I’d change my mind but I was certain I wouldn’t. During our engagement I realised my wife would like to have kids and I started coming round to the idea. Raising a child together with someone who love definitely has a very romantic appeal to it. Eventually I agree to having children together.
Fast forward several years. Our relationship starts experiencing more and more difficulties, mostly due to my as-of-yet undiagnosed adhd. My wife also has to deal with health issues that heavily impact her career path. At one point she tells me she thinks she’d rather nor have children after all and instead just focus on getting ahead in her training and career. I realise her telling me this makes me feel relieved.
Fast forward to last summer. Our relationship is doing pretty badly and I’m finally diagnosed with adhd after putting off getting help for almost a year. Not because I didn’t want to but, you know, life is busy, weeks go by and suddenly a whole year has passed.
Our relationship at this point is barely hanging by a thread. We talk about breaking up, that maybe we just don’t fit together because of our individual needs and personal baggage and trauma. But as I start medication and therapy and slowly find my tools to cope with adhd things start getting better and we feel happy in our relationship again.
At some point my wife starts talking about having children again. I ask her what about her telling me she didn’t want any after all and she tells me that she later realised that this wasn’t quite true, it just seemed “the smarter choice” but that she would actually very much like to have a kid.
Now, I really like children and am very good with them. The reason I never wanted any was that I didn’t want this kind of responsibility. I came around to the idea with my wife and I can see the attraction the idea has but I also realise that I myself don’t have any desire to have kids, from within myself. I was more like my wife wanted them and I didn’t feel as strongly opposed anymore to the point where I started to imagine it as a beautiful idea. But also that when she told me she didn’t want to have kids, that this would still be the option I think I’d prefer.
I think I’m slowly starting to cope better with my adhd but it’s still a struggle just to maintain a “normal adult” level of coping with day-to-day stuff. I can’t imagine adding the additional load of raising a child to this. I know kids can be great but even parents who wanted to have kids and are happy tell you that it’s super exhausting and requires a lot of planning and logistics. I don’t think I want that, I feel like regular adult life is already exhausting enough for me.
Two weeks ago my wife asked me if I was sure I didn’t want to have kids. We couldn’t continue the talk at that moment and are in the middle of a few extremely stressful weeks but I like, once they are over, we need to have a talk. I brought up my concern about adhd and she said that I was constantly getting better and that one year from now things that are still a struggle for me now probably won’t be a struggle anymore. That’s probably true but when that happens I’ll be happy as it is and don’t want to add additional stress to my life by having a kid.
Many of our friends have recently had kids and I think this is also affecting my wife. I feel bad about agreeing to have kids a few years ago and now realising I don’t think I want to have them after all. I can imagine having kids to be a beautiful experience but I think I just don’t want to have any after all, I think the stress and exhaustion would break me :(
The biggest question you need to ask yourself is can you imagine yourself being happy, being a parent? And for your partner, can she do the same with no kids.
I have also found many people can flipflop about having or not having kids. My best friend went from always wanting to never wanting during the same time my sister who never wanted anything to do with kids suddenly did and gaslights us into believing she always did.
What i mean to say is, you cannot really trust what people say on the matter. Biology can push buttons either way. Never blame people for perceivably having changed their mind about this.
But on the adhd part:
I am part of a very neurodivergent family. The autism and ad(h)d is part of my inheritance. And my partner is on the spectrum too.
We have multiple kids. And while we both knew we wanted kids and i ideally loved to have a big family i was incredibly scared to expand further mostly because i did not want to lose what we manage to have at that point. Just being able to handle one was beyond my teenage expectations. Just like being able to handle another was beyond my expectation. Now if i was asked if i would make the same choice i would say of course i would. That they showed me to be able to handle beyond my own original expectations is my biggest achievement in life.
But Neurodivergent life is tough, remains tough, having a bad time in your life is tough. Being a parent on top of that is exponentially tough. Both parents having a tough time? Now you are in for a real bad time.
But is that not also true for life and all parents divergent or not? Every life choice you make will always be more than just roses.
Also, for many neurodivergent people its easier to take care of others then themselves (is this true for you?). When you and your partner organise around kids you may benefit from the same structure. For example my own food intake became more structured (and healthy) since.
Neurodivergence also comes with bonuses like thinking outside the box which can make some parenting challenges significantly easier.
There is a certain unpredictability and chaos in parenting which can be scary but is usually where adhd can really thrive.
There is no ultimately no “correct” way to parent either. Every parent i know is just trying what they believe is right for a specific kid and no one, not even children in the same household are raised identically to another.
With that said there are many guides and books for adhd parents specifically.
So concluding.
I want you to know your adhd is not the limiting factor on whether you can or can not have kids.
What matters is where you and your partner would both have the best chance to find happiness, even if that involves one of you choosing for something personally less ideal and even if that does mean going separate ways.
I hope this helps. Good luck.