I'm new! How to decide when you are ready?

[FrannieM]

Hi!  I'm new in the Mothering Community.  I live in Amsterdam, NL, and I just turned 31.  I have lurked on Mothering for a long time...

I am curious why under Fertility, there is no category for discussing IF you are ready to get pregnant.  I can't be the only one who struggles with this question, right?  My husband has been wanting a child for a couple years now, but I always putting my career first (I travel almost 60% of my time).  I really struggle with this question.

Everyone I ask always says "you are never ready", but that has not been very helpful as I struggle with this question.   I DO want to be a mother, just not YET.  Maybe "you are never ready" is just not the advice that I want to hear.

How did you know you were ready to build a family?

[capretta]

I just want to say that I think this is a great question and I would love to see this type of discussion.

We have decided just recently to TTC (or at least stop TTA), but we still have some considerable reservations. What is this going to do to our lives? Our finances? Our marriage? My body? I'd love to hear from others who struggled with their decision and how it turned out. With the benefit of hindsight, would you have changed anything?

ETA Sorry, I didn't mean to hijack your thread with all my own questions.  I just have a lot of them!

[jaimrene]

I truly believe if it is your desire to raise children it is just something you have to do and not question it to death (I had been a wee bit guilty of that).  We have four and they are priceless. Do I get less sleep now than I did before? YES! Do I have less money to spend on myself than I did before? YES! Do I have less time to do what I want to do? YES! Is it worth it? YES! YES! YES!

    FrannieM~ This was the thing that came to mind when I read your post. Although I am a stay at home mom, I have one friend in particular who works for a very large auto parts manufacturing company (in the USA) and she travels overseas, almost monthly, for days and sometimes a week or more at a time. It is very hard on her two boys and her as well. She has tried finding a much lower paying job so she can spend more time with them, but no company has been brave enough to hirer her because they say she is far over qualified (she IS brilliant). Although her husband has a decent job there is no way he can provide for them without them having to make EXTREMELY drastic changes. This situation has been a struggle for her and has caused her a great, great deal of anxiety. Anyhow, not to be too old-fashioned (although I am... lol), but I have seen that it is almost always best if the parents are willing to do what it takes for mom to be at home (if not full time than at least a majority of the time). The kids always seem to be better adjusted, more content, and mom seems happier as well. 

    And as far as the body goes... I have four kiddos and have only two little stretch marks on my lower tummy (you would never notice them). I gained approx 50-60 pounds with each of my pregnancies and worked my butt off after each pregnancy to get it off. I know other women who have one or two babies, their tummies look like road maps and they only gained 15-25 pounds. I will admit with each pregnancy I had thoughts about what I would look like since I had made it through fine with with the previous pregnancies, but I couldn't really dwell on it... because what will be will be;-) I don't know any mother personally who would rather have a pristine tummy and not have their children though.

    I wish you ladies all the best. I can almost promise you that if you think it would be nice to be a mommy... you are ready! Life holds no guarantees (my first hubby left me for someone else 3/4 of the way through the pregnancy. SHOCKER!!! Didn't plan on that happening). You can plan for the best, but life changes... sometimes for the better and sometimes, not. Buckle up, hold on, and enjoy the ride;-) Blessings~

[HeatherAtHome]

Edited by HeatherAtHome - 1/18/11 at 4:00pm

[FrannieM]

Thank you for your replies :)      Sometimes I wish I could just get that overwhelming motherhood-desire feeling... then it would be so simple.   Where is my biological clock?

[sublimeliving]

I remember dreaming of starting my own family when I was a little girl. I always wanted to be a stay-at-home mom and spend every day w/ my children. I homeschool, and love every minute that I get to spend w/ them.

You said you want to be a mom, but not yet, so you are saying you're not ready. I think it's hard to plan for something if you're not taking steps in the direction of the goal. Just my 2 cents- it will be hard to travel that much and be a mommy. Can you switch jobs to be working in one city, or can you do that now? I would start doing baby things-maybe start buying little baby items from all of the cities that you go to. Start a little library of children's books. I think getting your mind in baby mode, will help let you know when it's time. 

[Gemini13]

Interesting- I've also noticed the lack of threads devoted to this type of subject... both here and on other parenting/ pregnancy boards.  Anyhoo, I'm definitely one of those people who will never truly feel ready... I'm sure lots of people feel this way, but that doesn't mean you can't feel more ready at some point. 

Some things are just not where I want them to be...  Mainly, my career, our finances (we're doing alright but I guess it always seems like you could use some more!), plus my husband has a back injury that's interfering with his job (hence, the finance concerns).  Other things are fine- we've been married for over 5 years, and we just sold our one-bedroom a few months ago and bought a larger place.  As ambivalent as I am, I imagine that right now I'm about as ready as I'll ever be.  I'm also a few years older than you (35), and I hope to have two kids- so it's very quickly becoming now or never time.  I actually had my IUD removed just this morning- in two weeks it will be time to start trying! 

Perhaps it would help to think about and write down exactly what your fears/misgiving are, and think about how you can work on them.  For example, one of my big things was that I was worried we'd never be able to afford a nice place anywhere I'd like to live.  When we finally got that place, it eased my mind a lot and I felt much more settled.   It sounds to me like your big issue might be your career... it wouldn't hurt to at least start doing some research into another position or career path that would be more compatible with parenthood.

I hope that helped some.  Good luck!

[Mosaic]

Originally Posted by FrannieM 

I am curious why under Fertility, there is no category for discussing IF you are ready to get pregnant.  I can't be the only one who struggles with this question, right?

Oh gosh, this question comes up ALL the time and has been discussed several times!! You just need to do a little search to find previous threads about it since only the newest ones show up here on top. Also, this kind of question usually goes under "family planning", so I'll move this there for you.

[NaaNaa]

When you're officially ready, I think you'll know it. No more doubts or questions... just an overwhelming desire. I too, always knew I wanted to be a mother, I use to worry myself sick as a child/teenager/adult that I wouldn't be able to have children. I watched my older sisters TTC with lots of problems and thought I was doomed for the same fate.

I got engaged when I was 22 to my long time boyfriend, and as I started to mentally plan our life together I became terrified of getting pregnant. It was a shocking feeling to me and I couldn't quite pin-point where it was coming from. My fiance was older and wanted to start a family right away and I suddenly started feeling very NOT ready for something I'd always wanted and dreamed of. To make a long story short, after a lot of soul searching I called off the engagement and ended the relationship. I loved him immensely (at the time) but my instincts were telling me that he wasn't the right one for me or my unborn children.

Six years later, after finding the RIGHT man, neither one of us could wait. We had planed to get married and conceive (god willing) in October of 2008. But after having to push our wedding back to March for logistical reasons, we couldn't "contain" our excitement. As it turns out, our little guy was even more impatient than we were and I got pregnant FOUR months before the wedding. :)

Having said all that, I think as long as you know you WANT children, then there is no need to rush yourself. When you're ready you'll know it. It is true that no one is ever really READY - but that's only because motherhood isn't something you can ever really prepare yourself for. Knowing when you're mentally ready and willing to make that commitment can be the tough part. :)

[lakeruby]

That is such a hard question!  I struggle with it myself.  I have been wanting a baby for YEARS now, but haven't felt "ready."  I oogle all of my friends' adorable babies and play with their older kids and babysit, etc but the timing has just not been right. I have a list of things that I wanted to do before I had a baby (everything from "start exercising regularly" to "buy a chemical-free mattress" to "save up the midwife fees" to "buy a house")  I have crossed a good number of those off the list, and, sure enough, I'm starting to feel ready!    I think it's a good idea to make a list of the things that are stopping you from feeling ready, and you might learn some things about yourself in the process!

best wishes~!

[AnaB]

I say stop asking questions and take the plunge! :)

I'm 27 and we are planning number two right now. Honestly, we weren't ready for our first baby 2 years ago. But I knew that I didn't want to wait until my career is in bloom and I'm in my thirties. I always imagined myself as a young mom and we both felt starting a family was way more important to us personally than a career or a comfortable income. We are so glad we didn't wait! Not only was getting pregnant easy, fertility wise, it has been an incredibly joyous journey with all its ups and downs. I do not regret for a single second choosing to stay home with baby and mostly abandoning my career as an Interior Designer and the 4 years I put into my education. I work from home now, part-time, and it's working out great.

We weren't ready financially, but that hasn't stopped us. I enjoy being a mother so much. It's hard but worth every moment. I know some women, in their 40s and childless, and I see how miserable they are. I didn't want to be that woman. Do I sound pushy? Perhaps. But it is all up to you! Just think - what are you more likely to regret when you're 65? Not having spent enough time on your career or putting off having children when you're younger?

[amelie9636]

My $0.02...

I was the same, happy independent, with a good career and a good marriage, great friends, a place where i wanted to be. Then DH wanted a baby and we've been discussing it for about 3 years, with me not convinced, primarily because of the lifestyle change. At one point, I realised that there was no amount of "logic" to having kids. If, how many, when --- these are questions that have no logical answer. So one day, I just told myself 'yes', lets think about why not to have kids, and then, it became clearer that the reasons to NOT have kids were not that compelling. I would not have the youth, the interest in travel, a great career, even some of my friends forever even if i did not have babies. Things change, and it was futile to imagine that by not having kids, i would manage to hang on to all that i liked about my life. Change was inevitable, having kids was a choice, and a way of choosing what kind of change would happen.

And so we said yes and had a LO. Now, he's about 4 mths old, and I have not yet felt a rush of emotion that makes me go gooey all over. I sometimes get frustrated with the lack of free spirits and the fact that I cannot be as impulsive as before. But definitely, its nice to have someone else to love and care for. Its like "Would it be nice to have another really close friend, or really close sister?" For me, yes. So its good to have another family member that in time will be really close to me.

[capretta]

Originally Posted by Mosaic 

Oh gosh, this question comes up ALL the time and has been discussed several times!! You just need to do a little search to find previous threads about it since only the newest ones show up here on top. Also, this kind of question usually goes under "family planning", so I'll move this there for you.

Really? Comes up all the time? I don't recall seeing any other threads like this and your search terms didn't pull up any relevant ones for me. I tried several other searches and came up with these few that I would say are related:

Deciding to have kids (March 2010 - more recent than this thread)

How serious is the "have kids before 30" thing? (December 2010)

so who thought they never wanted kids? (2008)

How to decide if you're ready (2006)

I'm sure I missed a few, but it still doesn't seem to me like it comes up "ALL the time". What does come up regularly is when to have the second, third, etc. and child-spacing, but that is a completely different question.

FWIW, our TTC was successful. I'm pregnant now and happy about it, but never had that moment of absolute certainty and yearning without doubts or concerns. Clearly, lots of women here have that experience, but I didn't and I would welcome more open conversation with others who experience some degree of ambivalence about having children.

[Gemini13]

Congratulations, Capretta.  We were successful too- I just found out last night that I'm pregnant.  I can relate to much of what you're saying.  I didn't always want kids- until about two years ago the idea was completely foreign to me, and I was actually dead-set against having children.  I'm not sure if what it took was spending time with my little neice, or perhaps my age and my hormones were messing with my head, who knows!  Anyway, I did start to feel a kind of biological urge.  My husband was the one who was always pushing for kids, but OF COURSE once I told him I wanted some, he started getting cold feet!  Anyway, we had a number of conversations about it.  It was obvious that something in our lives needed to change.  If we weren't going to have kids there was no point in slaving away and living where we are now (our neighborhood is nice but rather boring!).  We daydreamed a bit about getting an around-the-world ticket and trying to find somewhere we could live, about moving to Belize (which we considered the last time we were there), stuff like that.  Anyway, as I believe I said above, I'm 35 so we were heading into now-or-never territory.  I don't know if we're truly ready, but we're as ready as we ever will be.  I think my biggest regret is that I haven't seen nearly as much of the world as I'd like.  In reality though, unless we both quit our jobs or something, I would still never have the chance to travel as much as I'd like.  We now have the fantasy of being world travelers once we retire.  :)   I definitely have concerns about having children but at the same time I feel confident in our decision.     

[Mosaic]

Originally Posted by capretta 

Originally Posted by Mosaic 

Oh gosh, this question comes up ALL the time and has been discussed several times!! You just need to do a little search to find previous threads about it since only the newest ones show up here on top. Also, this kind of question usually goes under "family planning", so I'll move this there for you.

Really? Comes up all the time? I don't recall seeing any other threads like this and your search terms didn't pull up any relevant ones for me. I tried several other searches and came up with these few that I would say are related:
.

Sorry, the new search feature has been throwing lots of people for a loop, so I'll put a few links at the end for future reference. But what I meant by my post is that I think this is a question almost ALL of us ask ourselves at some point, so frannie is certainly not the only one who feels her biological clock might be broken!

I felt that way myself... in the end, I TTCed even though I didn't have that burning desire, and my doubts/worries just developed into prepartum depression. Everyone tried to tell me that my concerns were normal, but, well, they weren't, at least not completely. As soon as DD was born, however, all those doubts flew away like magic, and it was clear that we made the right decision in spite of myself.

Most parents say they can't envision their lives without children. I can, and it looks fantastic! But 5 years and 2 beautiful daughters later, I realize that the decision to have children isn't just that. It's a decision to put your life on an entirely different path, a promise to love someone you have never met, and a commitment to change in ways you can't even anticipate. It's no wonder, then, why some people don't ever feel truly READY or have that burning desire.

Other 'How do you know if you're ready?" threads: link1, link2, link3, link4

[capretta]

Mosaic: Thanks for sharing your personal experience and perspective.

I'm sorry you went through depression. I wonder, though, how abnormal that really is. Around all of the women who "always knew they wanted to be a mother" and who suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to procreate, I'm often a little hesitant to say anything about my true feelings. What if they think I'm not fit to be a mother if I don't feel that way? I can see how that could turn into self-doubt.

On the subject of biological clocks, I actually find the whole idea kind of offensive. In truth, the fact that I am a couple weeks shy of 35 did affect our decision, but not because some animal instinct to procreate kicked in. We made a rational decision involving many factors one of which was the affect my age might have on our chances of having a healthy child and preserving my own health and well-being.


For your convenience (now including Mosaic's links):

Deciding to have kids (May 2011)

How serious is the "have kids before 30" thing? (December 2010)

what do you do if career-wise it's the right time to TTC, but you don't know if you're ready? (April 2009 - About TTC #2)

How do you know if you're even ready? (February 2009)

How do you know when you are ready? (August 2008)

so who thought they never wanted kids? (May 2008)

How do you know when you're ready to TTC? (July 2007)

How to decide if you're ready (July 2006)

[Addie]

Originally Posted by Mosaic 


Most parents say they can't envision their lives without children. I can, and it looks fantastic! But 5 years and 2 beautiful daughters later, I realize that the decision to have children isn't just that. It's a decision to put your life on an entirely different path, a promise to love someone you have never met, and a commitment to change in ways you can't even anticipate. It's no wonder, then, why some people don't ever feel truly READY or have that burning desire.
 

Just wanted to throw in a huge here - I'm not sure anything I've read on this website has ever resonated more with me. It's taken me a while to come to peace with that feeling, but man do I identify with it.

[FrannieM]

Ladies, I came back to see my thread had more activity; thank you!   I can really identify with the people who say "ready as I will ever be"... because that is where I am at.  I don't think this decision is going to get any easier, I have no clue what a baby will do for my career and I don't think i can plan for it (who knows what will happen?) so to the OVERWHELMING delight of my husband, who is convinced after 1 time having sex without a condom a day or so after ovulation that I am already pregnant. (i have explained that this is like 2% likelihood).  I guess I don't need overwhelming excitement, readiness, or a loud biological clock since my husband has that going on in spades...

I guess I am at peace with starting to try to conceive?  I think I will be excited if we do get pregnant.

I DO want kids, and I know our situation is not going to get any easier career wise, just harder, so here we go...!

 

[Brown Lioness]

Im at this same juncture.   Hubby is READY but things arent perfect but we are doing ok.  Im 31, so the clock is ticking as we'd like more than one child.  Taking the plunge, as it were, seems like the scariest thing ive ever had to contemplate.

[Sol_y_Paz]

Hi and welcome!

I felt I wanted to be a mom in my very young 20's, I was in a stable relationship for 4 years at that point.  Before that I never thought about kids and being a mom.  We waited a few more years and I was ready, he wasn't due to money issues.  TTC things are not working out as planned now.  

Kids aren't logical.  Not really.  But really, is falling in real love always logical?  Many things that are great aren't always logical.  You can go all deep thought things over and over and endlessly go in circles and trains of thought, but what does that accomplish really?  Life is short and isn't meant to be lived that way IMO and this is coming from a person who is a planner and likes everything just right.  

Edited by Sol_y_Paz - 10/12/11 at 12:06pm