Or think perhaps you may have been? The thread on parents’ ages has me wondering, especially with the number of posters with older parents. I’m pretty sure that I was, since my brother is eleven years older than me and my sister is ten years older. Back in the 40s, the only protection was condoms or abstinence, and I doubt that my parents deliberately waited ten years to have the privilege of raising another child. I suspect drunken revelry and an “Ah shit, honey, got no rubbers.” “C’mere Tiger!”
The dynamics of birth order is well known, and I’ve known psych profs who can tell you the personality characteristics of every child in your family, just by the order of birth. Youngest children with a large gap between them and the next oldest typically grow up exhibiting the same characteristics as an only child.
I never asked my mother, but I’m pretty sure I was accidental, for the opposite reason of yours- my mom got pregnant with me 6 weeks after having my brother. He was breech and it was a horrible birth and they both almost died, so I don’t think she would have been trying again so soon.
Not only was I an accident, my parents weren’t even living together, let alone married, when I was conceived. I only learned that detail about a year ago, although I had long suspected that I was an accident.
When my mother found out my first GF was taking birth control, my mom tried to scare me by telling me I was a birth control accident. It didn’t phase me in the least.
I could have been in that my aunt was talking about how my parents were pregnant when they got married then realised that they’d never told me that by the surprised look on my face. Was quite funny in that she thought she’d dropped them in it, while I wasnt worried at all and just found it funny even these days it would be kept a secret.
But they had several miscarriages before I was actually born, so in practise, no.
My brother and I were both very much planned . . . by our mother. Both times, she wanted to get pregnant, and needed to get a couple of drinks into our father. He wasn’t a drinker normally, but she could get some into him at New Year’s Eve. And luckily, her own biological cycle worked to her advantage. My brother and I were both born 9 months after New Year’s, three years apart.
My family likes to talk about all these details, so I’ve always known that my mom had 5 pregnancies, two were unplanned, I was the result of a planned one as were my stillborn brother and middle sister, and my youngest sister was a ‘surprise’ (as they always said).
My parents had given up on the possibility of ever having children, even having been told they were infertile. They certainly wanted kids though! So I wasn’t at all accidental, just unexpected. Nobody expects the Electric Warrior inquisition!
I don’t know anybody who says they were an accident, but about half of the parents who have discussed their family planning with me say their kids were accidents. None of those kids appear to know it, though of course they may.
Mom and Dad wanted kids someday so she went to the OB/GYN. He told her that she had a condition that would make it very difficult to conceive. Mom and Dad wanted to wait a couple of years but they didn’t want take any chances so Mom went off of birth control right away. She was pregnant six weeks later.
Twelve years later, my parents are divorced. My dad is with the woman who is now my step-mom. One of her daughters is five weeks older than me. It turns out that way back when she had the same OB/GYN. She was told that she had the same condition at around the same time with the same results.
I was not only NOT accidental, my mom fought to have me, as my dad REALLY did not want to bring children into the world, being a rather bitter, depressed, nihilistic alcoholic from a family with mom as the Town Crazy and dad the Town Drunk…
But she convinced him to have one…
She’d dreamed of playing with a little baby, and she got whiny, sickly me…
My mom planned, dad didn’t want another. I have an older brother and sister, but as a baby my older brother was always on the verge of dying from something or other (he didn’t - he’s a grandpa now), so my mom planned to get a spare - me. However, my younger brother, born a scant year after me, was definitely not planned by either. Last sister, 10 years after the rest of us, was my mom’s planning again. She’d been fostering babies for a couple years and I think just wanted to have one she didn’t have to give back.
Mom always said I was planned. There was a ten year gap and a World War between me and my brother. I was the baby of the family for nine years, then suddenly I was the only child. Made for some wierdness.
I was an accident but only in some definitions of the word.
My parents weren’t married, and I was my mothers 3rd child but my fathers first. I think I was 15 when my Aunt let it slip that Mom had given up two babies for adoption before I came along. I guess the difference was my Dad proposed. They married very quickly and I was born 7 months later.
Mom continues to deny this is true, but given the general believability of the two of them and my Aunts distress when she realized I had no idea I still believe it’s true.
If any dopers were adopted in Toronto between 1963 and 1966 and were rejected by the birth mother when they attempted to contact her send me a PM. I have no details at all about the sex or dates of adoption and all attempts I’ve made to get more information from my family has been in vain.
Yup, me and my 4 siblings were all accidents, especially my youngest sister. My mom got remarried at 40, and went to get on the pill, as she didn’t want any more kids. After giving her a physical, the doc said my mom didn’t have to worry about taking birth control, as she’d already been through menopause.
Three months later my mom goes to the doc because she hadn’t been feeling well, been sick all the time, etc. Doc tells her she’s preggers. The whole episode led to my mom losing 60lbs, going into severe depression, and nearly dying.