The Baby Question

There was a time when I wanted to be a parent one day. And then I hit puberty. Mom was a full-time nursing student at that point.When she wasn't in class (an at least two-hour round-trip drive several days a week) or studying, she was cooking, cleaning, helping us with homework or doing church work. She had very little time to call her own. I deeply appreciated what she did for us but I soon began to realize that I didn't want that life for myself.

It wasn't something I publicly admitted for many years. Growing up as a PK in a small town made it  challenging to find non-traditional role models. Nearly all of the women I knew were married. I can think of only a handful who didn't have children. Of those, only one publicly embraced a childless marriage (and her decision was at least partially influenced by chronic health issues.)

As a teenager I was determined to put off motherhood as long as possible. It hadn't yet quite occurred to me that I could choose to be permanently childless without making God incredibly angry. By virtue of being born with ovaries and a uterus I was suppose to want children. It was written into my identity as a woman, as much a part of my future life as breathing or sleeping or eating. The implication that hung heavy in the air, though it was never spoken aloud in my presence, was that had God wanted me to aspire to something else he would have made me male instead.

But by the time I was a legal adult it had quickly become clear that gender and the desire to reproduce are two completely different things. Barring social pressure to shave my legs and wear makeup and heels ( ;) ), I was wholly comfortable as a woman. Yet my desire to have children had become non-existent.

For a very long time, I assumed this meant I'd never get married. Too often, relationships lead to babies and I could scarcely imagine how to untangle one from the other in the community I called home at that point. My tentative plan was to move to a big city after college graduation- maybe one day I'd meet someone there who would agree to domesticity sans children? Soon after I was surprised by Drew, who had no interest in ever having children either.

We have been together almost six years now, married nearly five. If I was following the traditional life script we almost certainly would have produced at least one child in the last half-decade. If my parents were still following the script, they almost certainly would have been profoundly, vocally unhappy with the purposeful lack of grandchildren from their only daughter. ;) Not only are we breaking the rules, we're grinding them up into little pieces, mixing in some coffee grounds, banana skins and worms and composting them with all of the other ideas that no longer make sense in our lives.

This isn't to say that I dislike children or that I don't think other people should have them. I love watching my brother and sister-in-law parent their son Aiden.  It just isn't something that I feel any urge to do.

Compromising to make someone else happy can work extremely well... if you're debating which restaurant to visit this time or which movie to watch first. But other people won't be the ones raising your children and all of the opinions or religious beliefs in the world can't soothe a crying baby or pay the electric bill. This is why no one should jump into marriage, parenthood or any other long-term investments of one's time and energy because God or your parents or the people in your community think you should be doing these things. Commit to a lifelong relationship with your significant others or stay permanently single. Have twenty children or none at all.  Just don't make these choices for any reason other than out of a genuine desire to experience those life events.