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agonyaunt2022-09-13 11:11 am
minoanmiss) wrote in agonyaunt2022-09-13 11:11 am
Entry tags:
Dear Prudence: Couple Fighting Over Vasectomy
specifically the husband's reason not to get one.
Her Body, Her Choice, My Body, My Choice: My wife and I are 33 and 34, respectively, and have two children. Pregnancy was hard on my wife (nonstop morning sickness, food aversions, and constantly uncomfortable) and she said she didn’t want to have any more children after our son was born four years ago. I was supportive of her wishes, even though I thought we’d have at least one more child.
After _Roe v. Wade_ was overturned, our state enacted stricter restrictions on abortion. We are both outraged at what is going on and I have tried to be understanding and supportive of the complex feelings she, and all women, are dealing with. One of my wife’s solutions is for me to get a vasectomy. She is currently on birth control but has, rightly, decided that preventing pregnancy shouldn’t be all on the women. I do not want a vasectomy and told her I was willing to use condoms and explore other options to prevent pregnancy if she no longer wanted to be on birth control. She did not like this response and insisted I need to get a vasectomy, and even scheduled an appointment for me to see the doctor.
Prudie, I do not want a vasectomy because there are a lot of unknowns in life and I don’t want to permanently take away my choice of having future children if something happens and I am left divorced or widowed. My father’s first wife died unexpectedly when my brother and sister were 6 and 9 and five years later he married my mother and had me and my sisters. I tried to get my wife to shelve this conversation and talk about it at a later date, when emotions weren’t so raw off of such a major event, but she wouldn’t let it go and kept pressing.
I finally told her my reason—that if we ever ended up divorced or anything happened to her, I didn’t want to take away the option of more children. As expected, this did not go over well and we had a big fight, resulting in her going to spend the weekend at her sister’s house. She came home, but is angry at me and claims everything from I don’t really love her if I am thinking about children with another woman to accusing me of cheating on her and plotting divorce. I am trying to be patient and understanding. I tried to explain the situation like our prenuptial agreement (that she proposed), and that just because we signed one didn’t mean we were thinking of getting a divorce before we married. I don’t know what else to do. We tried speaking to a marriage therapist but the session was not productive. We both go to therapy individually, but I do not know if she is talking about the situation with her therapist. A couple of months ago our relationship was warm and loving, and I felt like we were partners who could communicate honestly with one another and now my marriage feels cold, distant, and bitter. How do I get us back on track?
A: How are you discussing this with your therapist? Because it sounds to me like your anxiety about a hypothetical future in which you get divorced or are moving past a dead wife is ruining the marriage you have now with your very-much-alive wife. That’s a problem. To refuse to do something to keep your current relationship intact and happy because you might one day be in another relationship is not wise. And no, this isn’t like a prenup. A prenup is signed once and from then on has no effect on your day-to-day life unless the worst happens. A decision about birth control is completely different. Someone has to do something, or you have to stop having sex or risk having an unplanned child.
You need to apologize to your wife. Not for your choice to pass on a vasectomy (yes, it is your body, and that’s your right—if you just don’t want to have surgery because you don’t, that’s OK) but for prioritizing your future with a possible second wife over your present. Try to figure out how you go there, mentally (I’m guessing it might have to do with the tragedy in your father’s life) so you can explain it to her and reassure her that you aren’t actually planning to leave, you’re just over-fixated on worst-case scenarios. Re-emphasize your very fair offer to take responsibility for birth control by using condoms. Perhaps the two of you could even look into other options, like fertility awareness or natural family planning (though these options leave fewer room for mistakes). But none of these conversations can happen until you repair the damage you did when you shared your exit plan. Make that a priority. Because right now, you’re closer to moving on to family #2 than you ever thought.
Q. Re: Her Body, Her Choice, My Body, My Choice: It’s not unreasonable to consider the issue of a second marriage when discussing fertility decisions when in one’s 30s. He may have gone too far with his comments, but both of them need to figure out with their own therapists (and whether the wife is discussing this with her therapist is none of the LW’s business) how they feel about whatever matters to them. Full stop.
A. I mean, I feel like there are a lot of things that fall into the category of “not unreasonable” but also the category of “very bad for a marriage.” What if, say, one spouse needed an expensive medical treatment and the other spouse said they couldn’t help pay for it because they were saving money for a possible future second marriage? I guess under your theory, that’s reasonable. But it still sucks and is no way to live.
Q. Re: Her Body, Her Choice, My Body, My Choice: Prior to getting a vasectomy, the husband should get some of his sperm stored in a sperm bank. WIN-WIN for everyone involved.
A. Not a bad idea, but he might argue that he’d rather get his next imaginary future wife pregnant the old-fashioned, free way instead of IUI or IVF.
Her Body, Her Choice, My Body, My Choice: My wife and I are 33 and 34, respectively, and have two children. Pregnancy was hard on my wife (nonstop morning sickness, food aversions, and constantly uncomfortable) and she said she didn’t want to have any more children after our son was born four years ago. I was supportive of her wishes, even though I thought we’d have at least one more child.
After _Roe v. Wade_ was overturned, our state enacted stricter restrictions on abortion. We are both outraged at what is going on and I have tried to be understanding and supportive of the complex feelings she, and all women, are dealing with. One of my wife’s solutions is for me to get a vasectomy. She is currently on birth control but has, rightly, decided that preventing pregnancy shouldn’t be all on the women. I do not want a vasectomy and told her I was willing to use condoms and explore other options to prevent pregnancy if she no longer wanted to be on birth control. She did not like this response and insisted I need to get a vasectomy, and even scheduled an appointment for me to see the doctor.
Prudie, I do not want a vasectomy because there are a lot of unknowns in life and I don’t want to permanently take away my choice of having future children if something happens and I am left divorced or widowed. My father’s first wife died unexpectedly when my brother and sister were 6 and 9 and five years later he married my mother and had me and my sisters. I tried to get my wife to shelve this conversation and talk about it at a later date, when emotions weren’t so raw off of such a major event, but she wouldn’t let it go and kept pressing.
I finally told her my reason—that if we ever ended up divorced or anything happened to her, I didn’t want to take away the option of more children. As expected, this did not go over well and we had a big fight, resulting in her going to spend the weekend at her sister’s house. She came home, but is angry at me and claims everything from I don’t really love her if I am thinking about children with another woman to accusing me of cheating on her and plotting divorce. I am trying to be patient and understanding. I tried to explain the situation like our prenuptial agreement (that she proposed), and that just because we signed one didn’t mean we were thinking of getting a divorce before we married. I don’t know what else to do. We tried speaking to a marriage therapist but the session was not productive. We both go to therapy individually, but I do not know if she is talking about the situation with her therapist. A couple of months ago our relationship was warm and loving, and I felt like we were partners who could communicate honestly with one another and now my marriage feels cold, distant, and bitter. How do I get us back on track?
A: How are you discussing this with your therapist? Because it sounds to me like your anxiety about a hypothetical future in which you get divorced or are moving past a dead wife is ruining the marriage you have now with your very-much-alive wife. That’s a problem. To refuse to do something to keep your current relationship intact and happy because you might one day be in another relationship is not wise. And no, this isn’t like a prenup. A prenup is signed once and from then on has no effect on your day-to-day life unless the worst happens. A decision about birth control is completely different. Someone has to do something, or you have to stop having sex or risk having an unplanned child.
You need to apologize to your wife. Not for your choice to pass on a vasectomy (yes, it is your body, and that’s your right—if you just don’t want to have surgery because you don’t, that’s OK) but for prioritizing your future with a possible second wife over your present. Try to figure out how you go there, mentally (I’m guessing it might have to do with the tragedy in your father’s life) so you can explain it to her and reassure her that you aren’t actually planning to leave, you’re just over-fixated on worst-case scenarios. Re-emphasize your very fair offer to take responsibility for birth control by using condoms. Perhaps the two of you could even look into other options, like fertility awareness or natural family planning (though these options leave fewer room for mistakes). But none of these conversations can happen until you repair the damage you did when you shared your exit plan. Make that a priority. Because right now, you’re closer to moving on to family #2 than you ever thought.
Q. Re: Her Body, Her Choice, My Body, My Choice: It’s not unreasonable to consider the issue of a second marriage when discussing fertility decisions when in one’s 30s. He may have gone too far with his comments, but both of them need to figure out with their own therapists (and whether the wife is discussing this with her therapist is none of the LW’s business) how they feel about whatever matters to them. Full stop.
A. I mean, I feel like there are a lot of things that fall into the category of “not unreasonable” but also the category of “very bad for a marriage.” What if, say, one spouse needed an expensive medical treatment and the other spouse said they couldn’t help pay for it because they were saving money for a possible future second marriage? I guess under your theory, that’s reasonable. But it still sucks and is no way to live.
Q. Re: Her Body, Her Choice, My Body, My Choice: Prior to getting a vasectomy, the husband should get some of his sperm stored in a sperm bank. WIN-WIN for everyone involved.
A. Not a bad idea, but he might argue that he’d rather get his next imaginary future wife pregnant the old-fashioned, free way instead of IUI or IVF.
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Apart from the fact that tubal ligations cost a lot more money; are more painful; and have longer recovery times
it is very, VERY difficult to find a Dr who will agree to do a tubal ligation on a woman under 40 who has not given birth.
This is because Drs believe "You'll change your mind and regret it"
Weirdly, they don't have that same belief about childless men under 40...
I had first hand experience of this - after trying
several different kinds of oral contraceptives, Implanon inserts, and an IUD, and failing to tolerate any of them
I asked a gynaecologist for a tubal ligation and was told "you're too young to know your own mind, you'll regret it"
I WAS 30
After arguing that yes, this IS what I want
I was told he would be willing to do it "if I went away and thought about it for 6 months"
unfortunately, in that 6 months, a condom broke or came off, and I had to have a surgical abortion.
And that could have completely been avoided if the gynaecologist hadn't been insisting that he knew what I wanted better than I knew what I wanted!
This is not one bad gynecologist - it's a near universal experience for single childless women under 40 asking for a tubal ligation.
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But what really surprises me is not so much that the outcome is that the guy is getting the snip and more that it seems to be--- more in the first letter we had on this topic than in this one--- that there are a lot of women who, specifically in the wake of Dobbs in the US, seem to start with wanting their male partners to get the snip, rather than wanting to get it themselves and then their partner getting the snip being the last resort, or an interim option, or as another commenter described, a step on the way to convincing a doc to take them seriously about wanting to be sterilized themselves.
I can see, "Oh, shit, nobody will fix me, but they'll at least do it for my partner!"; I can't see what the columnist in the last vasectomy letter we had here described, with a lot of US women apparently reacting to Dobbs by wanting their significant others to get snipped as a first response, rather than wanting to be protected from pregnancy by anyone.