Baby Fever self or society-inflicted?

Dear Diary,

baby fever is something I will say that all women feel at one or multiple points in their life. I know me personally I probably need a baby fever vaccine shot because I catch it often. But it's like to have a baby? or to not have a baby? that is the question that I feel like I am constantly harassing myself with. As a 27 year old single woman without any children I am often perceived as "not doing something right" because I should either be married, or engaged or at least in a serious relationship right? Or I should at least be pregnant, & that's whether I'm in a relationship or not. I've had more people ask me when I am going to have a baby wayyyyyyy more than anyone has ever asked when am I going to get married, or go back to school, or start a business. It's almost like even if I become extremely successful & find an everlasting love I can still only be considered to be a "real woman" the moment I have a baby. I feel like as women we succumb a lot to the pressures & opinions of the world & we tend to allow these pressures to determine our life plans for us because you're not a "real woman" if you don't carry & give birth to a child, you're not a "real woman" if you never get married, etc. Even if we go back to our childhoods every story, every cartoon, every show always showed us that you get married & live happily ever after, that includes your son and daughter (& in that order), your house with the white picket fence, & of course the family dog. Going further into our childhoods little girls are always given baby dolls to play with and care for, and in a sense to prepare early how to become a mother, as if little boys will not grow to be fathers. Society has been helping from the very beginning to inflict this fever on us. Now this is not to say that I do not believe that being around a cute little baby will not make you want one around, or seeing the baby section in target won't make your ovaries hurt, or not to even say that I do not want to get married or become a mom myself, but I just want to be sure these life-changing decisions are made solely by me, as opposed to the opinions of others, family pressures, or even matters of circumstance. I want to know that I am ready to accept the roles & responsibilities that come with being a mother. I want to know that I will still have money left over to treat myself after supplying my child with their wants and needs. I want to be sure that I am a woman my child can be proud of and aspire to be like. I don't want to let age decide that it's time for me to have a baby, or my family, or my spouse, or society because if I fall short as a mother I will not be able to blame that on any of those things, so why have a baby because of them? I know a lot of people with

children who wish that they would have waited longer to have them, that regret how many sacrifices they've had to make as a parent, and some that just should not have had children at all. There are some days when I think "I'm ready to get pregnant like yesterday" and then there are days where I feel like "mmmmm the whole kid thing just might not be for me", & because of that I feel like my feelings are too temporary to make such a permanent decision for my life. I find children to be too precious, innocent & dependent to bring one into the world for any other reason than to be ready to dedicate my life to them. This is why I love women with platforms who speak out on this touchy subject, like Tracee Ellis Ross and Chelsea Handler. Tracee Ellis Ross said in her very inspiring speech "It's really interesting to be a woman and to get to 45 and not be married and not have kids. Especially when you have just pushed out your fifth kid on TV. You start hearing crazy s#!& like: 'Oh, you just haven't found the right guy yet', 'What are you going to DO?', 'Oh, you poor thing', 'Why is someone like you still single', 'Have you ever thought of having kids?', 'Why don't you just have a kid of your own?'. It's never ending and not helpful." I completelyyyyyyyy agree with her, if a woman without a child is not asking your opinion on children and whether she should have one DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT off her your unsolicited, bias advice. Please and thank you. Like she said it is not helpful, especially for an avid over thinker like me who fixates on ideas and opinions longer than the average person. The older women in my family (my mom, aunties, older cousins) all had their children either at 20 or in their very early 20s, so it's almost like they don't understand why I don't have a kid yet or why I'm not pressed to do so yet. But like I always tell everyone I'm not trying to be out here reckless reproducing (this is how I say it verbatim, & if you hear someone else say it they probably got it from me, just saying). Reckless reproducing means exactly what you think, producing a life in a careless way. This can include, but not limited to having a baby by someone you know is no good or trifling, producing a child knowing you have no way to care for it (whether that be physically, financially, or mentally), getting pregnant & having no care to change your current life at all, etc. I've had women with kids tell me both to have them and to not have them, but what's funny is I can't ever think of a time when I heard this that I asked for the woman's opinion on the subject. People with children DO NOT and I repeat DO NOT place your biases and unpleasant experiences on people without children. Again, let us come to you; there are enough cute baby pages on instagram for us to have to sift through without reckless reproducing, and enough viral baby throw up and child bullying stories to scare us into reckless hysterectomies. I prefer to watch the moms and the children around me, & see how their relationships evolve with one another, and how they affect one another. I prefer to still watch my mom and how she still bends over backwards for me and my siblings and now for her grandson, my nephew. I prefer to walk into love with a man & really get to know him, instead of falling fast & making rash decisions based upon infatuation that feels like love. I prefer to think of my pregnancy as a pleasant surprise or a goal finally accomplished as opposed to an unexpected responsibility or a gift from lust. I know it sounds crazy but I want it to be perfect, or at least as perfect as it can be. In my ideal situation I want to be married, and either planning for a baby or not necessarily planning but not necessarily not planning for one, surrounded by love and being loved on. Now I know that sounds like it came straight out of storybook or a chick flick but hey when Beyonce says "who wants the perfect love story anyway?" I always think me, whether it's cliche or not. Now I wouldn't mind having a baby by someone who I was seriously involved with and we weren't married as long as I still feel very much in love because I think it is important for children to see that their parents love each other, whether that means in love or just love as friends and family (not no weird incest stuff, grow up). Which brings me to my last case scenario, if I can not find a man who I am in love with to have a child with I think I would want to have a baby with someone whom I simply love, like a friend who also isn't in a relationship but still wants a baby. I know it sounds weird but when you think about it friends love, respect & support each other as parents should, and honestly I think friends would make better co-parents than ex's, because there isn't any underlying sexual tension & there aren't any unspoken feelings. That would still be the last case scenario because I don't think I'm into the whole stem-cell, petri dish baby just because I know what it is like to not have a dad, so I wouldn't want to knowingly & willingly place my kid into that disadvantage, & that also keeps me from having a lot of hard conversations that I would prefer not to have. I also do not want to be a single mom, I'm not necessarily opposed to being single and being a mom, but a single mom is not what I want to be. I saw my mom struggle & I remember feelings of disappointment & abandonment that I still deal with to this day because of my father (or lack thereof) & I will try my hardest to be sure that neither me nor my child have to deal with that, if I do in fact decide to have one. & the reason I say that is because I know women without kids who live really fulfilled lives; they travel whenever they want, up & move when they want, change careers when they want, etc. They can do anything they want without a second thought because their decisions only affect them. Some of them are married, some of them are not. Some of them regret never having kids & some of them do not, but either way they're all happy! & to me that is what matters more than anything! If getting married will make you happy, DO IT! If staying single will make you happy, DO IT! If having a baby will make you happy, DO IT! If staying responsibility free will make you happy, DO IT! just do WHATEVER makes you happy! FORGET what society has to say, FORGET what your mom friends have to say, FORGET what your family has to say & FORGET all those cute baby pages on instagram & all those sad viral videos, FORGET EVERYTHING, so that you can actually know what YOU

want & what's the best for YOU & what will make & keep YOU happy. Don't let the outside pressures get to you, instead allow them to further help educate you, because remember pressure burst pipes, but makes diamonds. & remember the cure to baby fever is babysitting a talkative kid/crybaby, researching daycare rates & watching child birth videos, but until then keep smelling the tops of those babies' heads & browse that baby section freely!