Dear Prudence,
My wife and I both had kids rather young so when we met, they were well into middle school. I got the snip right after my daughter was born and was upfront about not wanting more children. My wife was OK with this until around our second year of marriage. Then she became obsessed with having a baby that was “ours.”
It nearly broke our marriage. I thought we had hit the lottery because our kids all got along and we had a successful blended family. I basically told my wife she had to choose what kind of life she wanted: what we had versus what she dreamed up. We went to therapy and we worked through it—or so I thought.
We recently went through a crisis where one of our kids had an unplanned pregnancy and they chose to end it. We are lucky to live in a blue state but the situation was fraught. My wife’s reaction blindsided me. She was so angry and felt she had been “cheated again” because we would’ve raised the baby if they kept it. Luckily, she didn’t say this around our kids, but her reaction makes me think our marriage is not salvageable. She told me she regrets not pushing for another child and that I forced her to give up her dream. She didn’t want to be a single mom again. She later apologized but is the damage done? We are both pushing 50 and I thought we were happy. Is counseling even possible at this point? I feel like I am living with a stranger ever since she confessed.
—No Baby