Dear Claire,

I’ve been married for 5 years, and my wife is getting anxious to start having kids. I’m not ready at all to take this step, but she is putting more and more pressure on me. How do I tell her that I want more time before we have a baby?

Best,

Desperate not to be a Daddy

Dearest darling Desperate,

You silly spaghetti carbonara, you might be worried about nothing at all – you don’t even know if you and your wife will be able to have children. Hurray for you if you can’t, problem solved! Should she set her sights on adoption, buy several large fish and use up your wife’s possible baby names on them. She will have no choice to abandon her family-based dreams. However, in case you are indeed the unfortunate victim of a fertile uterus, don’t despair. There are several ways to handle this situation, but as this is quite a personal and sensitive matter, it’s best to go with the kindest option. Refuse to have marital relations with your wife. Put your foot down hard and keep your undergarments firmly on. If she tries to initiate it, simply walk away from her without acknowledging her presence. Should she follow you, walk into the bathroom and shut the door in her face (as her husband, this is your absolute legal right, but do it slowly, out of respect). Now, many women have a tendency to want to talk about things – we are such adorably bothersome creatures – and you must resist this as well. Talking leads to persuading, which leads to resolution, which leads to action, which leads to a drooling, crying, pooping lump of baby that can’t take a joke and watches a terrible quality of television. Better to it shut down hard and have pointedly loud manual orgasms in the shower.

The best part of this plan is that it’s long-term! Scientifically, she can’t make a baby without you, so put it off as long as you desire. Should you decide you never want to have kids, you simply have to wait out the old egg timer (if you know what I mean). Spend some of that saved money on rated-M video games and DVD’s, and enjoy yourself – you earned it!

Cordially, Claire