When my husband and I decided to have a baby we weighed a lot of pros and cons and had to really evaluate the decision carefully. We weren't sure for the first 5 years of our marriage if we wanted to have children.
My husband has a child from a previous relationship who is 10 and is just wonderful. My husband went through an emotional ringer with becoming a "non-custodial" dad. That was the main reason for his hesitation in the decision. Not that he necessarily thought that we were going to split up any time down the line, but just because the heartache he suffered and still does from having his son ripped from his arms was too much to bear and he knew he could never go through that again.
There were financial reasons at first and the fact that we didn't have a very big house at the time. Those were easy cop-outs. I personally didn't know if I was the right type of person to be a mother. I actually thought that I was a bit too selfish. My husband and I enjoyed being able to come and go as we pleased and at the drop of a hat some weekend go out to breakfast at 3 AM, because we could! Still I knew that we would have to make the decision for the right reasons and not because it wasn't convenient.
After our 5th year of marriage we got to a point where we lived in a big enough house and both made decent enough money and were well into our early 30's, etc.. We needed to make the decision once and for all. I do have to admit that there was never a question in my mind that I wanted a child "someday". But "someday" was going to have to be soon. My husband and I sat down and discussed how we both felt about children. Well, we both love them of course. I come from a huge family with oodles and oodles of nieces and nephews and my husband being a dad already loved being a dad. That was a no brainer. We discussed circumcision in the event that we have any boys. That was a tough debate that actually lasted months, because frankly, there is really no compromise. It's either do or don't do. After reading up on much literature about it and getting the opinions of several medical professionals we came to the conclusion that we weren't going to circumcise any boys that we might have.
Then there was the day care issue. I personally would prefer to stay home and not send my child to some stranger. After we crunched numbers and went through every possible scenario, the bottom line was I was working, like it or lump it. I did find a girlfriend who worked in day care for a number of years and is a stay at home mom who was willing to take on the task! At a decent rate as well. So, we checked that off of our list of dilemmas.
There were other little insignificant odds and ends we had to talk about and decide and those weren't as impossible to figure out as we thought.
The time had come and we made our decision to have a baby. And wouldn't you know it the first time "at bat" HOME RUN!!! I have never been so excited to see a pink line in my life. But then suddenly... It was all real! It was all finally happening. By this time we were into the 5 1/2 year mark in our marriage and by the 6th year, we were going to be new parents!
Ok...now I should probably get to the actual point of my story. I have had such a wonderful pregnancy and enjoyed being pregnant so much that I would write volumes about it, but I won't. At least not in this essay. The point is, I have learned so much in these last 8 months that I can't imagine how I could have lived this long without this wonderful little person inside me. My husband has been unbelievably supportive and helpful and just willing to do ANYTHING! I am truly blessed with a wonderful man. I am so excited about raising a child with my husband. It breaks his heart every time his son, Alex has to go back to Rhode Island at the end of the summer or at the end of a holiday and it kills me to watch him go through that. I hate to see Alex go too, but never truly understood just what he goes through until I got pregnant.
I would literally do ANYTHING and EVERYTHING for this child I have inside of me. I would climb Mt. Everest if it meant keeping him from harm. I never knew that I was capable of feeling that way about another human being, other than my husband of course. :)
Being pregnant has taught me so much, yet I still have so much to learn. I mean in 2 short months(or less) I am going to have this little person who depends entirely on the two of us for everything. How incredible is that? I hope I'm not getting too many of you rolling your eyes out there. Remember, this is all new for me.
Well I really appreciate anyone who took the time to read my essay. It was just a jumble of the emotions that I'm feeling right now. You see, I just came back from my 2nd ultrasound a few hours ago and still can't believe that something as miraculous as my son, Austin Richard is living inside of me. I am so elated and just high on love that I had to tell someone about it. My edd is 4/2/04. I just hope I'm ready! I have a feeling I'll be ok. Though I am scared. Any advice would be much appreciated.
Thanks again for reading! God has truly blessed us!
