I don't dismiss your views, and I'm certainly not trying to convince you that one way is better than the other. In my experience most people don't end up changing their overall views about marriage, in the long run. Those who crave independence end up in marriages that give each other a lot of room, if they do end up with someone. However, do remember that your views about having kids are determined in large part by hormones over which you have no control. On your 36th birthday you may wake up thinking "Holy shit I have to have a baby, gotta make that happen now!" and it will have nothing to do with your philosophical or logical views on the subject. You also may not. But biology is working against you on that one.

I have a couple of female cousins who were dead set against having kids, then in their mid 30's everything changed. Everyone in the family was very surprised. None of us every thought either of them would have kids.

Life is funny like that.

My clock never ticked and now never will.

Same here Pico.

I think I expected I'd meet my perfect man and he'd talk me into having kids and OMG I'd be amazing and nothing like my Mum or my Nan...!
However, hearing my sister (who was Lil Miss Sugar and Spice & All Things Nice) scream at my nephew this afternoon, turns out the family temper does breed true down the female line, and my poor unfertilised eggs were better off as they were.

There is still time, but given that my social cirlce is my family, teachers at school and errr.... well that's it.... I'm not really expecting that I'll ever meet anyone eligible before I hit the menopause.

I don't think I really mind - I love my 90-odd kids (30 in Class 2a on Wednesdays, 30 in Class 2 on Fridays and the 30 I was with last year). I've spread my net wide in terms of being remembered.

If I won the Euromillions tomorrow I would have a baby.
Maybe I'd advertise - because I'd want my baby to have a father and yet not be financially dependent on him.
Without that minor miracle I'll settle for being an almost spinster almost school-marm.

Nope. :headshake

Great read Sam. I bet you are not alone in your thoughts about the internet dating thing in your current circle of friends.

Nice scribblin, missy.
 

Mating is madness pure n simple, see also: strip clubs, ladie's night, plastic surgery. :3eye:
Strikes me that finding "the one" I could live with without going bonkers is alot like locating the one pre-1963 silver half dollar coin in a bag full of the silverless clunkers they coined after that: I'll know when her when I see, hear and hold her, but the odds are ridickylus.