Greedy

I had a strange realization the other day.

When I was younger, I was in no hurry to have kids - I had way too many other plans! Kenton and I thought we were being smart, not having kids before we got married or were financially stable. We also wanted to have some time to ourselves, build the founding blocks of what we thought would surely be a wonderful, stable family life.
Still, even though I was never one of those girls who dreamed of becoming a wife and mother from, say, age 7, I always assumed that I'd have two kids - you know, the generic average.

Things changed when this whole journey hit the first speed bumps and I had to come to terms with the fact that I might not just NOT have two, I might not even get ONE. So, all of a sudden one seemed perfectly fine - not ideal, but I'd settle for one. After all, one is better than none and, it's not like I'd wanted a gazabajillion kids in the first place.

Well...it came as a complete surprise when, a few days ago, as I was talking to Dad, I realized that at this point in my life, I felt more than ready to take on motherhood. All this time I kept thinking about all the bad bits and all the crap - the infertility issue, the fact that we might not be able to have kids, that we probably wouldn't be able to afford either IVF or adoption without going broke or even into debt. But I had this epiphany: the gross, the icky, the worrying, the disciplining, the scolding, the yelling, the sleepless nights...all the inevitable drawbacks of motherhood suddenly seemed like they were just not that big of a deal in my head. Before, I had so many doubts as to whether I was just panicking because I'm getting older, because there seems to be a big hold-up in the maternity department and so on. I'd gotten to the point where I was almost embarrassed as I was forced to contemplate that I had become one of "THOSE" women who were constantly talking about the proverbial biological clock ticking.

At the tailend of that conversation which led to said epiphany, I had another unexpected revelation. I suddenly thought, twins might be fun - and it would be cool to have four kids when it's all said and done. WHAT??? I mean, here's the thing. I'm not one of those people who thinks there's some kind of godliness about reproduction. Technically, it's a purely scientific process that, in general, the female body simply negotiates without much input (no pun intended). Still, I had very specific "demands" of potential motherhood: preferably girls or a boy but only first born; no twins (who wants to start motherhood with twice the poo? EEEWWWWW!), and definitely not more than the middle class perfection of 2.2 (rounded down mathematically to 2) kids.

But suddenly I realized that, for the first time in my life, I can say that I really, truly feel ready. And not in that desperate, must-have-a-baby-NOW kind of way. I just feel like I've rounded a corner and feel a sense of balance, almost zen-like acceptance of the potential challenge that becoming a mother would present.

Of course the reality of our situation hasn't suddenly faded from my peripheral vision - it's pretty much still smack-dab in the middle of it all. But Kenton and I had a long talk not too long ago and we decided that, next year, we're going to pull out all the stops. I'm going to get every test under the sun done to find out what's going on with me, demand answers, results & advice, and I will do everything I can possibly do to combat this problem. Infertility? Pah, I'll show you!!