As you grow older, there are a series of questions which you can rarely avoid.
It all starts out very innocently, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Adults ask this to children as a way of making conversation. Sometimes adults just don’t know how to converse with children. They worry that asking, “What’s the purple thing you’re making out of play-doh?” will somehow be offensive since they cannot immediately identify the creation themselves. At any rate, many children can tell you what they want to be- a superhero, a fireman, a dentist, a veterinarian. The answer may change from day to day, but they have an answer.
As you get older, the question evolves a bit and gets harder to answer. Depending on the time of year, I can get many a high-school senior to break into a cold sweat by asking a combination of “What are you doing after high school?” or “Where are you going to college?” or “Do you know what your major is going to be?”
After college or the equivalent time span, the inevitable question gets to be more personal if you’re dating someone. Parents, who were once wary of you so much as looking at the opposite sex, are suddenly wondering, “When are you going to get married?”
Yet, getting married will not end the line of questions. What follows is the most personal question, the question that I am currently enduring- “When are you going to have a baby?”
Babies. Sigh. C. and I have been married for almost three years. Many people are curious as to when we will start a family. Within the last year my mother has commented, “I’m counting down the days until I have grandchildren.” I looked at her aghast and responded, “From what are you counting!?” (C. and I originally said we would wait at least three years before having kids. She interpreted this as would start having kids after three years.) C.’s dad built a playhouse in his backyard, proclaiming, “If you build it, they will come!” The teenage girls I mentor continually suggest that I start having children. Apparently, they all really want babysitting jobs.
Rarely does the question come in the form of the more polite, “Are you guys going to have kids?” Instead people assume that it’s only a matter of time before babies will appear. They don’t consider that maybe we don’t want kids or are unable to have them. Consider this, people: Isn’t it salt in the wound if you keep asking when a couple is having a baby, when in truth they have tried and are unable to? This is not the case for C. and I, as far as we know, but I urge you to give this question a little more thought in the future.
To be fair, C. has made it clear that he’s ready for kids. He wants to be a young dad. As for me, I suppose I’m the one holding up the whole process. Ignoring the complexities of C. being anti-daycare and figuring out finances, it really comes down to this- Do I want a baby and, if so, when?
One of the problems I have is that I don’t feel the urge to be a mom yet. I know of other women who just can’t wait to be a mom and know that ultimately that is what they want most in the world. But I don’t have that feeling. Do I need that feeling before having a baby? Or will that feeling come along once I find out I’m pregnant? Will that feeling ever come and if not, will that be okay? I think that I want kids…. eventually. I just don’t really know when.
Another problem is that I’m both stubborn and a people pleaser. Everyone already has the idea that I should be having a baby. Yet, I want it to be my idea. Clearly, that’s no longer possible. So, am I just digging in my heels to be difficult? Is that inhibiting me from being more in-tune with my maternal desires? Or, do I have the opposite problem? Am I thinking about and considering babies because I’m getting a little/some/ a lot of pressure from various sources? Or because it’s something I want? You all are making it increasingly difficult to tell!
If you’re a mom, what was is like for you? Did you always know you wanted kids? At what point did you decide you wanted kids? When, if ever, did your desire to be a mom kick in? We need to talk.
If you’re not a mom, what are some other questions that you hate being asked?