Jacquelyn’s Story: The love I have for my husband is far stronger than any desire I had to be a mother

I met my husband in 2005. We were both in our 30s. I remember discussing children very early on in our relationship. He made it clear that he didn’t want any. Children had never appealed to him and I knew then that no one could make him change his mind. I myself was still not sure whether motherhood was for me. I had a job I liked and until then, I hadn’t firmly made up my mind which way I was going to go. By making it clear that children were never going to be on the cards, my husband had unwittingly forced me to choose, and of course I chose him.

A couple of years into our relationship, I started having doubts. I wondered whether I had made the right choice. That’s when it dawn on me that I was questioning my choice because my younger sister had become a mother. It takes events like this to make you question your choices. Thankfully, that feeling didn’t last. My relationship with my husband was far more important to me than having children. The thought of losing him felt more painful than the thought of never becoming a mother.

2 years ago, we moved to the countryside to be closer to nature. We share a passion for the outdoors so on most days, we don’t need to take the car when we feel like walking. Our cats and dogs keep us busy as well. We have always had pets. That’s another passion we share.

As has been said on this website many times, it makes no difference these days when you become old whether you have children or not. Our next door neighbour who happens to be a widow, has children, yet they barely visit. We help her out with her shopping and my husband cuts her grass every now and then. She does have a gardener who comes in fortnightly, however in the summer, as the grass tends to grow faster, that’s when my husband helps out.

We have made provisions for when we become too old to do the things we take for granted now. We hope that all the years of taking care of ourselves by doing the right things will mean that we are mobile and fit until the end. If however fate decides otherwise, then we have made plans for the right help to come in. These things make one always feel a bit uneasy but ignoring them and leaving everything to chance can backfire spectacularly, and it’s a risk neither of us is willing to take.

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