By: Brad Brundage – CC BY 2.0 My husband and I got married last month, but we have been living together for two years. We both have part-time jobs, we own our own coffee business, and we rent a nice apartment. I am 22, but I have always wanted kids. A lot of our friends and family tell us to wait a few years before we have kids. Wait til we have more money, wait til we have a house, etc. I see where they are coming from, but I also think we could manage having children now, too.
We have names picked out, I know I want a water birth with a midwife at our local birth center, I take prenatal vitamins, I have a multitude of friends wanting to give me their old baby clothes, and I’m almost sure that at least 75% of our medical bills would be covered.
People say that we should enjoy our time alone as a couple, and we do. But we both want children so much and wonder if maybe we would enjoy our lives more with children. I’m not sure if we should go ahead and try to conceive, or wait. I would like to have some opinions: when is too early to try to conceive? — Lauren
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Comments on Is it too soon to try to conceive?
As my father-in-law told me when my husband and I started trying to conceive: “If you ‘wait until…wait until…wait until…’to have children you’ll spend your whole life waiting until…” It took us a year to conceive, and a lot can happen in that amount of time. Ultimately, it’s a decision between you and your partner, and everyone else’s opinions are just that; their opinions. Good luck! 🙂
lol my husband and i were married jan 13, 2012 and by march 23, 2012 i was testing positive! we did the math… valentine’s day baby! lol and yes we were actively trying to conceive, though we thought it would take at least a year since i waited until after the honeymoon to stop birth control.
I really don’t get the whole “enjoy your freedom because you’ll never have it again” thing, honestly. I mean sure, for the first few months, you’ll spend a decent amount of time at home [and perhaps in a more difficult situation like mine was, in the NICU] but for the most part, as long as your baby is relatively healthy and able to go outside [i.e. no oxygen tanks like mine had for 4 months], there isn’t much that you actually can’t do. I’ve found personally, as a young parent who got pregnant at 20 and turned 21 at five months, that the only thing I might have done before that is more difficult to do now, is going to the bar/club and getting ‘crunk’. Can’t waste a morning with a nasty hangover these days, it doesn’t work and isn’t fair to anybody in the house… But I really don’t mind that in the slightest. I was in a committed relationship and I was working a full time job when I got pregnant, so it’s not as if I was responsibility-free even then. I wasn’t in the position to travel the world on my own or crash on couches and sleep in ’til noon anyway, because I was already caring for myself independently and planning to move in with my [now] husband. Like going to music festivals? You can still do that. Enjoy taking two hour long hikes? You can do that, too [we do it several times a week]. Wanna go on a roller coaster? Okay, you may need to wait a few months and find a sitter for that one, but hey, maybe bring your sister, cousin or just a friend you trust to sit out and take turns with you, and problem fixed! Yes, simple activities like going to the store on your own will take longer and sometimes be harder. Your kid might have a meltdown and get in the way of errands getting done quickly, and you will be dealing with a lot of poop. Just be ready for that, because it is absolutely inevitable… But I can tell you, as a person who was actually a little younger when we got pregnant and in a less stable situation as well, I feel more productive and better about myself and my contribution to society [and the world] every day as a parent. I don’t miss being able to run out and attend every party because once you have a kid, that sort of thing just seems… Boring at best. Of course I still like to see my friends, have dinner parties, drink wine and play board games, read books, take random mini-road trips into the mountains and walk downtown for tapas, practice Yoga in the park, paint and write, and occasionally kick ass at karaoke.. But I can do all those things with my daughter, and if I can’t bring her with me, I have a loving and supportive partner who is always willing to try and work out a scheduled outing for Daddy and Baby so Mommy gets her ‘me’ time.
All in all, I think the person you share this experience with matters more than anything else. Age does not matter, and my husband and I [still madly in love and kissing at every red light] were only together for a year before we got pregnant, we were pretty far from financially set and have only just now [three years later] gotten the chance to buy a house… But not only has it all been absolutely worth it, it’s been fun! It’s been downright enjoyable! Better than I ever thought my life was before! There’s a line in the move What to Expect When You’re Expecting when one father is trying to explain to another why it’s all worth it, despite how horrible it might look sometimes. He says “I used to think I was happy… But now I KNOW I’m happy. Exhausted, but happy.” I love that line.
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As my father-in-law told me when my husband and I started trying to conceive: “If you ‘wait until…wait until…wait until…’to have children you’ll spend your whole life waiting until…” It took us a year to conceive, and a lot can happen in that amount of time. Ultimately, it’s a decision between you and your partner, and everyone else’s opinions are just that; their opinions. Good luck! 🙂
lol my husband and i were married jan 13, 2012 and by march 23, 2012 i was testing positive! we did the math… valentine’s day baby! lol and yes we were actively trying to conceive, though we thought it would take at least a year since i waited until after the honeymoon to stop birth control.
so imo now’s a great time to start!
I really don’t get the whole “enjoy your freedom because you’ll never have it again” thing, honestly. I mean sure, for the first few months, you’ll spend a decent amount of time at home [and perhaps in a more difficult situation like mine was, in the NICU] but for the most part, as long as your baby is relatively healthy and able to go outside [i.e. no oxygen tanks like mine had for 4 months], there isn’t much that you actually can’t do. I’ve found personally, as a young parent who got pregnant at 20 and turned 21 at five months, that the only thing I might have done before that is more difficult to do now, is going to the bar/club and getting ‘crunk’. Can’t waste a morning with a nasty hangover these days, it doesn’t work and isn’t fair to anybody in the house… But I really don’t mind that in the slightest. I was in a committed relationship and I was working a full time job when I got pregnant, so it’s not as if I was responsibility-free even then. I wasn’t in the position to travel the world on my own or crash on couches and sleep in ’til noon anyway, because I was already caring for myself independently and planning to move in with my [now] husband. Like going to music festivals? You can still do that. Enjoy taking two hour long hikes? You can do that, too [we do it several times a week]. Wanna go on a roller coaster? Okay, you may need to wait a few months and find a sitter for that one, but hey, maybe bring your sister, cousin or just a friend you trust to sit out and take turns with you, and problem fixed! Yes, simple activities like going to the store on your own will take longer and sometimes be harder. Your kid might have a meltdown and get in the way of errands getting done quickly, and you will be dealing with a lot of poop. Just be ready for that, because it is absolutely inevitable… But I can tell you, as a person who was actually a little younger when we got pregnant and in a less stable situation as well, I feel more productive and better about myself and my contribution to society [and the world] every day as a parent. I don’t miss being able to run out and attend every party because once you have a kid, that sort of thing just seems… Boring at best. Of course I still like to see my friends, have dinner parties, drink wine and play board games, read books, take random mini-road trips into the mountains and walk downtown for tapas, practice Yoga in the park, paint and write, and occasionally kick ass at karaoke.. But I can do all those things with my daughter, and if I can’t bring her with me, I have a loving and supportive partner who is always willing to try and work out a scheduled outing for Daddy and Baby so Mommy gets her ‘me’ time.
All in all, I think the person you share this experience with matters more than anything else. Age does not matter, and my husband and I [still madly in love and kissing at every red light] were only together for a year before we got pregnant, we were pretty far from financially set and have only just now [three years later] gotten the chance to buy a house… But not only has it all been absolutely worth it, it’s been fun! It’s been downright enjoyable! Better than I ever thought my life was before! There’s a line in the move What to Expect When You’re Expecting when one father is trying to explain to another why it’s all worth it, despite how horrible it might look sometimes. He says “I used to think I was happy… But now I KNOW I’m happy. Exhausted, but happy.” I love that line.