Once upon a time, between marriages, I dated this guy I’ll call T.J. He was brilliant, charming, loving and sexy, but he was also verbally and physically abusive and a little insane. I completely fell for him. I still feel the attraction to him many years later, even though I know it’s dangerous to even think about it. Anybody who has ever been with an abusive guy will understand.

I bring him up because T.J., unlike the men I married who didn’t want to have kids with me, frequently offered to father my children. He urged me to get rid of my birth control, saying things like, “I know you want to have my baby” and “We would make beautiful children together.”

It was so tempting, but he was a scary guy, and we were not married. This was back a while when pregnancy out of wedlock was still a scandal. My parents would never have forgiven me, and I probably would have lost a job that I loved, with no guarantee that T.J. would stick with me. I gambled with the “rhythm method” for a while, but really tried not to get pregnant. Wrong time, wrong guy. Apparently it was my only chance.

Have you had a situation in your life where you could have had a baby, but the situation was just wrong? What happened? How do you feel about it now?