How Do We Know If We’re Ready For Kids?

We’ve wrapped up our series on conversations to have before you get married and if small children everywhere are to be believed:

First comes love

Then comes marriage

Then comes a baby in a baby carriage!

Now, there are plenty of couples who are childless by choice and plenty who are childless not necessarily by choice so, I admit, the nursery rhyme is flawed, but for those of you who are interested in having kids, how do you know that you’re ready?

If you ask ten different people, you’ll get ten different answers to this question. I’m going to attempt to hit what I think are the major highlights

1.       Do you or your partner have an ideal timeline? Where are you on that timeline?

·        For some couples, they go into their relationship with an ideal timeline of when they would like to have children. There can be all kinds of reason for this. Some common ones include wanting to spend time as a couple before adding the responsibility of children or school schedules, wanting to achieve specific career goals, potentially facing biological factors that may make it easier or harder to have kids (ex. Early menopause). Talk about this with your partner and what you think your ideal line looks like and see how they feel about that. See if you can be aligned on this. Some couples will have had this conversation before getting married and in that case, this will be just revisiting the idea over time to make sure you’re still aligned.

2.       In what ways do you think your life will be different with children? Are you looking forward to those changes?

·        When you think about having a child, does it excite you? Repulse you? Give you anxiety? Is there a part of you that is prepared to welcome those changes? That’s a pretty good indicator that you’re ready.

3.       Do you feel like you and your partner function well as a team?

·        Have you guys figured this part out? Having kids can be wonderful and can be work. It’s crucial that you and your partner have some idea of how to work together and trust one another.

4.       Are you having a child for the joy of adding to your family or because you think it will fix something between you and your partner?

·        Eeek! Thankfully this is something that I do not see as often anymore, but there have certainly been couples in the past who have thought that things feel stale or not quite right in their relationship and they have hoped that the love they will feel for a baby will bring them together. Loving your child will bond you in unimaginable ways, and it will not fix existing issues in your relationship. Especially as you navigate this major life transition, it may even serve to amplify relationship issues.

5.       How is your health?

·        On a concrete note, how is your health? Is it safe for you and your partner to get pregnant and have a baby? If no, have you guys discussed your options? (ex adoption, surrogacy, donors, etc). Just because it may not be safe for your body to have a baby does not mean that you cannot add to your family, it just means that you and your partner need to decide if you’re ready to start the other processes to add to your family. It does not negate any of these other things to consider!

6.       Embrace the fact that you might not ever get a sign that you’re 100%, without a doubt, ready and maybe you’re going to feel ready enough to do it anyway.

·        Having a baby, adding to your family, is a big decision. It is normal to feel mostly confident in your decision and still have a little bit of niggling doubt. It’s something new! You can’t account for every single “what if”. If you’re feeling pretty aligned on all of these other topics, you’re probably at least ready to figure it out.