okay so alec is completely excited to have kids and casually talks about them here and there and thinks even magnus also wants them but magnus isn't very into having kids he doesn't say anything when Alec talks about having them cause insecurity *sprinkle angst *
udhdhdhdjsnsksm this has me torn because on the one hand i really dont stan "having kids" plots (i really hate the idea of having any and they usually just feel very like.... "following standart procedure" anyway and boy id love to have more happy couples who dont fucking want kids) but on the other i do think Magnus would want them? i mean he already has 73737383 children and he loves kids and he was all longingly looking at children after the s3 breakup and shit. so i tend to think he'd want to? idk
with that being said tho, definitely not now. i mean Alec and him are definitely still easing into their relationship and this is not the kind of step you can speedrun into even if they got married in like two months lmao. also he went through some fucking trauma that he needs to process, he was tortured, he lost his best friend, he lost his magic and his home and that's on top of a lot of other unresolved issues. i mean i think Magnus has been healing from Camille and asmodeus and everything else for a long time and that's why he was even ready to start a relationship, but like. it's still far from resolved
and he needs time to process that, and honestly Alec needs it too, needs time to process his own abuse and trauma and unhealthy coping mechanisms, isolating tendencies, taking-responsibility-for-everybody tendencies. but i dont think he sees that quite yet, especially because like, now that he has Magnus, he's living the dream and he's on a high and he wants to go for everything he didn't dare to dream of
so Magnus has to be like hold your horses cowboy i dont think either of us are ready for that. and he's scared af that Alec will take that as a rejection or give up on him because Magnus cant give him what he wants- and Alec feels a little hurt too, a little wounded, because he kind if- well, assumed. like this is what couples do, right? and also what was expected of him. "start a family". educate new generations. whatever
so it's a painful conversation for them both but for once Magnus is the one to push it forward and not let it go until they understand each other. and slowly Alec realizes that Magnus is right, that he wouldnt even know where to start with a kid anyway, that there's still so much in his life thats unstable and precariously balanced without adding a kid into the mix
besides, they have infinite time. they're immortal. they can wait, and this is not set on stone
and id like to think that they both finally, finally start therapy after that. i like to think that warlock therapists are a thing - i mean vampire and werewolf therapists certainly are anyway because of course some therapists would have been realistically turned at some point. but i like warlock therapists specifically because they can get their education in a completely different way, plus they can dedicate themselves to understanding the traumas specific to shadow people from the start - like being Turned, like immortality angst, like fantastical racism, like whatever the fuck's even going on with shadowhunter society - and also mix in magic with their techniques
obviously you cant just magically solve trauma but you can use magic to assess memories and experiences or provide small, temporary treatments, although of course you have to be really careful not to force the patient into something they're not yet ready for. but just like. idk there are possibilities, using magic for hypnosis, using magic to create scenarios that the patient can play out and imagine, using magic to assess feelings that the patient doesnt know how to put into words so they can better help them find a way to describe it, using magic as a form of art therapy. there are a lot of possibilities and i really dig the idea of warlock academies dedicated to studying, discussing and creating methods that mix the usual mundane knowledge with shadow world knowledge and magic. plus specifically studying the issues that affect shadow people, since even a mundane therapist who was Turned would be very out of their depth to explore the trauma of someone like, say, Maia, who was Turned on top of her abuse and whose wolf issues probably mix in with other body issues/dysphoria (trans maia ftw baby!), not to mention the fantastical racism on top of regular racism, pack issues, etc etc
anyway i need to stop being so obsessed with warlock society when nobody asked lmao but anyway i think Magnus and Alec would both find themselves therapists and work out their personal issues, as well as of course supporting each other as they always do, and go through the painful process of revisiting traumas and healing together
and maybe eventually they do decide to have kids, or they realize one day that they already have a family, with alec's siblings and magnus' downworlder kids and their friends and their friends' kids, and theyre happy with that. but either way theyre glad they didnt take that decision lightly, and that they took time for themselves instead of immediately jumping into finding someone else to take care of instead, like theyre both so used to doing
