Wife’s desire to have a child may surpass love for spouse

My husband and I are 15 years apart in age. We have been together for six years, married a year and a half. He is my entire world, my best friend.

When we met, he told me he didn’t think he wanted another child (he has a daughter). I learned to accept it if I wanted to be with him. I had to be OK with being a stepmom.

Fast-forward: It’s six years later. His daughter (now 14) no longer comes around. (The exwife discouraged any relationship between my stepdaughter and me.) I’m finding it harder and harder to cope with the fact that I don’t have a child of my own. When I bring this up to my husband, he tells me, “I told you in the beginning that I didn’t think I wanted another child.”

How do I deal with this? It’s breaking my heart.

Tell your husband that you agreed with him because you thought you could accept it, but that as time has gone by, you no longer can. Then tell him you feel an important part of being a woman is being a mother. If he refuses to relent, then as much as you may love him, you may be married to the wrong man. You will have to move on if you need to follow your biological imperative.

Every time I buy groceries, I encounter people who push or park their carts in the middle of the aisle. I also see them blindly blast through intersections in the aisles and barely avoid colliding with others.

A few weeks ago, I said to a gentleman, “Pardon me, may I go around you? Thank you.” He said I was the first person who had ever said that to him!

Why don’t we follow basic traffic rules in the supermarket? For example, stay to the right unless you are passing. Yield at intersections to the shopper on the right, etc.

Also, what’s your take on big kids riding in grocery carts?

What you describe happens when folks fail to consider how their behavior affects others. When someone blocks the aisle with a grocery cart, the logical way to deal with it is to say, “Excuse me, please,” which alerts the “offender” that there are others in the store.

Your suggestion that shoppers observe basic traffic rules is a good one — particularly when it involves observing the speed limit.

As to “big kids” riding the carts, as long as they aren’t bothering other shoppers and the store doesn’t care, I don’t judge.

— Longing To Be a Mom Dear Longing: — Disgusted Shopper in Illinois Dear Disgusted: