After seven years of marriage with no children, my husband and I have gotten used to the freedom. On the weekends we go to bed when we want and sleep as long as we want. We take off for a weekend trip on a moments notice. We enjoy going to the movies and eating out frequently.
There are things we haven't done yet that we'd like to do too. For example, our honeymoon was nice, four days stay in a family friend's cabin, but we always said we'd go on a tropical vacation someday. It hasn't happened yet. There are other places we'd like to travel too.
If we have a child, it doesn't mean we won't ever be able to travel, but it will certainly make it harder. Money will be tighter and we'll probably end up putting off our "honeymoon" plans even longer - or forever.
Then there's the stuff we'd like to get. This Christmas we got a couple Wal-Mart gift cards and we talked about what we wanted to get. Although we have a desktop computer we've always wanted to get a laptop so we had a long discussion about using the gift cards toward a laptop. The problem is, the gift cards would only go a short way toward the laptop and we'd have to charge the rest. The whole reason we've decided to wait to go off birth control, is to focus on paying off our credit card bills, car loan and put money into savings.
In the end we didn't get the laptop. But there's always other purchases that we'll have to weigh. New furniture. Nice dishes. Four-wheel drive vehicle. Nice clothes.
It guess the upshot here is we might have some cold feet. I got all gung ho about having a baby because hubby talked about wanting to. Now he's not sure and I'm not sure.
Confusion.
Sunday, January 2, 2011
Friday, December 10, 2010
Things we couldn't do if we had a baby!
This morning I got an email offering really cheap tickets for my husband's favorite sports team. Really cheap. But the game is four hours away from us. So I sent my husband the link, thinking he'd never go for it, and promptly forgot about it.
I worked a half day (I get to leave at noon on Fridays) and spent the rest of the day running errands. Haircut. Oil change. Thrift store clothing for a Christmas play we are in at our church. Groceries.
I got home at 4 p.m. and put the groceries away. My husband checks his email.
We're going!!! The nice thing is, my brother lives in that city so we won't have to get a hotel. And we'll get to spend time with our neices and nephews! The only thing I wish I'd done differently is that I should have texted him about it right away and we could have left this afternoon instead of driving after dark. Oh well.
When hubby was wavering, considering whether or not we should go, this is how I convinced him. "We don't have a baby yet!! We will someday, and then we won't be able to do things like this!"
Still, I doubt this trip will make us change our minds about having a baby. Visiting the neices and nephews will likely make us want our own baby even more.
I worked a half day (I get to leave at noon on Fridays) and spent the rest of the day running errands. Haircut. Oil change. Thrift store clothing for a Christmas play we are in at our church. Groceries.
I got home at 4 p.m. and put the groceries away. My husband checks his email.
We're going!!! The nice thing is, my brother lives in that city so we won't have to get a hotel. And we'll get to spend time with our neices and nephews! The only thing I wish I'd done differently is that I should have texted him about it right away and we could have left this afternoon instead of driving after dark. Oh well.
When hubby was wavering, considering whether or not we should go, this is how I convinced him. "We don't have a baby yet!! We will someday, and then we won't be able to do things like this!"
Still, I doubt this trip will make us change our minds about having a baby. Visiting the neices and nephews will likely make us want our own baby even more.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Babies
Have any of you seen the documentary film “Babies” by filmmaker Thomas Balmes? I just finished watching it and I LOVED IT!! It follows four children from separate areas of the world from birth to a bit more than a year old. They are Ponijao from Namibia, Mari from Tokyo, Bayarjargal from Mongolia and Hattie from San Francisco. (Shown in order on the photo below.)
The thing that was really eye opening for me is the big difference between how the children are watched by the parents. The children from the U.S. and Japan live in very clean environments, are watched very carefully and attend play classes with their parents. The two little boys from Mongolia and Nambia are frequently unattended, often dirty and engaging in activities that most of us would be horrified at. And yet, all the parents love their children and take good care of them in their own way.
Let me give you a couple examples. Bayar is often left alone on a bed tightly swaddled. One time a huge rooster with big spurs comes up, checks out the bed, jumps up and hangs out there with him for a while. Another time he’s given a piece of bread to suck on while he is lying down. He’s so little he can’t really eat it so they put a match stick, complete with the match head, through the bread, creating a barrier that keeps the bread from sliding down his throat and choking him.
Ponijao crawls around in the dirt pretty much all the time. He’s shown with dirty hands, sucking on his fingers, rooting around in the sticks and stones on the ground and once comes up with an animal bone, which he promptly sucks on. His mother is right next to him and only once makes a move to stop him. Another time, before he’s even walking, he’s shown lying on his stomach in an inch or so of water, playing and leaning down to drink unassisted. (If that seems like a lot to give away, trust me, there’s a lot more.)
Most of us would be shocked and horrified by these behaviors. Some of the things the children are doing seem downright dangerous. Even if it’s not exactly dangerous, if a child of ours was sticking his very dirty hands into his mouth we’d all likely quickly grab him up and wash him thoroughly. Could a child choke on a pebble or get a disease from playing in dirt or sucking on an old animal bone? Maybe. Am I going to let my child do that? Probably not.
But here’s the thing. For me, the film really opened my eyes to the “proper way to raise a baby.” Sure, I identified more with the way the baby from Japan and the U.S. were raised, and I’ll likely raise my children more like that than the babies from Mongolia and Nambia. But there’s nothing wrong with the different ways that children are raised in other areas either. Children all over the world grow up in vastly different ways and they manage to survive without pristine clean play areas, play dates with singing and clapping and parents that entertain them every second with bright toys and books. There really is no one “proper way to raise a baby” it’s just our cultures and upbringings that dictate certain behaviors in us. The mothers in Nambia and Mongolia learned how to care for their children from their mothers and others around them and would probably be shocked at many of the ways we raise our children in developed countries.
After watching this film I hope I can be a little more relaxed as a parent. I want to remember that there are different ways of doing things and they aren’t necessarily bad, just different.
Has anyone else out there seen this movie? I’d love to hear from you if you have. If not, I highly recommend it. I found it fascinating, touching and, frequently, very funny. If you have Netflix it’s available on instant watch.
The thing that was really eye opening for me is the big difference between how the children are watched by the parents. The children from the U.S. and Japan live in very clean environments, are watched very carefully and attend play classes with their parents. The two little boys from Mongolia and Nambia are frequently unattended, often dirty and engaging in activities that most of us would be horrified at. And yet, all the parents love their children and take good care of them in their own way.
Let me give you a couple examples. Bayar is often left alone on a bed tightly swaddled. One time a huge rooster with big spurs comes up, checks out the bed, jumps up and hangs out there with him for a while. Another time he’s given a piece of bread to suck on while he is lying down. He’s so little he can’t really eat it so they put a match stick, complete with the match head, through the bread, creating a barrier that keeps the bread from sliding down his throat and choking him.
Ponijao crawls around in the dirt pretty much all the time. He’s shown with dirty hands, sucking on his fingers, rooting around in the sticks and stones on the ground and once comes up with an animal bone, which he promptly sucks on. His mother is right next to him and only once makes a move to stop him. Another time, before he’s even walking, he’s shown lying on his stomach in an inch or so of water, playing and leaning down to drink unassisted. (If that seems like a lot to give away, trust me, there’s a lot more.)
Most of us would be shocked and horrified by these behaviors. Some of the things the children are doing seem downright dangerous. Even if it’s not exactly dangerous, if a child of ours was sticking his very dirty hands into his mouth we’d all likely quickly grab him up and wash him thoroughly. Could a child choke on a pebble or get a disease from playing in dirt or sucking on an old animal bone? Maybe. Am I going to let my child do that? Probably not.
But here’s the thing. For me, the film really opened my eyes to the “proper way to raise a baby.” Sure, I identified more with the way the baby from Japan and the U.S. were raised, and I’ll likely raise my children more like that than the babies from Mongolia and Nambia. But there’s nothing wrong with the different ways that children are raised in other areas either. Children all over the world grow up in vastly different ways and they manage to survive without pristine clean play areas, play dates with singing and clapping and parents that entertain them every second with bright toys and books. There really is no one “proper way to raise a baby” it’s just our cultures and upbringings that dictate certain behaviors in us. The mothers in Nambia and Mongolia learned how to care for their children from their mothers and others around them and would probably be shocked at many of the ways we raise our children in developed countries.
After watching this film I hope I can be a little more relaxed as a parent. I want to remember that there are different ways of doing things and they aren’t necessarily bad, just different.
Has anyone else out there seen this movie? I’d love to hear from you if you have. If not, I highly recommend it. I found it fascinating, touching and, frequently, very funny. If you have Netflix it’s available on instant watch.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Nonimor revealed
OK, so nobody figured out what my new name means. Not that I really expected a flood of entries. :-)
1. Noni is a name I have loved since college. I googled it after the fact and found that it's actually spelled Nonnie in the movie "A far off place", where I first heard the name. But I have always imagined it spelled Noni and I like that better. As I recall, I never watched this whole movie but I liked the name so much I wrote it down in my journal so I'd always remember it. I'd gotten it into my head that the name meant a far off place but maybe I'm dreaming that part since it's the name of the movie.
2. Mor is the Norwegian word for mother. I'm a mutt, but I have more Norwegian in me than anything else. Uff da.
3. The combination, to me, indicates someone that considers becoming a mother a far off place or thought. And yet, dreams change quickly, meaning that far off place might not be so far off anymore.
4. Noni is a root sound in the word anonymous, interesting because this is an anonymous blog. (Hence the duck with a superhero mask on.) The word anonymous reminds me of the time my brother said "It's anonymous!" when he meant unanimous. Giggle.
So, there you have it. Nonimor.
1. Noni is a name I have loved since college. I googled it after the fact and found that it's actually spelled Nonnie in the movie "A far off place", where I first heard the name. But I have always imagined it spelled Noni and I like that better. As I recall, I never watched this whole movie but I liked the name so much I wrote it down in my journal so I'd always remember it. I'd gotten it into my head that the name meant a far off place but maybe I'm dreaming that part since it's the name of the movie.
2. Mor is the Norwegian word for mother. I'm a mutt, but I have more Norwegian in me than anything else. Uff da.
3. The combination, to me, indicates someone that considers becoming a mother a far off place or thought. And yet, dreams change quickly, meaning that far off place might not be so far off anymore.
4. Noni is a root sound in the word anonymous, interesting because this is an anonymous blog. (Hence the duck with a superhero mask on.) The word anonymous reminds me of the time my brother said "It's anonymous!" when he meant unanimous. Giggle.
So, there you have it. Nonimor.
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
A new name
Since husband and I aren't telling anyone about our plans to have a baby until when/if we get pregnant, this is an anonymous blog. When I set it up, I struggled with finding a good name for myself. I finally called myself babymomma, though I wasn't happy with it.
Then I stumbled on the blog of Gracie Lou Freebrush. I commented on her blog, she commented on my blog, I commented back ... All the while, I was thinking, where have I heard that name?!? Then it hit me. Miss Congeniality. Very clever. I love that movie!!
This inspired me to think up my new name. Nonimor. It's a name from a movie combined with a word from my heritage. Anybody able to crack the code? The winner gets ... well, nothing really. A nice comment from me.
Then I stumbled on the blog of Gracie Lou Freebrush. I commented on her blog, she commented on my blog, I commented back ... All the while, I was thinking, where have I heard that name?!? Then it hit me. Miss Congeniality. Very clever. I love that movie!!
This inspired me to think up my new name. Nonimor. It's a name from a movie combined with a word from my heritage. Anybody able to crack the code? The winner gets ... well, nothing really. A nice comment from me.
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Post No. 3
Yes, there's more to the story.
All this happened this November. By this time it was Thanksgiving and we traveled to visit family for the holiday. We rode part of the way with family and on the way home my husband seemed quieter than usual. We were holding hands in the back seat of his brother's vehicle and I asked him what he was thinking about. He said he wasn't thinking about anything.
Once we got to our own car it was another hour to get home. I decided to tell him what I had realized, that I wasn't just wanting to have a baby to fulfil his wishes anymore, that I wanted to have a baby just as he did. That's when he told me that his answer - that he wasn't thinking of anything - in his brother's car, wasn't true. He hadn't wanted to mention this in front of his family, he said, but he'd been thinking about the possibility of us having a baby. He'd been praying for guidance.
The thing is, we want to make sure that what we do God's will in all things. We've lived our lives on our own schedules and desires before and it never works out well. For right now we've made a plan to wait 9 months and then go off birth control. However, we also fully believe that if God wants us to get pregnant before that, birth control will not stop Him. If we are not meant to get pregnant after we go off birth control, we won't get pregnant.
So that's what this blog is about. We've decided that 10 months from now, or three more three month packs of birth control, we'll stop taking those little blue pills and let what happens happen.We've also decided not to tell anyone until after we are actually pregnant.
The purpose of the blog is to:
1. document our journey to becoming pregnant and beyond
2. provide an outlet for me since I won't be talking about this to anyone other than my husband - at least until I am knocked up.
All this happened this November. By this time it was Thanksgiving and we traveled to visit family for the holiday. We rode part of the way with family and on the way home my husband seemed quieter than usual. We were holding hands in the back seat of his brother's vehicle and I asked him what he was thinking about. He said he wasn't thinking about anything.
Once we got to our own car it was another hour to get home. I decided to tell him what I had realized, that I wasn't just wanting to have a baby to fulfil his wishes anymore, that I wanted to have a baby just as he did. That's when he told me that his answer - that he wasn't thinking of anything - in his brother's car, wasn't true. He hadn't wanted to mention this in front of his family, he said, but he'd been thinking about the possibility of us having a baby. He'd been praying for guidance.
The thing is, we want to make sure that what we do God's will in all things. We've lived our lives on our own schedules and desires before and it never works out well. For right now we've made a plan to wait 9 months and then go off birth control. However, we also fully believe that if God wants us to get pregnant before that, birth control will not stop Him. If we are not meant to get pregnant after we go off birth control, we won't get pregnant.
So that's what this blog is about. We've decided that 10 months from now, or three more three month packs of birth control, we'll stop taking those little blue pills and let what happens happen.We've also decided not to tell anyone until after we are actually pregnant.
The purpose of the blog is to:
1. document our journey to becoming pregnant and beyond
2. provide an outlet for me since I won't be talking about this to anyone other than my husband - at least until I am knocked up.
Post No. 2
When I last wrote, I left the story with my husband and I, driving home in the dark, talking about the possibility of having babies. The conversation went on for at least a couple hours so I don't remember exactly what was said. I do remember laughter bubbling out of me. "Did we really just have this conversation," I asked?
And there it sat for several days, maybe a week. We were sitting in the living room, me on the love seat and my husband at the computer. I decided to check in with him about this conversation we'd had. The baby conversation. I brought it up, reminding him again, that if he wanted to have a baby, I wouldn't stop him. At one point, he cracked up. "What's so funny," I asked him.
"Let me tell you a story, little girl," he said. Apparently, since the time we'd last talked he'd been praying. He'd asked God to give him a sign that we should move forward with having a baby. The sign? That I bring it up again.
So we talked about it some more. I told my husband that I thought we should wait a year and spend that time paying down some bills, put some money in savings and then go off birth control. Initially my husband said he'd heard people say that if you waited until you were financially ready to have babies, it would never happen. But I told him I wasn't wanting to get all our bills paid off, I just wanted to work on paying down our bills for a specified period of time and then go for it. He agreed this sounded like a good plan.
At this point, I was still saying that I was prepared to have a baby for him. I'd told him I would if he ever expressed interest and now he'd expressed interest.
A few days later I came to him with 2011 and 2012 calendars, mapping out a possible plan. Nine more months on birth control, while we got on firmer financial footing, and, depending on how soon we got pregnant, a baby in 2012. He teased me a little bit about really having the baby fever and to be honest I got a little irritated. I was doing this for him, after all.
It wasn't until later on in the week, when I found myself googling nursing rockers and cribs, that I discovered that might not be the case any more. Maybe I wasn't just saying I'd have a baby for him any more. Would I be happy if my husband came to me and said he had changed his mind and didn't want to have a baby after all? No, I wouldn't, I realized. I'd be disappointed.
For me, it was an almost instantaneous transformation. I went from someone that said she could go her whole life without having children and be perfectly happy to someone that was ready to have a baby. Someone that wanted to have a baby.
And there it sat for several days, maybe a week. We were sitting in the living room, me on the love seat and my husband at the computer. I decided to check in with him about this conversation we'd had. The baby conversation. I brought it up, reminding him again, that if he wanted to have a baby, I wouldn't stop him. At one point, he cracked up. "What's so funny," I asked him.
"Let me tell you a story, little girl," he said. Apparently, since the time we'd last talked he'd been praying. He'd asked God to give him a sign that we should move forward with having a baby. The sign? That I bring it up again.
So we talked about it some more. I told my husband that I thought we should wait a year and spend that time paying down some bills, put some money in savings and then go off birth control. Initially my husband said he'd heard people say that if you waited until you were financially ready to have babies, it would never happen. But I told him I wasn't wanting to get all our bills paid off, I just wanted to work on paying down our bills for a specified period of time and then go for it. He agreed this sounded like a good plan.
At this point, I was still saying that I was prepared to have a baby for him. I'd told him I would if he ever expressed interest and now he'd expressed interest.
A few days later I came to him with 2011 and 2012 calendars, mapping out a possible plan. Nine more months on birth control, while we got on firmer financial footing, and, depending on how soon we got pregnant, a baby in 2012. He teased me a little bit about really having the baby fever and to be honest I got a little irritated. I was doing this for him, after all.
It wasn't until later on in the week, when I found myself googling nursing rockers and cribs, that I discovered that might not be the case any more. Maybe I wasn't just saying I'd have a baby for him any more. Would I be happy if my husband came to me and said he had changed his mind and didn't want to have a baby after all? No, I wouldn't, I realized. I'd be disappointed.
For me, it was an almost instantaneous transformation. I went from someone that said she could go her whole life without having children and be perfectly happy to someone that was ready to have a baby. Someone that wanted to have a baby.
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