If you were dating someone and found out he/she had children?

I would break up with them. I do not like children.

One...I do not want kids, any ones kids. Nothing but problems with step kids.

I'm hard pressed to meet someone without kids at my age.  But i will tell you my boyfriend has no children, and he's one of the only mature men i know who doesn't.

I wouldn't mind.  My heart is big enough to care about children.  But I wouldn't want to meet the kids for about 6 months, because he and I might not MAKE it to 6 months of dating.  No sense getting the children involved if I'm only going to end uhp OUT of their life. That's bad for the children.

Also, children usually have a hard time accepting a parent's new S.O., and can cause problems.  With 6 months of dating, at least my date and I have started to bond and maybe even to learn how to work with issues... and have a chance of surviving until the kids accept my presence.

Prior to my own marriage, I dated women with kids, didn't matter to me. But I also didn't fully understand the impact, commitment and such. Didn't understand that until years later when I had my own kids and looked back at those points in time.  At that point in my life, if I had divorced, I would think twice about getting involved with one who had kids, as well as who my kids would have been exposed to. That never happened so I never had to deal with it.  I have seen all to often kids negatively impacted from that situation, usually with very few admitting it too.

Back when I was single, I always made an effort with their kids and even their kids' mom to make things easy.

If the kids and I couldn't get along and/or there was too much baby mama drama..  I walked away.  I'd never ask someone to pick me over their kids because I would never pick someone else over my kids.

My husband didn't have kids when we met but he accepted my kids from a previous marriage as his own.   He treats them and kids we have together all the same.  My ex and I always got along so that made things easy too.

To be honest though even as a single parent myself, I usually didn't date people with kids.  I didn't mind the kids themselves but it was the BS which came with it ...you have the single parents who often use their kids as excuses when they don't want to do something rather than being honest and then there's the too often baby mama drama.  Very few had at least cordial relationships with their ex.  So after a little bit of that ...  I made it simple and dated men who didn't have kids.

I would love to have acquired some children through marriage. I only had one child. I know many people who love their stepchildren as their own. Certainly, no. 3 is not an option- that's the most heartless, unethical, immoral thing a person could do.