How did you decide you were ready to try?

[mentallydiseasedapostate]

33F, married to my best friend for 8 yrs. We are financially stable enough, we have built-in child care (we have an in-law who lives with us) but we also work from home, my husband and I are both smart and capable people, there is literally no reason not to have kids except… I’m not sure I want them? I always said to my husband that I didn’t know whether I wanted to have kids and he accepted it. I always thought that one day I’d get baby fever, but it never happened.

Due to my age, I’ve been thinking about it more. I see aging relatives/friends who live alone and don’t have family around (after their spouses pass away), and think about how lonely that seems. I feel like I need to decide soon because of biology and my life timeline. I see how much fulfillment my friends get from their kids and I’m sure I would feel the same way, but who knows? It doesn’t feel right to bring an human life into this world when I’m not 100% wanting its existence.

I also struggle with the idea of getting pregnant because I am obese and I worry about being able to be healthy and give birth to a health child.

My husband has expressed lately that we would ideally have at least 2 kids, but he’s still supportive.

Do I just try, and see what happens? Please, I’d love any advice or personal experiences someone can share.

 

[toastylife]

@mentallydiseasedapostate I'd try r/Fencesitter, it's better suited to your situation

 

[mentallydiseasedapostate]

@toastylife Thank you! I will.

 

[theodor98]

@mentallydiseasedapostate

Thank you! I will.

You're welcome!

 

[skrause947]

@mentallydiseasedapostate We thought about everything we wanted to do/ liked to do that would become too difficult or impossible with young children. We realized there weren’t many things maybe only 2 - 4 things. We did those things. Once we had experienced them we knew we were ready.

 

[craigp]

@skrause947 Can I ask what the things were? This seems like a great conversation to have - for me, the answers are probably last minute trips, my expensive hobby (can pause for a few years, I’ve accepted this), and straightening my teeth (want to be done with that before the possibility of morning sickness etc)

 

[skrause947]

@craigp Here’s my long drawn out answer - last minute trips to go see comedy shows, complex and long travel experiences that involved moving hotels every one to two days, living in a cute/trendy, but not child friendly, apartment in the city (it would have been really difficult to get a stroller in and out and we had stairs that a child would easy fall down). We really loved that apartment, but knew we’d have to give it up as soon as we got pregnant. And lastly using the money we would need to put a side to take care of another life on anything we wanted. I wanted to take 14 months off and my husband two if we were on parental leave, we also knew we wanted to be in a position to fully pay for their college/university education if they chose to go (its not a goal for everyone but is for us since it’s the norm in our families). This required us to look at our budget and decide if we wanted to stop funding certain things in order to support a child in the way we felt we needed to. If there were things we didn’t want to stop funding yet, it meant we weren’t ready. A couple example were that we had a pretty large tasting menu budget. It’s something we really enjoy doing together, but we’d have to reallocate a lot of that budget. Also, my husband loves cars and had to decide to get a lower end model. These sounds frivolous if one already has kids, but when deciding to make the leap from DINKs or not (especially in your 30’s or later) it’s part of the life style change that seriously needs be considered.

Once we knew we wanted a child more than all those things it was a simple decision to make, honestly. Nothing is guaranteed or perfect, but we made the best decision with the information we had at hand. So it feels good to know that we throughly thought the decision out since there are no “take backs” lol

 

[craigp]

@skrause947 Thank you so much for the reply! It seems well thought out - and now that you mention it, I may need to add to my list with some things I forgot about haha. Especially the financial considerations. By far the biggest wiggle room in our budget will come from me pausing my hobby for a while, but another big one will be when student loans and vehicles get paid off hopefully in the next couple years!

 

[eligp1240]

@craigp I will say I did Invisalign as one of my “to do’s” before trying and now I’m struggling to wear my retainer at night due to nausea in the first trimester. I try to get in a few good hours of retainer use each night but I’ll probably have to do another (hopefully shorter) round of Invisalign again due to my teeth shifting back from not wearing my retainer as much as I should. This time I’ll wait til I’m all done having kids…

 

[craigp]

@eligp1240 I’m sorry to hear about your nausea! Thanks for sharing though - I’m doing Invisalign myself and I can’t imagine trying to do this while pregnant or with a newborn

 

[ninaua]

@mentallydiseasedapostate So I went from really wanting kids since I was young to thinking my husband and I wouldn’t have them for a few years once it became a real possibility. Then I started rethinking it and honestly wasn’t sure anymore and he could kind of go either way but was definitely nervous about the idea. We both read a book called “motherhood, is it for me?” that is a 12 week program to help you figure out what you want. For me it turns out it was still a deep desire to have them and now we are waiting to try for a bit longer but planning on it. Maybe it could help for you too to feel certain of your choice either way.

 

[johnabill]

@ninaua My husband and I read The Baby Decision, which is a similar book that is aimed at a broader audience, and worked with a Family and Marriage Therapist who is very experienced with facilitating this choice. It was very helpful and I definitely recommend therapy and reading books for anyone who is on the fence.

 

[ninaua]

@johnabill Yeah I think for me it immediately became very clear I still had a strong internal desire and was basically trying to talk myself out of it for a lot of external reasons. I’m a nanny so I do get a lot of the enjoyment of raising babies and toddlers but I am also happy to get to come home and enjoy my other hobbies. So I think it just became very real that having my own would be much harder but ultimately I feel like much more rewarding as well and that’s still something I want. I also worried a lot about the fact I mostly picture having a baby and I love that age and have a lot of experience with it but worried that I wouldn’t enjoy them as much when they are older but now I am picturing different life stages and remembering my own childhood and excited about showing them lots of different things as they grow up.

 

[mercifulwoman]

@mentallydiseasedapostate Wasn’t really a mental choice. Felt like the biological clock was saying it was time and I was mentally losing it at the idea of not being a mom.

 

[reactcoder]

@mentallydiseasedapostate I think it’s better to think of it as “would I be ok not being a mom forever?” It’s hard to decide whether you want something you can’t imagine.

 

[xethea]

@mentallydiseasedapostate I also don’t think you need to immediately rush. 33 still gives you plenty of time to make a decision