I feel like this is the year of the "babies"! Tons of bloggers, and real life friends seem to be having them this year!
Hubs and I have been married only 4 months now, (together over 2 and half years) and we often get asked "So when are you going to have kids?"
Naturally one assumes they ask us this since we are 31 and 30 years old. Which to "old" folk they get wide eyes and say, "you are old." Meh. Really? It's not 1950 where it's normal to have kids at 20 anymore. My favorite is when a lady the other night told me that my time was ticking! "Tick tock tick tock" she chanted at me. For real? Hubs being a nurse and all has constantly told me that we "have time" and we are still YOUNG. Where do old people get off saying I'm old? Good grief charlie brown!
I say we are SMART. There is no way I would of ever been ready to of been a "mom" at anything under the age of 26. I have to scowl and say most people don't "get it" when I say this. I say it for one darn good reason. I AM A TEACHER. This means the following things:
I see other peoples kids for more hours in a day then they do. I enjoy coming home to NO KIDS. Just a dog thank you very much. (for now that is haha)
I AM A TEACHER.
What a wonderful form of Birth Control. You see just about every problematic child there is and what your life "could" be like.
I AM A TEACHER.
This means I am at the bottom of the barrel for salary esp in my lovely state of AZ. When you hardly make anything to support a party of 1, and now a husband, how in the heck do you expect a teacher to support having a kid? God does NOT provide funding and any one who has this mentality of Little House on The Prairie type of mindset, you are not thinking about money like I do.
With all that being said, I confess becoming a parent petrifies me. I confess I am a selfish person. I like my "ME" time and often find myself wondering how in the heck I would be with a kid I can never leave alone like you can a dog for a few hours and come back. Granted I do this with Aspen now, my life and schedule revolves around her. I never leave her for more than a few hours at a time, (other than working my normal 7-4 time slot for work)
I see parents who are like this daily. They are stressed. They don't even have to say it, I see it on their faces when they are dropping their kids off to school or picking them up in the office. They look like they never have any "ME" time which I get it, when you make the choice to have kids, you are giving that all up. You are sacrificing your life for the better of your child's life.
I confess I am terrified of the whole giving birth part of having a kid. I've had nightmares that I'd be the one soul that would die from giving birth to a child. Seriously. I think about these things. I know, not the happy part of mommy hood right? I have a ZERO pain tolerance and fear I just won't be able to handle the pain of all that one feels when birthing a child. And there's the whole gaining weight and then the thought of not being able to lose it, I fear I will lose my mind!
I have always been the babysitter that lies awake next to the child that is sleeping that isn't my own, fearful that the kid will stop breathing. The beauty of babysitting, is that the job is eventually over in a few hours and I get to go home at the end of the night and let the parents do the worrying about whether or not their kid is breathing.
People always tell me, "You'll make a great mom". Heck even my own boss at school says this to me. I can't help but think yeah right! Will I really? How do you know?
Not to mention that we are still paying off our wedding which we paid for on our own, and thus holiday X mas bills. I know they say you'll never have enough money saved, but I have to believe part of being a responsible parent is having SOMETHING saved! Not living paycheck to paycheck!
Hubs and I do want to have kids. I know eventually I'll get over my fears and suck it up, but for now, we are okay with just us party of 2 (plus Aspen)
Anyone else share these future unborn children fears of mine?
