Dear Sugar,
I am a woman in my late thirties and still single. I never imagined this would be me at this age. I’ve had several relationships where I thought I had found “the one,” only to have the rug pulled out from under me.
The most devastating of these ended about five years ago, at the age when most of my friends were getting married or having babies. My boyfriend of three years, with whom I lived, was divorced with a child, and decided abruptly to go back to his ex-wife just as we were looking to buy a house. This was after he had spent a fair amount of time in therapy at the beginning of our relationship to reach the conclusion that he was certain he wanted to build a life with me and have children with me, something that allowed me to take the plunge, as I really wanted to have a child. What a fool I was. When he left me, he assured me that it was only for his existing child, who was struggling, and that I was still his true love and he knew that once she was off to college, he would come back and we’d live happily ever after. She was 8. Apparently I was supposed to wait 10 years, getting old while he finished up his old life.
I spent a couple of years wrecked and jaded over that relationship. I pulled myself together as best I could, though, and dated a few people casually. Last year, I met someone I connected with. Unfortunately, he was even more jaded than I, and he didn’t want to take a leap of faith with me. We split up a couple of months ago.
So now, I find myself in my late 30’s, watching the end of my fertility looming, feeling rather cynical and weary and not sure my heart can take another blow. I always wanted to experience pregnancy and birth. I’m now considering becoming a single mom. I’m not even sure I know how to go about that, but I am very aware that time is running out, and even though I would prefer to raise a child with a partner, I don’t have much faith in that happening anymore. Even if I met someone now, he’d pretty much have to want to have a baby right away, and that’s not likely. Yet, I am struggling with definitively letting go of the idea that I will find love and have a baby with a partner. I’m paralyzed. It’s hard to let that dream go and admit that that ship has sailed. If I take this step, I am deciding definitively that I will not get married and have a child like I watched most of my friends do. (Did I mention the burning jealousy every time I see their happy family pictures on Facebook, the photos from the hospital where Mommy smiles with baby on chest, the congratulations I write, accompanied by a feeling like I’ve been sucker punched?)
How can I move forward and let go of that dream? Should I start calling sperm banks? I just can’t believe that this is how my story ends.
Signed,
M
Dear M,
I’m of the opinion that there are some things one should never advise another to do: marry someone in particular, not marry someone in particular, pierce one’s clitoris or cock, oil one’s body and run around naked at a party wearing a homemade Alice B. Toklas mask, and have a baby.
And yet, I cannot help but say that it seems apparent to me that you should seriously consider having a baby, sweet pea. Not because I want you to, but because you want to.
Oh, the dream. The god damned man + baby dream. Written by the High Commission on Heterosexual Love and Sexual Reproduction and practiced by couples across the land, the dream’s a bitch if you’re a maternally-inclined straight female and not living it by the age of 37.1; a situation of a spermicidally toxic flavor. Of course you want to bring out your six-shooter every time you see another bloated mom hoisting up another squinty-eyed spawn on Facebook. You want the dream too! The man. The baby. The whole god-damned shebang.
But, M, you didn’t get it. Not yet. Not quite ever, perhaps. That doesn’t mean all is lost. This is not “how your story ends.” It’s simply where it takes a turn you didn’t expect.
I don’t mean to downplay your sorrow. Your disappointment is justified; your paralysis understandable; your conundrum real. But please remember that the dream you have of finding a long-term romantic partner and having a baby is not just one dream. It’s two. The man dream and the baby dream are so intricately woven that you can be forgiven for thinking they’re one. It’s lovely if it is rolled up into one. It’s more than lovely. It’s convenient. It’s conventional. It’s economically advantageous. It’s hella good when it’s good.
But it isn’t what you have. So let’s see what you’ve got.
You have the strong desire to be a mother by biological means coupled with a deep regret that you don’t currently have a partner with whom to reproduce. The only thing you need to make a biological baby of your own is sperm and luck. Getting sperm does not mean that you are “deciding definitively” that you “will not get married and have a child.” Life is long, darling. Who knows what’s going to happen? You could meet your Big Love tomorrow. You could meet him in ten years. You could have a baby on your own now and another with him when you’re 42. You don’t know. The question about who you will love and when you will love him is out of your hands. It’s a mystery that you can’t solve.
There is, however, no mystery about sperm. There are vials to be had at banks for purchase. There are possibly friends or acquaintances willing to give you some for free. The time to answer your question about whether you want to try to conceive a baby on your own is upon you. The window of your reproductive viability will soon close. I agree with you that you’ve reached the point that it’s reasonable to assume that your choice is between having a baby without a partner or having no biological baby at all. Which scenario makes you sadder? Which are you going to be happy you did when you’re fifty? It’s time to do the emotional and practical work you need to do so you can make a decision. The organization Single Mothers By Choice is an excellent place to start.
I can’t tell you what to do. No one can. But as the mother of two children, I can tell you what most moms will: that mothering is absurdly hard and profoundly sweet. Like the best thing you ever did. Like if you think you want to have a baby, you probably should.
I say this in spite of the fact that children are giant endless suck machines. They don’t give a whit if you need to sleep or eat or pee or get your work done or go out to a party naked and oiled up in a homemade Alice B. Toklas mask. They take everything. They will bring you the furthest edge of your personality and abso-fucking-lutely to your knees.
They will also give you everything back. Not just all they take, but many of the things you lost before they came along as well.
I don’t know anyone who regrets having a baby and I know a lot of moms. They each have a different story, though we tend to group them up. We like to think that partnered moms have it good and single moms have it rough, but the truth is that we’re a diverse bunch. Some single mothers have lots of child-free time because their kids are regularly in the custody of their fathers. Some seldom get a break. Some partnered mothers split childcare duties with their spouses in egalitarian ways; others might as well be alone. Some mothers of both varieties have parents, siblings and friends who play active roles in their children’s lives in ways that significantly lighten the load. Others have to pay for every hour another person looks after their kids. Some mothers, single or partnered, can’t afford to pay anyone for anything. Some can and do. Others can and won’t. Some are aided financially by parents, or trust funds, or inheritances; others are entirely on their own. The reality is that, regardless of the circumstances, most moms are alternately blissed out by their love for their children and utterly overwhelmed by the spectacular amount of sacrifice they require.
What you must answer when you delve into this question about whether to have a baby alone, honey bun, is what the landscape will look like for you. Not what it looks like for “single mothers by choice,” but how it will actually play out in your own life. How will you need to restructure or reconsider your life if you become a mother? What resources do you have, what resources will you need, and how will you get them?
Knowing what I know about having babies, three of the four big questions I’d have if I were considering parenting a child without a partner are surprisingly the same questions I asked myself when I—with my partner—pondered having a baby. They were:
- How the hell am I going to pay for this?
- Who the hell is going to take care of the baby so I can work?
- Will I ever have sex again?
So let’s start with those.
You don’t mention financial matters in your letter, but I presume you have to earn a living. Kids cost a fortune, especially if you have to pay someone to take care of them so you can work. My kids are now 4 and 6. Preschool tuition over the past few years has nearly bankrupted me. Literally. When my kids were babies my husband and I hired a part-time nanny and juggled childcare between us the rest of the time—we both make our living as artists, so neither one of us has what’s called a “real job.” The nanny cost us $15 an hour. We hired her for twenty hours a week. When the nanny came, my husband and I would go into our shared office in the basement and ignore each other so we could each do our thing (at which point our children would invariably settle down for a long nap, strangely able to discern when we were paying someone else to look after them). Talk about writing like a motherfucker! I didn’t just write like a motherfucker in those days, sister. I wrote like a god damned fucking motherfucker. Every hour that passed I’d think, “Did I make fifteen dollars? Did I even make seven fifty?”
Often enough, the answer was no.
Which is a long way of saying that questions number one and number two are inextricably bound. More so than the man + baby High Commission on Heterosexual Love and Sexual Reproduction dream. Especially for you, since you’ll be the sole breadwinner.
Many partners are great for watching the baby while you work or shower or make phone calls that go better if a small beast is not shrieking in the background. You won’t have one—the partner, that is. You’ll have only the small shrieking beast. What will you do? Do you have any support in the way of free childcare? Do not believe all the sweet friends who say, “Oh, M! Have a baby! I’ll totally help you with the baby! I’ll be, like, the baby’s auntie!” Those people have good intentions, but most of them are bon vivants who will not take your baby. Or they might take your baby once when it’s spring and they get the urge to go to the zoo because they want to see the elephants. You need someone to take your baby every Monday and Wednesday and Friday from nine to three. One thing I’ve learned since becoming a mother is that most adults aren’t willing to spend much time with other people’s children unless there is some direct benefit to them—namely, money or the promise that you will someday return the favor and take their children.
There are, of course, exceptions. Some grandparents long to play a significant part in the lives of their grandchildren. Do you have an essentially sane, remotely physically fit, non-daytime drinking, baby-loving parent or two who lives nearby? A sibling or friend who genuinely wants to commit to pitching in? If you don’t have that sort of support, what will you do for childcare and how will you structure it and how will you pay for it?
Next we come to the question of whether your post-child life will be a dreary, sexless hell.
There will probably not be too much action for a while. But worry not: this has little to do with your partner-less status. My husband and I joke that the only reason we opted to have our second child was so we’d have sex at least one more time before we died. You’ll be exhausted, hormonally-altered, and perhaps vaginally or abdominally maimed by the baby, and thus not thinking about sex for a while, but eventually you’ll come around and be interested in dating men again. Some won’t be interested in dating you because you have a baby. Others will be fine with the baby and you’ll date them and maybe one of them will turn out to be “the one.”
Regardless of what happens with the men, you’ll have a baby. An amazing little being who will blow your mind and expand your heart and make you think things you never thought and remember things you believed you forgot and heal things you imagined would never heal and forgive people you’ve begrudged for too long and understand things you didn’t understand before you fell madly in love with a tiny tyrant who doesn’t give a crap whether you need to pee. You will sing again if you stopped singing. You will dance again if you stopped dancing. You will crawl around on the floor and play chase and tickle and peek-a-boo. You’ll make towers of teetering blocks and snakes and rabbits with clay.
It’s an altogether cool thing.
And it will be lonely too, doing all that without a partner. How lonely, I can’t say. You will hold your baby and cry sometimes in frustration, in rage, in despair, in exhaustion and inexplicable sorrow. You will watch your baby with joy and laugh at the wonder so pure and the beauty so unconcealed that it will make you ache. These are the times when it’s really nice to have a partner, M. What will you do? How will you fill the place where the man you’ve been holding out for would have been?
That is your hard question for me; the one I didn’t ask myself when I decided to get pregnant and become a mother, though of course it was naïve for me to think I didn’t have to. Not a single one of us knows what the future holds. The unexpected happens even when we’ve got everything mapped out. My friend A lost her husband in a car crash four days before her daughter was born. My friend B’s husband died of cancer when their son wasn’t yet two. My friend C’s husband left her for another woman when their baby was six weeks old. My friend D’s partner decided he wasn’t all that into being a dad a few months after his child was born, moved across the country, and sees her once a year. I could go on. I could work my way all the way down the alphabet. Even if you get the dream, you don’t know if it will stay true.
It works in reverse too. What you fear might not come to pass, sweet pea. You might decide to have your baby and find true love in the midst of that. You might search your soul and realize that you don’t want a baby after all, not if it means going it without a man.
What’s important is that you make the leap. Jump high and hard with intention and heart. Pay no mind to the vision that the commission made up. It’s up to you to make your life. Take what you have and stack it up like a tower of teetering blocks. Build your dream around that.
Yours,
Sugar
30 responses
I’m in a somewhat similar boat, but have planned for a year or two now to become a “single mother by choice.” I cannot recommend their book highly enough- it covers most of the what-ifs, and how-will-I’s that I had without even knowing it.
I’ve had a few friends and mentors who made the leap partner-less and I can say that none of them regret having a child. They are tired, and busy, and have a lot more to do than they ever knew they could. And the same is true of the mothers I know with partners. Babies are like that, it seems.
Another factor I’m finding that I have to consider is how much I am willing to spend to “make” a baby. Unknown donors are cheaper than known donors; Ivy League costs more than GED; IVF if you have trouble conceiving is another cost. Do you and your insurance company have the resources saved to make this happen? Most clinics have financial counselors, but it’s something to consider before you you’re neck-deep and selling your car for one more batch of sperm.
Thanks for taking this one on Sugar. It’s timely for me.
I absolutely loved this answer — not only for the writer of the original question, but also because it so intelligently addresses the questions everyone should ask themselves before deciding to have a child. Much though we might like to believe that love conquers all in child-rearing as well as in marriage, it really doesn’t conquer some of the hard stuff in either scenario — and one of the things it doesn’t even begin to address is access to resources … financial, emotional, psychological.
Lack of a husband shouldn’t be an impediment to having or raising a child. Adoption is always a possibility as well. It’s certainly possible to have strong male role models for a child without being married to the role model. Uncles, cousins, friends — loving people in a child’s life can sometimes be far better role models than a disinterested or uncommitted father.
I have a client who decided to have a child by herself in her late 30s, and who never regretted it. She had a sister who was also very involved in the child’s life, and a lot of emotional support from family. She also had a great job with a boss full of respect and affection, who gave her some useful understanding as far as time and days off and whatnot. And I had a cousin who married the wrong guy in her late 30s in order to have children within the illusion of a nuclear family … and regretted it — not the children, but the choice to try to co-parent with someone she was settling for out of biological desperation.
Effen A Sug…you are brilliant.
Very sound advice, Sugar.
M, best of luck to you, sweet pea! I hope you find your answers.
Love this.
As someone without a child, I have to say this post contains some of the scariest and most wonderful things for me to think about.
I’m always a little leery when I read variations on the “I know a jillion Moms and none of them regret having their kids!” statement. Consider, for a moment, a woman who had a kid and regretted it. Would she admit it? To anyone? My guess is no. Our culture can barely handle the idea that some women might not want kids at all, let alone that some women with kids might wish they didn’t have them. Let us not forget the results of Nebraska failing to define a maximum age for their safe haven law.
My motto has always been that I would rather regret NOT having a child than regret having one. At least this way, I am the only one who (potentially) suffers.
Obviously this is different for everyone and M has to make her own decision, but let’s not pretend that NOBODY regrets having children. The plural of “anecdote” is not “data.”
My best friend chose to not have children for reasons that are deep rooted and emotional. I have 3 children for reasons that are deep rooted and emotional. She and I have very different lives but we both have lives we love — without regrets.
Thank you as always Sugar. I’ll miss you while you’re away but will cheer on your writing success!
Sugar, I read this week’s letter curious beyond what even I think was reasonable at what your answer could possibly be. And then … oh, you so nailed it. Life is long. Even the love you’ve got could be unreliable or about to die. Think about what you want and then, yes, if you have a first child, do try to stay alive long enough to have sex again. Because if you are lucky enough to get pregnant again, that second child will give you perspective on your first. And you’ll need it.
my girls are now 23 and 18. i wouldn’t wish single parenthood on anyone. those who do it by choice have really admirable constitutions – i would be lost without a partner to pick up the slack, share the financial burden, discuss problems, laugh over recognizing traits in our kids, etc. also, i grew up without a dad and it completely sucked. it still strangles me sometimes. it’s completely “normal” to want to reproduce. and most of us just pick a time and go for it. you will never be completely ready emotionally or financially. hopefully you won’t get a screamer.
Wow, this is only the second column I have read of yours and I freakin’ love your answers! I am a movie lover, and love to watch movies that “relate” to any experience I have had. Some fun movies that M should watch are The Backup Plan, The Switch, and Baby Mama. All comedies that are about single mothers by choice.
Oh, Sugar, this is so beautiful and heartmelting that it almost makes me want to have a baby. Almost. Actually, still no. But it does make me more likely to cast aside my bon vivance (vivant-ism? leeway, please, it’s 6 am) and offer babysitting services to my friends. Mostly for the selfish purposes of glimpsing that pure wonder and unconcealed beauty. And, really, who doesn’t love the elephants?
Here’s my anecdotal data: My mother had her own host of issues before I was born, but it turned out she didn’t really want a baby, she wanted a man. That was the more important part of the equation for her. She didn’t have a problem telling people that it was one of her bigger mistakes, which…I probably don’t need to tell you it took a lot of fucking therapy to get me past that little speedbump. I have a friend with a now 8-year-old son who watched her closest friends fall away when the real work started. Like the earlier commenter said, I think she’d be hard pressed to admit it, possibly even to herself, but her life is one long fucking uphill slog and she looks like vampires are sucking the life from her on a daily basis. In counterpoint, I have another friend who has an 8-month old, oops, the indigent babydaddy forgot to mention that he never actually did kick that pesky heroin habit, so no help there. She’s broke, the pregnancy and recovery were difficult and…she’s never been happier. There is much to consider and, Sugar, the way you’ve addressed the issues with humor and grit and love is the best gift you could ever give to M to take on her journey. You consistently fucking rock.
This column absolutely gobsmacked me. I shared it with a number of friends and mentioned that “whoever Sugar is, I am completely blown away by her level-headedness, her humer, and her generous spirit.” I adore Dear Sugar and this particular column really resonated for me. I am in a similar position to the LW, though I have considered the questions you suggest and am 99% positive that, much as I want a child, I do not want to set out on that journey without a partner. That’s not written in stone, of course, but at the moment I am in the process of learning to live with that decision, and your answer means a lot to me where I am right now. Thanks.
Very good advice today. Just wanted to say that. I tend to think that women in this situation should just go for it on their own if they will regret it forever if they didn’t.
I wish people would address the effects of when “babies” grow up, past the stage of ten and under when they’re MUCH easier to deal with. Why not address what this woman will do when her kids are teenagers and maybe hate her guts, want to drink and have sex, and all of the other issues that arise with “growing up”. I’m not a mom, and I’m not sure I want to be one…but I’ve heard from COUNTLESS mothers that the teen years are the absolute hardest. They may be difficult to tackle on your own especially. It’s just just a “baby” you’re having, it’s a whole other person who will someday have their own family and lives and problems. Please, people, consider that. Maybe it’s just because Sugar’s kids are still so young, but the teenager aspect needed to be addressed in this answer.
*it’s NOT just a baby. Sorry about the typo.
This is extraordinary writing. It is empathic and well reasoned, and engaging even for someone like me who is at a life stage slightly beyond this particular important decision. It is also a reminder to me that I want to write about this myself.
And, Sugar, if there were ever occasions when your writing didn’t provide you with half a nanny’s hourly wage, please take comfort in this: the universe owes you.
What about the kid? What about knowingly bringing another person into this world that will never have a father? Sure there will be ‘role model’s’ and such, but no biological father other than a test tube.
Just cause you want to procreate doesn’t mean you get to procreate.
‘ve known plenty of women that regretted having kids. It’s not always a ‘fairy tale’ ending altho society would have you think so.
Good insight, shells. The one person I know who regularly says, I regret having kids, is currently navigating one child’s difficult teenage years. I am certain that she loves her kids – but she’s also incredibly frustrated, angry, and sometimes heartbroken.
If you become a mom, you’re in it for life, or should be. Mom of a baby, a teenager, a young adult, and like shells said, a whole other person with their own journey. I think having kids ties you to your family, or to being family, and not having kids means that you are, as you get older, having to consciously both choose and create family over and over again in a very explicit way- especially if single.
It’s going to sound selfish, but I take my aunting very seriously in some small part because I want my nephews and nieces to feel some obligation when I get old. Having a child is participating in the societal life cycle, claiming a role and a place, in a particular way.
Big fan of being an auntie, by the way. I like that this conversation might inspire the childless to step up to the plate, take on a babysitting gig or two. Having amazing aunts and uncles made a huge difference in my life; taking on that role for my goddaughters, nephews, and niece has been satisfying, and challenging as they get older. It really does take a village, and there’s room for all of us, and need for all of us.
Just cause you want to procreate doesn’t mean you get to procreate.
Actually, in our society, the desire to procreate is pretty much all you need, assuming that there are no insurmountable medical obstacles in the way. Or are you suggesting that certain members of our society shouldn’t be allowed to procreate? Because if that’s what you’re saying, then who gets to choose? Who do you trust to make that kind of call?
“What’s important is that you make the leap. Jump high and hard with intention and heart. Pay no mind to the vision that the commission made up. It’s up to you to make your life. Take what you have and stack it up like a tower of teetering blocks. Build your dream around that.”
Such true words! And not just about having a baby, either.
What about knowingly bringing another person into this world that will never have a father?
I honestly don’t see why this is a problem; I’m struggling to grasp it. I don’t know why this is much different from a single woman adopting a child from, say, China, who will never know either of its biological parents. Granted, I am also coming at this from the perspective of someone who was raised with two parents and wish I hadn’t been; I’d have preferred to be raised only by my mother. But I don’t know why it would be a disservice to a child to bring it into the world without an immediately present biological father.
I also know plenty of women who have regretted having children, and who were unrealistic about the fact that it’s a lifelong commitment to honor and bring out the best in a total stranger. Scary thought, that one.
There’s a lot here that’s beautiful and brilliant (as always). But there’s another side of the story, isn’t there? The, um, BABY, and their life, their wants, lacks, needs.
I must agree with “Slightly Cranky.” To say no one regrets having a child is a lovely idea, but not at all a reality.
Not. At. All.
I work with the offspring of these regret-filled parents, parents who aren’t always easily identified because they come wielding a belt or a fist or a sharp tongue. They’re also the ones cloaked in exhaustion and overdrawn bank accounts and most of all in a noxious cloud of unmet expectations (“What do you mean this baby that came out of MY ACTUAL WOMB hasn’t filled the man-shaped/woman-shaped/love-shaped void in my life? Hey you! Baby! You owe me! I was promised!”) Disappointment leaves a mark.
You see, it’s not all about you.
“Just going for it” or “making the leap” just because you want to, you really really want to…is well..selfish. And making it sooner, rather than later, just because you’re afraid your eggs will wither and leave you without the option is the worst kind of bet hedging. Would you settle for a man, ANY man, just because you were afraid another might not come along? (sure people DO this, but that doesn’t make it a good idea).
I’m not saying DON’T, anymore than I think Sugar is saying DO, but please: Don’t go making such a colossal life-altering choice out of fear or lack. You just broke up a couple of months ago. It’s not that good things can’t come from profoundly misguided choices, but do you really wanna spin that roulette wheel? Heal your heart and head first.
Make the decision to have a child when you feel you have so much (EVERYthing, in fact) to give, not because you have so much that you want or need.
It is perfectly legitimate for a woman to choose to have a child and raise it on their own — but babies are not consolation prizes for a life that didn’t turn out how we’d hoped.
Sperm isn’t a magic potion after all. It won’t inoculate you from your pain. It won’t cure you of your sadness, even if it grows a baby. That baby needs you to feel whole — to BE whole — all on your own, before you bring it into the world.
First, do whatever it takes, for however LONG it takes, to restore you shattered faith M. You’ll need it if you’re going to take that biggest of all leaps: motherhood.
Sugar is taking two weeks off to just give advice to me.
I took, “Just because you want to procreate doesn’t mean you get to procreate” to be a counter to the idea that everyone is entitled to have a baby, and that it is an unreasonable unfairness that must be overcome and not accepted if you are medically unable or if circumstances would make it very difficult emotionally, financially, etc. I think it is in keeping with Sugar’s and other folk’s reality checks.
I agree with Brian (at least what I think he’s saying) that no one gets to make that choice for you, and that we should remember that heinous past laws and practices that have attempted to make that choice for certain parts of the population.
But I do think that we (“Americans” broadly) are sometimes encouraged culturally to claim (among other, contradictory things we are encouraged to claim) our “right” to everything we want, even in the face of real, substantial barriers that should be considered for their real effect. I read that comment as voicing the perspective that we may not get everything we want, and that too might be okay. That it is a positive option to accept some limits and go on shaping your life within them.
Tricky? Difficult? Yes. But “accept no barriers” path is tricky too.
“em” should start his/her own advice column. what you said, em, is a perfect response to sugar’s column and to M’s problem. really, really good reply. thanks for posting it.
I’m a single mom because I chose a partner foolishly in my late thirties, desperately afraid I’d miss the chance to have kids. I don’t regret it, but I think that if I didn’t have an ex who does a fair amount of parenting I probably would. I’m not proud of that, but I have to work a lot and during the months when I’ve had no help taking care of my kids outside of my work hours I’ve been, in all honesty, a lousy parent. It’s just too hard. I have no qualms about saying that no matter how sad it might be to miss out on raising a child, unless you have resources that will allow you to work less than full time or pay for childcare beyond your workday so you can have a little free time, just don’t do it.
I also agree with the commenter who pointed out that as kids get older they stop giving you unconditional love, and, let’s face it, that’s part of what makes it wonderful when you have little ones (even when the love is punctuated by tantrums). My kids are still nice to me, but I know they’ll get more moody and self-absorbed as they grow up, and I think it’s hard to lose the feeling of being adored by your kids no matter how tired and overwhelmed and cranky you are. Which is how I feel a lot of the time.
Tomorrow cannot come soon enough!! I’m addicted, Sugar!
I am a child of older parents.
My mother lived in Israel in the seventies and eighties, where she fell madly in love and became engaged to a brilliant man who would die of shrapnel poisoning. She would return to the States older and sadder and lonelier, and would put an advertisement in a newspaper. A quiet and dorky man would respond and they would marry at age 42. Then they would start a life together and have my sister and I, myself being born last, when my mother was 46.
They are very much in love and we are the luckiest daughters to have been their children. We are smart, successful, charismatic people who are much better rounded than many children our age. I’ve always thought my parents’ advanced age and experience had something to do with that.
Maybe this is something to think about, M (I am also an M). They waited and then found one another and started an interesting journey.
Some things about our family: on my father’s birthday, we sang madrigal rounds by the piano. We vacation on a beach in the dead of winter. My mother yells and screeches and my father calms her down with a silly pun in less than a second.
Some things are worth the wait.
I think that the meaning of the statement about how no one regrets having a baby is very true, for those who want babies. Although my marriage ended while my 2nd son was still a baby, and though I had my babies at a young age (started at 20, due to medical advice), and though I have had some really hard times, I never, ever regretted my children. I have actually considered having a 3rd, on my own. I have always wanted a little girl, and if I could just get my act together, I could easily “afford” another child on my own. (I need to handle money better) I started considering this about 3 years ago, and shortly after that, my health took a turn for the worse. I’m not sure now whether I’ll ever go through with it, I suppose it depends on whether they can figure out what’s causing my health problems. I’m only 35, so I probably have time left, and I won’t hurry toward the decision. But, reading through the comments made me want to scream at a few people. My boys were terrors as toddlers – I still wonder how we made it through the neverending 2 – 4 year old stages (which lasted SO long, they are less than 2 years apart) without one of us being institutionalized. Now that they are becoming teens, I have to say, I love it. No, I don’t get that same type of love as they gave as babies and toddlers, but this is even better. I get not only love, but respect, and thanks for what I do for them, and so many other things. Teenagers, even the hormone-riddled, girl-crazy 14 year olds, are not automatic disrespectful rebels. I raised my boys to make their own decisions, and to deal with the results of those decisions. And they’re doing a damn fine job of it, so far. I’m proud of both their accomplishments, and their mistakes, and their attitude. Don’t let anyone tell you teens have to be impossibly hard, or aren’t worth it. I adore my teen, and tween, enough to want a 3rd, even on my own.
What if you have a special needs child? Do you have the strength, resources, and wherewithal to deal with it? What if your child develops a genetic disease — can you bear the idea that their disease could be a product of you and/or of the sperm donor? What if your child is in a horrible accident — can you carry the burden that you brought them into the world where they will live with pain?
I agree with the commenter who also addressed teenagers and adult children — they are a lot to handle. Can you deal with discipline? Drunk or high teens? Young adults who have school loans, broken dreams, who need to live with their parent/s until their 30s?
As an older mom, is it fair of you to inflict your old age on your adult child/ren, assuming if they live until 40, you will be 80. Perhaps you will still be magnificently healthy, but if not, could you spare them the burden of caring for you, or deal with the potential guilt you may feel if they spend their 20s, 30s, or 40s, caring for you if you are ailing?
Only when you know the answers to these dark and difficult — yet entirely real — questions, should you consider having a child both at your age and in your situation.
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