I Never Thought It Would Come To This But I Might Have To Have A Baby On My Own

I’m totally baby crazy. I don’t know if my biological clock has gone into overdrive or what, but I feel this overwhelming urge to be a mother and I don’t know what to do about it. I have a great guy in my life but I don’t know if we’re ready to get quite that serious together. That’s why I’m starting to think I might end up being a single parent…

1. My fear of missing out is at crazy levels. I’ll admit that part of my baby craziness is the result of my intense fear of missing out. My friends are starting to settle down and the next few years are going to be chock full of wedding bells and babies! I want wedding bells and babies too, but I really, really want babies!
2. My boyfriend and I haven’t really talked being parents together. We’ve been together for a while but we haven’t really talked about the baby thing. It’s not that we don’t talk about our future or where we want our relationship to go; we do, but it’s more like we only take that conversation so far. He knows that I want to have kids but we haven’t discussed the possibility of having them together. We’re a millennial couple, after all. Living in the moment is the key to what makes our relationship successful, but it also hinders conversations about important things like babies!
3. No one is getting married young anymore. The statistics don’t lie—millennials are waiting longer and longer to get married and some of us don’t bother to tie the knot at all. We care about our careers and we don’t want to rush into unhappy marriages that lead to divorce like our parents’ generation did. For someone like me who’s still dreaming of being married and having a child within a marriage, this new trend is really cramping my style.
4. Being a single mother scares me. Single moms are some of the most badass women on the planet. They care for themselves and their little ones with purpose, resolve, and love. Although being a single parent isn’t as unconventional as it has been in the past, I don’t necessarily want to be one. Like I said, I’ve always dreamed of raising a child with a partner, but I’m realizing that I may have to go it alone if I want to be a mom on my own terms. It’s a really daunting thought.
5. Where are all the men that want to be fathers? I feel like I’ve dated men who just aren’t that interested in being dads. My current boyfriend is approaching 30 and has expressed in so many words that he doesn’t feel ready to take care of a small human yet. My ex, who was in his early 30s when we met, had only contemplated having children when all of this friends were starting families or thinking about it. I even dated a guy in his late twenties at the time who laughed when I asked him what he thought about having children. I mean, don’t men have the same pangs for parenthood that women have?
6. I’m worried that my career aspirations are going to make it difficult for me to settle down. My career is a big part of my life and my identity, and while I believe that I can have it all, I’m afraid that it’ll keep me from achieving my dream of marriage and children, especially children. Women in the corporate world still have to think about timing when it comes having children. When a woman decides to have a child can affect her promotions, her business development, and her career trajectory. Part of me wants to do it now so that I can get used to having a child as my career takes off. Unfortunately, that might mean doing it alone.
7. I don’t think I want to be an older mother. I actually think that being a younger mother can be kind of awesome. My mother had me at this age and our age gap allows us to have a friendship as well as a standard mother/daughter relationship. I recognize that late twenties isn’t super young, but in today’s society where some women are waiting until their thirties or later to get pregnant, it is on the younger side. Running around after a 10-year-old in my forties or even fifties sounds exhausting!
8. I’m thinking seriously about freezing my eggs. What if I spend the next few years with my boyfriend only to find out that he never wants to get married or have children? I’ll have wasted prime baby making years and have way fewer eggs than I would have if I froze them. I’ve had to consider freezing my eggs and what that would mean. Besides being sort of invasive, it’s extremely expensive. The extraction and storage of the eggs are costly and if I don’t end up using my eggs or getting pregnant naturally then I basically spent a ton of money for nothing. It’s definitely a lot to consider, but I really want to be a mom.
9. I can’t control if I’m going to be married but I feel that I can control when I become a parent. When I think about my life, I’ve always gone after what I think will fulfill me because I have control. I can’t make someone marry me, but I can control whether I’m going to be a parent. Even if I can’t biologically be a parent, I can adopt a child who needs a loving, supportive parent. It’s not a decision that necessarily requires another parent or another person’s input. As scary as it is, it is also strangely empowering.