An Unrelenting Case of Baby Fever

*Disclaimer*
This post is all about babies, how bad I want one, and my jealousy of people who have or are about to have one. If you are one of those people, please don't be offended--I love you and your babies.

I've always been a good babysitter. Folks from church trusted me with their children from the time I was 12 onward. Caring for kiddos came fairly naturally to me, I consider myself a very nurturing person, I'm fantastic in an emergency, and kids just generally like me. So I babysat.

Right around the time I turned 18, something changed. It literally felt like some sort of biological clock inside me switched on and started ticking. It was the mommy clock. To be honest, I don't know what caused it. My best guess is that it had something to do with being in a relationship with the man I knew I was going to marry. Who really knows? Anyways, the point is, my mommy clock has been ticking for five years now, non-stop. Obviously having a baby right then and there was not in my plan (I'm one of those people, I always like to have a plan). So I continued on with my plan, I went to school, got my degree, set out to save the planet, got a dog, got married, etc.

Having a baby is in my plan; heck, having three babies is in my plan! But other parts of my plan need to happen first. Before we have a baby, one of us (ahem, Ricky) needs to have a full-time, seemingly secure career. If I got pregnant right now it would be bad news. We'd probably have to move back in with one of my parents because we're poor grad students. We certainly don't have the money that we would need to support another human because we barely have the money to support ourselves.

The second thing that needs to happen is home ownership. I really want to be in a house with a yard that we don't have to share with anyone. I want to paint the walls whatever color I want and not have to worry about disturbing anyone else with my barking canine. I know that people have babies all the time in tiny little apartments and other rented spaces. Hoorah for you! That's just not what I want to do. I know for a fact (and those of you that have visited our apartment will agree with me) that I am going to be way into nesting when I'm pregnant. The thought of preparing a space for my small human and then having to leave and redo it 6 months later makes me shudder. I know that some of you that are reading this are doing exactly that and I think that you are strong and brave, or maybe what matters to me doesn't matter to you. But, like I just said, it matters to me. And, to link the aforementioned criteria with this one, I would really love to have the money to be in a comfortable space and buy cute baby things and organic toys and stuff.

The third thing that needs to happen is travel. I will not compromise on this. I believe very strongly in the importance of having experiences and making memories with your spouse (lots of them) that don't involve children. I think that the best husband-wife teams really put in the time with one another to establish a healthy and strong family with just the two of them before bringing in an unknown (what your baby will be like really is an unknown). So Ricky and I are constantly reminding ourselves to cherish this time that we have just us--even though it sometimes sucks being students, working crappy jobs, and being dirt poor. I know we will look back on this time with some fondness, and I really know that it has forced us to really work together and trust one another. However, we want some awesome fun memories all to ourselves as well, which is why we want to do some traveling before making baby Holton. So, this December we are going to Hawaii. Next year, if all goes according to plan (there's that plan again) Ricky will have a career and be making the big bucks. After a couple of substantial payments on our student loans, we want to take a trip to the other side of the world. We want to fly to Paris, hang about for a bit, train to Italy for a while, and then fly to India for the last leg of our journey. I am so jazzed about this idea I can hardly wait, but it's obviously a journey we wouldn't want to make with an infant or toddler, or even kindergartener.

So that's my plan. If all goes according to plan we could start trying to create a wee small bundle by next Christmasish time. The thing that makes it very difficult to stick to my plan, that makes me bitter and weepy, is all of you people with your babies and your pregnancies, which lead to more babies.

Now, I'm not trying to be insensitive. Some of you have had far more than your fair share of trouble trying to concieve and get a baby actually here. I hope and pray all of the time that that doesn't happen to us. Some of you may be thinking that I am only 23 and I have lots of time, and you might be much older and still not have a baby either. Well, to that I say that I am grateful not to be the only one in the childless club, and that everyone has their own plan. Some of my friends my age quit school and had a baby shortly after marriage. Some of them are just as poor as us and still making it work. Some of my friends are older and more ambitious than I am, they are getting PhDs and are already world travellers. To all of these friends, you are great and I admire you for choosing the path that you did and for doing what feels right for you. But, I know some of you know how this feels, it feels like nearly everyone I know is pregnant or just had a baby. I personally know four people who had a baby this past month and I know three more that are pregnant. I am so jealous.

I know that, if I really wanted to, I could throw my plan out the window and have a baby right now, but I can't. Or won't. It's just that that internal ticking is starting to get really fed up with my plan. It's just a big mess of feelings that I'm trying to deal with. I feel like I'm even being a lame friend because I haven't been as congratualtory as I should be to my friends who have had babies or who have announced pregnancies. I'm sorry for that, I really am just jealous and feeling sorry for myself.

So there's that. I want a baby but I want everything a certain way. I know that starting a family is messy and things generally don't go as planned, but can you really blame me for at least trying to make things perfect (in my eyes)? So I'll wait, but I'm not super happy about it.