Hello! I really enjoyed (re-)reading your Persuasion story, For Those In Peril On The Sea. I have a bit of an oddly specific question that's also slightly NSFW (so please feel free to delete this ask if it's a discomfiting one) but there was a part that stood out to me:
“I know,” says Anne into his shoulder, “that we were not expecting — that is, that we had not thought of a third child, but — ” She feels him stiffen, and looks up to meet his eyes. “I thought we might ask Sophia and the Admiral to be godparents? If all goes well, that is, if…”
Firstly, I love how sweet this discussion and frankly all these two's communication is, and Frederick's certainty that if there was something even slightly off with his wife, 1) he would've instinctively understood 2) she would've found some way to communicate that to him even without words. Makes me think of homophrosyne!
But I was wondering, does "we had not thought of a third child" imply that there was some attempt(s) made at family planning by the Wentworths? I've read a couple Regency marital hygiene manuals (thanks archive.org) that alluded to husbandly "consideration," i.e., men taking measures to prevent one's wife from going through frequent pregnancies, with all the "modern" sense of men's sexual selfishness as a vice that this implies(!); I was wondering if your Frederick did indeed have that sense of "consideration" which Anne knows about and discussed with him, and what that might've entailed. Thanks and hope you have a good day!
Hi! I'm gratified that you enjoyed it! (Fic here for the curious.)
To your first point, the ways we see Anne and her Frederick attuned to each other even when they think everything between them is hopelessly consigned to the past really do drive me wild. I love them.
To your question: it's been a long time since I thought about this, but I'm going to say yes. I read Anne as genuinely devout, and therefore very likely to assent to the proposition in the Book of Common Prayer that marriage is ordained for (among other things) the procreation of children. But also, as you observe, the medical/social advice enabling and encouraging couples to take a degree of control over reproductive sex, largely as a consideration for the woman's physical and mental health.
Also, for the record, I'm not discomfited by sex being a fact of life.
