Looks like I have to unfollow yet another friend

Someone I've known since high school recently shared their "blessed news" on social media, using X-mess as a springboard for it by saying something like "Opening our best gift in the spring!" with a picture of some baby booties.

It's kind of disappointing because I really thought for a while this person and their partner were going to go against the grain. They seemed like devoted pet parents who shirked marriage and kids and were just loving life together, and while they've been together for some time (I want to say it's close to a decade), they only got married less than a year ago. I don't give a crap about whether or not people are married prior to spawning, but I have noticed that the longer people are together when they reproduce, the bigger the wedge will be that the loaf drives between them.

Speaking of their pets, they would always share photos of their two adorable dogs and I imagine that won't happen anymore. This saddens me the most because you know those dogs will be shelter fodder before the kid can walk. Either that, or they'll get neglected and cast aside. Poor dogs have been there for years and suddenly they'll be regarded as trash once the loaf shows up.

Maybe it'll be different for them, but I doubt it.

Probably only got married so they could legally sprog. That's what most 30something people I know have done in recent years.

Funny you should mention that, starlady, because I know a couple who were together since age 16 (which in itself can be an issue, but I won't go into my opinion on that here), and didn't get married until their early 30s. I was thinking "Huh, okay, whatever...if they're happy, I'm happy for them. But why now? Why bother after all these years?". Then sure enough...a couple years later they had a baby. Then they morphed into far less interesting versions of themselves. Oh, and the theory about the longer you're together, the tougher it is to adjust to having a baby? Yup. She would never admit to it, but they had a really, really rough time after that bundle of "joy" arrived.

Sorry to hear about your friend, Cambion. I hope they defy the odds and are still good dog owners. It can happen. Friends of mine just laid their sweet 15 year old springer spaniel to rest a month ago, and they'd had her since before they had kids. They were good to her right up to the end. Their kids know the pets are family & to treat animals with respect. Maybe your friends will still be good, ethical pet owners.

Anyway...I know that feeling of "another one bites the dust".

I have the same mindset. I mean I personally don't really think much of marriage, not that I have anything against it, but just I don't want to do it myself. If two people have been together for years and years, I guess I don't really see the point in getting married. If neither one flew the coop when they weren't legally bound to one another, they can't be too unhappy together, right?

I'm kind of losing hope as far as these two already. I don't know my friend's wife, so I don't want to pass judgment or make assumptions, but it seems like she's already reached the "I can let myself go since I snagged a man" stage before they even got married. She was a normal size (maybe a tiny bit chubby) for years and when I saw their wedding photos, I honestly thought it was a different lady because she was significantly larger, like at least 70 pounds. I can only hope they figure out how to have kids and pets in harmony, but I know how most breeders are and they'll probably decide the pets are too much trouble.

My friends and I are in our thirties, so I know it's that time when everybody's starting to have kids on purpose and several of my friends, acquaintances and classmates have announced pregnancies or had kids within the past couple of years. Makes me glad most of them aren't local so I don't have to pretend to be interested in their squirming maggots and bloated pignancy guts. It still sucks and I experience something akin to light mourning when someone I know reproduces because I know the person I know is going to die and be replaced with a soulless husk once the kid comes along.