Hello readers! Long time no see!
A lot has been happening in our lives the last couple of years. But most recently…. We are expecting a baby!! Woohoo!!!
We found out right before Christmas, told our family on Christmas day and have been enjoying (mostly) every second of it since then!
I am currently 4 months pregnant with a little girl. We are ecstatic to be bringing a precious baby girl into the world. We are nervous but excited and ready for this crazy, joyous transition.
Which brings me to the topic of this post and why we waited to start a family.
My husband and I are 30 now (yikes, still weird to say) and only started to really talk about starting a family a year before we got pregnant. We were young when we married (barely 23) and have lived a lot of life since then. At least the military life makes us feel like that.
We honestly never really felt like we were “ready” yet for them. Now I know you are never fully ready for them, but there is a time where you want that next stage to happen. We moved a lot the first couple of years we were married and even when we got to our first permanent station my husband deployed. And since then has spent quite a bit of time gone doing different things.
A lot of seasoned military spouses told me that there is never a “perfect” or “right” time to have kids in the military. We wanted to do our best to time it where life was a little slower and my husband would be home more. Easier said than done with our lifestyle, ha!
For the 7 years that it’s just been the two of us we have just enjoyed our time together. We never felt pressured to start trying to like we are late the game. We did what was and is best for us. And we will continue to do so!
As for my journey of getting to this point, it’s been a little all over the place. I have never been the girl with baby fever. I always knew I wanted kids but the thought of actually trying to get pregnant, giving birth, raising a child, scared the absolute day lights out of me, I used to have nightmares about having a baby. As I got older and my anxiety/mental health got worse those fears only grew and led me to believe I didn’t want to have children. Not because I actually didn’t have a desire for them, although I was scared that the desire would never come, but my anxiety led me to think that I wasn’t capable of going through the process of having kids. And I really believed that for a good while.
I had these anxious thoughts surrounding children for awhile and it wasn’t until I started therapy where I verbally spoke about these. It was a scary thing to admit, that I might not want them or I really believed I couldn’t handle it. Speaking about these with a professional actually helped me get over my fear, which I was incredibly grateful for.
It took a long time to unwind the lies anxiety told me (about a lot of things) around kids and replace them with God given truths.
Things I had to stop believing:
I am not capable of having kids because I can’t handle it
I will have to do most of it alone
It’s too hard
Pregnancy sucks, I will always be sick, and not enjoy it
It makes me anxious and fearful which means I shouldn’t do it
I’ll be trapped by motherhood and never have alone time or be me
I don’t want them right now so that means I don’t want them ever and will never have the desire for them
Things I started believing:
I am CAPABLE of having kids, It’s a choice I will make that won’t be fear based
I will NOT do it alone, I have a husband who is fully in this and wants to love on babies and be a wonderful dad
It is hard, but I am still able to do it
Pregnancy is a short period of time in ones life. Yes there can be complications and sickness but that doesn’t mean I can’t do it
Anxiety and fear don’t need to be in the drivers seat and making decisions for me
Things will change once/if I become a mother, but I have the support I need to make it a wonderful journey
It’s OKAY to be on our own timeline for starting a family, and it’s okay that I don’t have a desire for them right now
Like I said, this took a LOT of work. A lot of unlearning, a lot of praying, facing real fears and anxieties, and beginning to believe what IS true.
And believe it or not, but my husband was the one to be ready first. He brought it up to me a little over a year ago and planted the seed. I was still scared but really had to dig deep to again, not let anxiety be the driving force of this decision.
We started trying later that summer and I went in with the mindset of “If it happens great, if it doesn’t that’s okay too”. It took us a few months of trying, and not consecutively thanks to military life, but once it happened I was truly so excited.
I have a lot of other things to say about this whole pregnancy thing, because I was seriously scared it would be horrible. BUT, I have been very fortunate to have an easy pregnancy so far, with no sickness, only a little nausea, and am really enjoying it so far.
So to the girl who doesn’t have baby fever, it’s okay. To the couple waiting 5, 10, 15 years for kids, you’re right on time. I know it can be weird with maybe a lot of your friends around you having kids at a young age or maybe right after getting married. It may feel like you’re doing something wrong because you’re not at that stage yet. But it’s all okay, starting a family with your spouse is a personal decision that shouldn’t be taken lightly. Do what is best for your own relationship and mental health.
Even if you get the question all the time “When are you going to have kids?” over and over again and feel like no one will understand, they’ll eventually stop asking haha.
We are very happy to be entering this new stage of pregnancy and eventually the new parent life. It will obviously be hard, but joyful and life giving at the same time. And whatever we face my husband and I are in it together.
Thanks for reading!
You can follow along with more of our lives and my pregnancy journey over on Instagram! And sign up for emails to receive the latest blog posts and news. Don’t worry, I forget to email a lot of the time so you probably won’t see me in your inbox that much, ha!
~Erin, The Short Wife
The Short Wife 