# Pregnant Instincts - Need for a Good Man



## MAJDEATH (Jun 16, 2015)

W relayed a story recently and it made me want to ask the ladies of TAM about it. Prior to marriage and when we were not in a relationship, W had a ONS and ended up pregnant. Bio dad left soon after their night, with no forwarding address. A few months later W was back visiting her home town several states away, and rekindled a frienship with an old junior high crush. They soon became intimate.

W told crush she was 3 months pregnant. Crush was in a transitional phase of his young adult life and was looking for a change. They decided that they loved each other and wanted to get married. He said he would help with the baby. They soon packed up and moved several states back to where she was living. But he had additional baggage.

He smoked a lot, but said he would always go outside to smoke. Eventually he stopped doing that, which annoyed her. He drank. He did drugs, but said he would stop. He didn't. He said he would get a job right away to support the family. He did, but a somewhat low paying job that he had trouble keeping. And his coworkers were the drug connection. 

He also left something behind - a fatherless child. He himself had an "oops" moment and fathered a daughter, which he conveniently forgot to mention until his pay started being garnished for child support. W was working 2-3 jobs while pregnant and provided nearly all support for the family.

My question to the ladies is this: while pregnant, is the instinct to find a good man to provide support so strong that you would settle for less? Or overlook so obvious character/behavioural flaws in your attempt to have a father figure to provide support?

Eventually they broke off the engagement and he moved out. I asked my W the number 1 reason why, and she said it was the smoking. She stopped smoking once she learned she was pregnant and wanted to protect her unborn child, and he couldn't manage that. What was lost on her is what I took away from the story: that she was seemingly really settling for less because she was pregnant and in a hurry to get something in place.


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## NickyT (Aug 14, 2017)

MAJDEATH said:


> My question to the ladies is this: while pregnant, is the instinct to find a good man to provide support so strong that you would settle for less? Or overlook so obvious character/behavioural flaws in your attempt to have a father figure to provide support?


OP, I would argue that the perceived need to find a man causes women to settle all the time regardless of their circumstances or stage of life.


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## samyeagar (May 14, 2012)

MAJDEATH said:


> W relayed a story recently and it made me want to ask the ladies of TAM about it. Prior to marriage and when we were not in a relationship, W had a ONS and ended up pregnant. Bio dad left soon after their night, with no forwarding address. A few months later W was back visiting her home town several states away, and rekindled a frienship with an old junior high crush. They soon became intimate.
> 
> W told crush she was 3 months pregnant. Crush was in a transitional phase of his young adult life and was looking for a change. They decided that they loved each other and wanted to get married. He said he would help with the baby. They soon packed up and moved several states back to where she was living. But he had additional baggage.
> 
> ...


My wife got pregnant at 18. The biodad didn't want anything to do with her or the kid, so she did exactly what you described. She went on an all out hunt to find someone, anyone who would take care of her and the kid. That's how she ended up with her screwed up ex husband and abusive marriage. Not saying it is always going to be the case, but red flags should be all over the place when a 28 year old single guy marries within months of meeting, an 18 year old girl pregnant with someone elses kid.


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## She'sStillGotIt (Jul 30, 2016)

MAJDEATH said:


> My question to the ladies is this: while pregnant, is the instinct to find a good man to provide support so strong that you would settle for less? Or overlook so obvious character/behavioural flaws in your attempt to have a father figure to provide support?


I'm going to be brutally honest.

I would have NEVER, EVER have gotten myself into this position in the first place. And if hell had frozen over and I actually DID find myself in this position, I wouldn't have been in it for long. So I can most assuredly say I certainly *wouldn't *latch onto the first loser who came along and was willing to take me on even though I was pregnant with some _other _loser's kid. But let's be honest - not too many quality guys would want to take on some pregnant woman whose 'baby daddy' has run off on her. This loser was probably the best she was going to get.


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## Parttimehippie (Dec 23, 2017)

If I may, how old is this lady? I get the gist that she is still young. If that is the case, I can see why she would 1) move in very quickly so soon after eating and 2) break up over something trivial. She has some conflicts to sort out. First, yes I believe that we have a need to have a good man around when we are pregnant. But if she is young, or has very low self esteem, I can see where she would look past all of those awful qualities and want to be with him. Weren't we all ignorant when we were young and made bad decisions when we're feeling low? I truly hope that this lady is able to find some inner strength and confidence and pick her next mate wisely. Dating when you're a single parent is scary!


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## Rowan (Apr 3, 2012)

I had been married for about 2 years when our happy surprise pregnancy occurred. We'd been seriously planning to start to trying for a baby, but wound up with a birth control failure just weeks before our targeted "starting to try" date. So it wasn't like it was an unwed teen parents kind of thing. And my husband, with whom I'd been in a relationship for 8 years at that point, still_ freaked the hell out_ on me. I spent the entire pregnancy violently and severely ill with severe hyperemesis, in and out of the hospital, on and off bedrest, etc. With as unsupportive as he was for the duration, I should have cut and run then, particularly if I'd been in any condition to realize what he was actually up to. So, maybe I, too, settled for a less than great guy. Not because I was pregnant, but because he was my husband and he and my marriage meant a great deal to me. All sorts of people, particularly young people, make retrospectively poor choices of mate, for a variety of reasons. 

But yes, pregnancy can be a very vulnerable time for a woman. I can certainly see how a young, scared, perhaps not super emotionally mature woman, likely suffering from low self-esteem and a fair amount of hurt over her boyfriend's departure and panic about the future, could decide to settle for a less than stellar guy just to have _some_ sort of support. Someone who seems to want you when you feel yourself unwantable can be very alluring. That said, I think settling for anyone just to have someone is probably just as much a product of poor life choices as getting pregnant by a less than stellar guy in the first place was. Young, vulnerable, people make mistakes. The situation the OP describes is simply a product of allowing one mistake to lead to another.


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## MAJDEATH (Jun 16, 2015)

Parttimehippie said:


> If I may, how old is this lady? I get the gist that she is still young. If that is the case, I can see why she would 1) move in very quickly so soon after eating and 2) break up over something trivial. She has some conflicts to sort out. First, yes I believe that we have a need to have a good man around when we are pregnant. But if she is young, or has very low self esteem, I can see where she would look past all of those awful qualities and want to be with him. Weren't we all ignorant when we were young and made bad decisions when we're feeling low? I truly hope that this lady is able to find some inner strength and confidence and pick her next mate wisely. Dating when you're a single parent is scary!


She was 23 at the time. And the guy was a junior high crush that I believe she still saw in that light. He might have been a great kid at 14, but not so great as an adult. I looked him up recently and he had been incarcerated for robbery/drugs in another state.
I never knew about their plans to get married. We had broken up 6 months before she got pregnant but still talked occasionally. She mentioned the other guy once or twice but I never knew he moved back with her or that they were engaged.


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## MAJDEATH (Jun 16, 2015)

She'sStillGotIt said:


> MAJDEATH said:
> 
> 
> > My question to the ladies is this: while pregnant, is the instinct to find a good man to provide support so strong that you would settle for less? Or overlook so obvious character/behavioural flaws in your attempt to have a father figure to provide support?
> ...


Thanks for the honest answer. I was reluctant to get involved (romantically) with her again for those very reasons. But she needed my help and I couldn't not try to help a friend in need.


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## MAJDEATH (Jun 16, 2015)

Rowan said:


> I had been married for about 2 years when our happy surprise pregnancy occurred. We'd been seriously planning to start to trying for a baby, but wound up with a birth control failure just weeks before our targeted "starting to try" date. So it wasn't like it was an unwed teen parents kind of thing. And my husband, with whom I'd been in a relationship for 8 years at that point, still_ freaked the hell out_ on me. I spent the entire pregnancy violently and severely ill with severe hyperemesis, in and out of the hospital, on and off bedrest, etc. With as unsupportive as he was for the duration, I should have cut and run then, particularly if I'd been in any condition to realize what he was actually up to. So, maybe I, too, settled for a less than great guy. Not because I was pregnant, but because he was my husband and he and my marriage meant a great deal to me. All sorts of people, particularly young people, make retrospectively poor choices of mate, for a variety of reasons.
> 
> But yes, pregnancy can be a very vulnerable time for a woman. I can certainly see how a young, scared, perhaps not super emotionally mature woman, likely suffering from low self-esteem and a fair amount of hurt over her boyfriend's departure and panic about the future, could decide to settle for a less than stellar guy just to have _some_ sort of support. Someone who seems to want you when you feel yourself unwantable can be very alluring. That said, I think settling for anyone just to have someone is probably just as much a product of poor life choices as getting pregnant by a less than stellar guy in the first place was. Young, vulnerable, people make mistakes. The situation the OP describes is simply a product of allowing one mistake to lead to another.


I think that is sound advice: don't follow one mistake with another. Alas in the end she ended up with me and all her dreams came true


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## Red Sonja (Sep 8, 2012)

I have never been pregnant, always took precautions and they worked. When I was young and unable to properly parent a child (school, 4 jobs) I would have chosen the option of adoption. By age 25 (graduated, career) I would have kept the child and been a single parent to the best of my ability.

IMO, marrying because you are pregnant is a bad idea for all involved ... unless, the pregnancy is an "oopsie" inside an already established LTR and both parents are enthusiastic about the situation.

No instinct involved.


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## MAJDEATH (Jun 16, 2015)

She also learned that birth-control pills and antibiotics don't mix very well, even when adding a condom to the equation.


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