I see myself in your writing with an almost uncanny frequency. I had my only child at 24 with a man I didn't love, married the right one, and after much discussion, decided not to have any more children. I don't regret the decision, but he does. His branch also stops with him.

Many of my friends have only one child, and we've discussed the issue of overpopulation at great length. One thing that keeps coming up is that yes, we contributed to the world population, but we're all committed to raising children who are aware and responsive about the state of the world. Not just more mindless consumers, but thoughtful, caring and empathetic young people who could actually make a difference. Essentially, it's not terrible that you bring a child into the world, but it really helps if you work to raise that child to respect the earth and work to make it better. The numbers may not look like they're in our favor, but how many heroes will it really take? Those of us who have tried to raise really great people (and obviously I know that's subjective. We all think our kids are great) feel pretty good unleashing them on the world. They will make their mistakes just as we did, but they will come back to the values they were raised with, and will seek out others with similar values, and maybe, by fits and starts, change could actually happen. It certainly won't happen with our generation. We need them to take up the torch.