At what point in your life did you feel ready to start ttc and can I ask why?

[yellowpolkadots101]

I'm late 20s and I am noticing a lot of my friends are now ttc or have recently given birth. Although I am in in a relationship I still selfishly feel that I am not ready to give up my freedom and currently planning a nice 2 week holiday in the USA with my partner! Don't get me wrong I really really can't wait to start a family but I would like to wait until I am at least 31 or 32 and hopefully have bought my own house by then too! Albeit I would love to have 2 children so I really can't leave it much longer of fear that I may have difficulties conceiving!

Of course I know you can't always plan these things, life happens whether it's difficulties getting pregnant (I hope I don't offend anyone with this post I can only imagine how terribly hard it must be for couples struggling to conceive), difficulties finding a suitable partner and unplanned pregnancies etc

What's your story? =)

Boringly practical.
Met dh at 17. Married at 20.

Waited until I finished uni, got a teaching job and had a permanent contract as well as long enough service to qualify for the full maternity leave and pay.

I was 28. I had known for a long time that I wanted babies and dp was in agreement, but I was trying to get my career established. I got to a point where my distant yearning turned into a need I couldn't ignore.

I was 28. Was bored of holidays, didn’t feel motivated to visit places. Most friends were settling down, the only ones still going out were kind of hard work! So I just felt the urge to stay at home and have my own family. Sounds very pessimistic I know, but I felt that I’d had my fill of partying and going places. It took a long time to conceive, which amplified the feelings I described above.

28. I had a fantastic time in my twenties but it was starting to wear thin by the time I was in my late twenties so I started my family and had my son at 29 and then my daughter nearly three years later.

I thought it was a good age for me as once I had my children I had no yearning to go out as I did before and was dedicated to enjoying raising my children without feeling I was missing out.

Married, buying house, in good job. Could afford to and were sure we had committed to each other for life. Children seemed like the natural next step.

Married at 35 and TTC straight after that took a while and had baby at 37. Felt ready and also worried time was running out x

29 because I felt ready and we were married and my husband was more recovered from some health issues he was having- now approaching 32 and still not pregnant

I'm really sorry kiki, things don't always work out the way we plan and it can be a tough ride..! I hope things work out for you both soon

29 here, twins born at 30, then another two singletons at 32 and 33. Wanted to be old enough that I didn't feel I was missing out but young enough that once they had left home I could still enjoy the later years still relatively 'young'.

28..... felt "fed up" with my lifestyle which was selfish and indulgent. It felt empty and pointless and I knew all the holidays and expensive things meant nothing to me anymore as I wanted to share everything with my own small person lol.

Married at 28 started ttc couple of months later. Got pregnant which ended in mmc.
Got pregnant again had dd at 30 who’s now 10 months.
We own our house, dh has a great job, I’m self employed meaning a short maternity leave and business took a bit of a hit but luckily not heavily reliant on my money.
We just felt it was time as we both knew we wanted kids.
I love holidays and even they started to feel boring, and I no longer enjoyed laying in the sun for hours in end.
Would love to have number 2 now!

I was broody, 25, just married, we had a house, I had a good job and DH had just taken over the business he's worked in since school. He's also older than me.

Had DC1 at 26 and DC2 17 months later. I also knew I wanted to be 'done' by 30, as there's a history of early menopause in my family.

If you want to have lots of holidays first etc, that's cool too. Everyone's circumstances are different so do what suits you best.

Started ttc at 23. Most of my friends had a child by then. My best friend had her first at 21. I never conceived until 25! And had dc at 26.
I wish I had conceived sooner. Having children is tough and I am pleased that I was "younger" as I had alot of energy and patience in the sleepless night stage
Should add that at 23 I was also married with a mortgage and good job. I'm 29 now and no kids planned for me

At 30. Felt suddenly and unexpectedly broody. Never interested in babies before. Was out with friends as I was most weekends and just felt bored and that I wanted more out of life. The broodiness was a very strong, physical feeling. I felt suddenly jealous of people with babies to the point of tears. Finally had baby number one at 33, 10 years after getting married.

When I got bored with being selfish and felt like I/we truly did all the amazing, indulgent, self absorbed things we needed to do before life changed. I worked and lived abroad, travelled, partied, moved and settled in a different country, slept late, did everything I really wanted. And then I got bored with it all and knew I was ready. It was also a good time professionally for a career break. I was 32 when I had my 1st. 37 when had my 2nd, also a very intentional wait as we wanted to enjoy being parents to just one for awhile.

@yellowpolkadots101 thank you, just felt it was helpful to know the other side of things as it doesn’t always happen when you’re ready. But on the other hand you shouldn’t rush into it just in case you have problems because you might not, you could conceive on the first try! There’s no easy answer it’s a very personal decision.

Met Dh at 26. Knew he was the one pretty soon and was instantly broody. But did things in proper order, moved in together, bought a house together, got engaged and started trying when we were married at almost 30. I was a touch frustrated as we moved at his pace more than mine. I would have married a year earlier but he took his sweet time to propose! Started trying on the honeymoon. Took us a year to get pregnant with our first, I had two miscarriages back to back before that. With hindsight I would have wanted to start earlier. We had three which was always the plan but have had to get them in all very close together as I didn’t want to leave it too late. Three under 5 is hard going.

As someone upthread said, before I had my firstborn my life was starting to feel a bit empty. There’s only so many city breaks you can go on before they all start to look the same. It was never career related. I established myself in my early twenties. I think it very rarely is for women unlike the media paints it. It was more about meeting the right guy.

Pretty much the same as previous posters.

Mine was a combination of owning my own home tick married tick sick of partying every weekend tick not getting any younger tick

I thought it would take months but it took a week (I'm one of the lucky ones). If I knew we would be that lucky I would have delayed TTC by 6-12 months.

I got told once to think how many children you want, and then think how old you want to be when you have your last child and work back. Although on that reasoning I would have had first DC a few years earlier

You can't make yourself want a baby and if you had one because it's the "right thing to do" then you may struggle. A lot of my TTC reasoning was that it was the next step but I still struggled with the lifestyle change and kept thinking of things I should have done.

Maybe you can make a list of things to do before having a baby and see how you feel once you have completed the list.

32 here. Married at 29, had done all the travelling and partying I wanted. Career was well established. Suddenly the time felt right.

I thought it was a good age for me as once I had my children I had no yearning to go out as I did before and was dedicated to enjoying raising my children without feeling I was missing out.

Yes to this.

Married at 33, ttc at 34 when my career was settled but moving into a boring stage, couple of miscarriages and DS1 at 34. DS2 at 39.

I'd pushed my career, lived in the USA for 4 years, travelled, moved home, bought a house, paid for the wedding and honeymoon, and started building back some savings and it felt like this was as stable as it would ever be.

Buying a house big enough for a family, coming into some money to give us a cushion for me stopping working (self-employed), my age (33).

I think if I hadn't been conscious of getting older I could happily have waited a few years longer as I didn't have that burning broodiness, just a sense that practically it was a good time. But now DD is here and perfect it feels like everything worked out how it should

Met now-DH when I was 18, fell pregnant completely by accident six months in, had a MMC. Ended up splitting up after a year or so, got back together a couple of years later, I wanted kids, he wanted kids, had a chat about it and just never bothered using any contraception. By the time we’d been back together a year we were engaged and had a newborn! I was only 22 when I had DD1 so never really got the chance to get super broody.
TTC2 I was desperately broody, it felt like a physical pain how much I wanted another one. Had another mmc and mc and that didn’t help. Worked out in the end though, DC2 was born when I was 26, DC3 a few days before my 28th birthday.
I was never a major party person and have never wished things to be any different - contrary to the lack of freedom etc that you hear about, having the children has opened doors for me I’d never have expected. We still go to all the places we want to, just requires a bit more forward planning - DH and I do have some stuff we’d like to do without the kids, but we’ve shelved it for now and have it to look forward to all ours will be pretty much independent by the time we’re in our early 40s so we can enjoy ourselves then!
Don’t do it based on when everyone else does though OP. You’ll know when it’s time, one way or another!

I've definately grown out of the going out partying stage! I was a party animal in my early twenties and now I can't think of anything worse! I've established my career and myself and my dp are looking to purchase our first house, my partner is a couple of years younger than me so I want to also ensure we are both ready! We both talk about having children though but I guess we have a couple more things to fulfil first (I am 28) so I would like to ideally start trying within 3 years if possible.

Thanks for starting this thread OP @yellowpolkadots101 - I've been thinking about this a lot recently and the people around me have been sick of me asking them about their decision (it's fairly personal after all).

We're getting married next year, have been together for 7 years, and we've both done our fair share of partying/travelling... BUT I now run a fairly new small business and DP is a medical student, so there doesn't ever seem to be a logical time to ttc anymore.