Pls be kind-waiting to have a baby

[Elsie2022]

I am 29 years old and have been married to my DH since we were 22. We both work in London and we bought a 2 bed flat in London 3 years ago. My plan in the past was to have a baby after buying our flat (and making sure we have enough for childcare fees and a decent standard of living) but after the pandemic, I realized we needed a bigger place(previously we worked long hours and spent a few hours at home everyday and went out loads during the weekend) and so right now I am planning to move to a 3 bed flat in 2.5 years so that we can get a bigger mortgage before DC (we agreed we would only have 1 DC) and not be stuck. DH is a born and bred Londoner and we have close family in London so we don't wish to leave London. Also commuting fares mean we would spend even more outside London.

Now we talked to a family member who regretted waiting as his wife turned out to be infertile at 33. DH thinks I am procrastinating on having a baby as I want everything 'perfect'. He thinks we should be more like his sister who is my age and now pregnant with a baby. I am happy for her but her situation terrifies me. She is privately renting with no savings for a deposit in a country where rental is precarious (house prices and rentals rose 12% in her city last year). We were transferring money to her to pass to another sister (long story) and she confided this terrified her as her joint account with her husband was so low that she didn't even have £700 to spare to lend to that sister before the money arrived in the account (international money transfer can take a while). Plus she lives in the suburb if a really expensive city (most expensive in the world). This is basically my worst nightmare and I wanted to avoid being in it. I can't imagine having a baby with so little money, I know other people do it, but I wouldn't choose it.while we obviously have more savings than that, I still don't feel ready emotionally and financially. I mean, 4 years ago, we didn't even own our place but now we do so things do change with time.

DH thinks I am just too lazy to be in the 'struggle' and we would be left with nothing if we did it my way. And his sister is doing the right thing cos she will figure things out and everything will end up ok.

Life will never be perfect. We can try, plan, take all the right steps, and all of a sudden life surprises you and gives you something you never expected. I had a whole decade planned out and was so confident in the future, couldn't imagine anything disrupting my plans. Shortly after, life gave me one big slap in the face surprise and within months, I was moving countries and starting on a career path I had never imagined I'd take. 3 years down the line and the life and plans I had feel alien to me now.

I would personally stop trying to make it all perfect. Do you want a baby now? If yes, you know what to do next. If no, that's also a perfectly valid answer and you don't have to justify it with salary, housing or childcare reasons.

I personally want to have my kids young. It's not a great idea in my industry and with the current circumstances. But I gave up planning the perfect steps for a perfect life, long ago. Maybe a few people have managed to 'engineer' a perfect plan like you say, but for 99% or more, life IS a struggle. It will never stop being one.

In your position I would treat baby and housing plans separately, because it doesn't look like they're that much intertwined together. If you're not emotionally ready for a baby, tell your husband that. Not 'we should save harder for the bigger flat'. Tell him why right now, you're hesitant to have a baby. It's not something to hide from, it's just much better to discuss these things openly.

Should also mention my DH and I have been using the withdrawal method for nearly 8 years. Didn't get on with hormonal contraception, was married for most of that time, and we agreed if we became pregnant, wasn't ideal but would take it in our stride. But we never tried to TTC and I took the morning after 2-3 times when it was clear we messed up.

I could have written this myself Elsie!

I’m 36 and have just had my (one & only) DC 5 months ago. My husband has already had a vasectomy. I conceived immediately.

Please don’t let your anecdotal relatives story put you off waiting. If she was completely infertile in her early 30s, chances are she would also have been at 29. Being in your 30s itself doesn’t make you infertile. The statistics around decreased fertility in your 30s really aren’t as dramatic as people make out.

Not a day goes by that my DH & I don’t say to each other “Imagine we had DC in our old house?? What a nightmare!”. Our old house was a 3 bed semi on a new build estate. On paper totally fine for one DC, but not the life we wanted for ourselves.

We now live in a lovely big cottage in the country. Sure if we’d had DC in our old place we’d have “made it work” but why the f**k would we actively choose a life of “making it work”? Sounds shit tbh.

I adore my DC but having a kid is so, so, so hard & we had him exactly when we wanted too, are financially comfortable etc. I can’t imagine how much harder it would be in different circumstances.

You clearly aren’t ready & want to wait…so wait. Regretting not having a child is much fairer than regretting having one.

Get yourself a Daysy to track your cycle. Used it for 5 years with no accidentally pregnancies then used it to conceive & it worked first attempt.

@CallMeDaddy58 yes and when I actually asked my DH if we should actually TTC, he kinda didn't want to when placed on the spot! I think neither of us are ready but perhaps he feels we should be ready. I think a lot of people do struggle with fertilty and therefore try to search for reasons why they struggle and therefore give advice to others on this basis.

I think that is precisely it. If I turned out to be infertile later on, I think I would just accept it because it's not something within my control. Yes I could have TTC earlier but there is no guarantee that would have worked out. There are infertile 29 year olds too.

There is never an ideal time to have children op, sure some situations are better than others but you can never bank on it.

We waited, bought the house, got “financially secure” got pregnant and DH was made redundant! Was a nightmare.

We also waited so long we only managed to have one and I’ll regret that for the whole of my life

I was in a similar situation and ordered a Hertility test to flag any potential issues. You could also do a private fertility MOT.

It helped reassure me I had time to wait another year. But just to be completely transparent although I've not struggled to conceive I did have an early MC before my current pregnancy. Nothing is guaranteed.

'Yes I could have TTC earlier but there is no guarantee that would have worked out. There are infertile 29 year olds too.'

The point about this is, if you do have fertility problems you need time to have tests done and go through cycles of IVF. And while you're going through all that your fertility is declining. It's not just about fertility either - as you get older you're more likely to have a miscarriage (I had 4 between the ages of 32-35 after no problems conceiving DC1) and your chances of having a child with health problems increase.

Yes there are 29yos with fertility issues. But they have more time to try naturally, find out they have issues, then deal with the issues.

Lots of doctors fob couples off for tell them to keep trying naturally. Then getting any tests via the NHS takes time. Before trying the more mild treatments before people work their way up to IVF.

I know at least 4 couples who spent 10 years trying before having a baby.

@Dinoteeth I have not been taking contraception or using condoms for 8 years so technically nothing to say that i haven't been 'trying naturally'. we have been using the withdrawal method, but there is no proof of that!

You’ve bought your flat though - so you won’t be renting expensively at the mercy of a landlord like his sis.

I think your flat sounds adequate for a new baby.

I think, by the time you’ve tried for a baby (which takes up to a year on average), and had the baby, you might be 1.5 - 2 years from now. Then, one year mat leave with a little baba. You can start looking for a bigger place in that time maybe. That takes you to about 32-33yo. Over 35 and things might start slowing down, but the person you knew who was infertile at 33 was not normal by any means.

Good luck OP, sounds like you’re in a good, secure situation to me.

I had my first DC at 29 (unplanned.) Now pregnant again at 35. We do have more money now, but I had more energy then. (Though maybe that's more having one kid already than the 6 years :-D ) Risks are lower. My parents were in better health then too, as grandparents - they are still youngish but those years make a difference. I'm glad I didn't wait, even though we had some catastrophic financial reversals in his first year. He doesn't remember it.

I appreciate wanting a study and a baby room (I'm a writer) but then DS was in our room for the first year and a bit anyway.

DH thinks I am just too lazy to be in the 'struggle' and we would be left with nothing if we did it my way. And his sister is doing the right thing cos she will figure things out and everything will end up ok.

Honestly that's easy for him to say, as the one who will have to grow the baby and take some mat leave a lot of the work of figuring things out will fall on you. That's even assuming he's one of the rare ones who genuinely steps up 50% (yeah, everyone thinks theirs will, many are unpleasantly surprised.)

2.5 years is not that long to wait. I started this post kinda thinking the opposite - why wait, it's never perfect, fertility decline etc - but you actually have a pretty clear solid goal and if you don't feel emotionally ready you shouldn't do it.

When I took the pregnancy test with DS we were not at all financially ready and knew it was kind of crazy but when it turned up positive we were just grinning at each other like idiots. How do you think you (not DH) would feel if you got a positive test next week?

@Elsie2022 it would certainly worry me that your success in avoiding pregnancy is not entirely down to him withdrawing, ie is something else going on?

Op I just know far too many couples who have struggled with fertility including me took me 5 years to get my second. A long stressful 5 years.
But that's nothing compared to the 3 couples who I know tried for 10 for their only children.
I also know afew who left it too late completely.

You and DH need to decide what you want.

@Dinoteeth I talked to a fertility specialist and she said, you can't really know until you tried and withdrawal doesn't count as trying.

But yet at the same time, I don't think we can go the rest of our lives without slipping up. And there is no risk of us ending up with 6 kids this way, the most would be 2 I suppose

wife turned out to be infertile at 33.

That doesn't mean anything.

I was pregnant within 3 months at 36.

Everyone is different.

If you don’t want to have a baby, don’t. Having children is not compulsory, you are not defective for not having the feelings that some other women have.

Its all very well for your husband to call you lazy and say that you haven’t achieved very much. But YOU will be carry the baby, not him . You will be giving birth and breast feeding, not him.

You will no doubt be the one taking maternity leave, not him.

And If your marriage splits up, you will undoubtably be the one left holding the baby and balancing FT work and being a single mum while he strolls off into the sunset with his new love.

So Don’t have a baby unless YOU want one. Because it’s your life, body, finances, hobbies, free time , career, promotions prospects and pension that will be affected, not your husband’s.

OP just don't forget that age Vs infertility argument is purely around giving you enough to do something about if you did turn out to be infertile. Yes someone infertile at 36 may have been so at 29 as well - but at 36 their chances of conceiving with eg IVF or other assisted conception methods are a lot worse than if they'd found out at 29.

Maybe you could have a fertility MOT done as a couple to see where you stand?

But I agree with the others that it sounds like you're mainly coming up with excuses (apart from anything - it might take you up to a year to conceive, another 9 months to carry and then baby doesn't need it's own room for another year after that... Is that enough time to save for a bigger deposit?) and if it's because you're having doubts you should definitely speak to your husband about it.

Pulling out isn't a very reliable way to prevent pregnancy. It works about 78% of the time, which means that over a year of using this method, 22 out of 100 women about 1 in 5 would get pregnant. By comparison, male condoms are 98% effective when used correctly every time

Op this is what would worry me about the withdrawal method. 1 in 5 get pregnant using it every year.
8 years you say you've been doing it. The odds are it should have failed by now.
Your either incredibly lucky or their is a risk that you as a couple have low fertility.

BTW that was a Google copy and paste

If you don’t feel ready for a baby yet then don’t have one, don’t let people scare you with stories of people being infertile at 32, the difference in fertility between your early thirties and late 20s is very minimal, it’s after 35 it starts to decline more suddenly. So yes if you definitely do want a child you probably don’t want to wait until you’re 35 as you won’t have much time left to try and have treatment, but at 31/32 you have loads of time.

I’ve just turned 32 and I’ve had people telling me for years I should have got pregnant by now, but career wise and financially we weren’t ready. I then got “no one is ever ready, there’s never a perfect time, you just manage somehow”. The thing is I don’t want to just survive and scrape by, so I’m willing to take the risk and wait until next year when I’ll be 33.

I know a lot of women who had kids earlier because they were pressured and felt scared of being “too old” and they regretted not waiting longer, so it goes both ways.

You just have to do what’s right for you and what you feel comfortable with, but having a baby is scary, your whole life changes and you have so much responsibility, it’s also a hell of a lot of work, so I think it’s only normal to be apprehensive.

@Dinoteeth when we were first married, we were having sex daily, sorry if TMI. My DH thinks its because he is circumcised, so it is more sensitive and easier to predict when he ejaculates plus he pulls out well ahead of time..he also thinks that many men intentionally get their partners pregnant and pretend they are withdrawing.

@Elsie2022 my DH and I have only used the withdrawal method for the best part of 10 years and only conceived when we intended to, no fertility issues (few miscarriages but that's a separate problem) I don't think you necessarily need to panic about that.

Oh this is a hard one OP. I know how you feel. I’m 36 (husband 43) and just had my first (and only) and we put it off and put it off mainly because I could always come up with a reason not to! I am a worrier and a planner and a baby is such a huge unknown that I couldn’t deal with the unpredictability of it. It took a significant health scare to push us off the fence, I honestly think I would have found reasons not to until nature took the decision out of my hands. I think it’s one of those decisions that requires sensible thought and planning but involves a little bit of a leap of faith (terrifying)

OP it sounds like you aren't really keen on having a baby now, which is absolutely fine.
I do think perhaps you do need to get over your cultural 'norms' as they might not exactly apply to London. It's very normal to have even 2 dc in a 2 bed flat in London. In saying that though, if it's sonething very important to you and you aren't desperate to have a baby anyway, then there is no harm in waiting.

I hate it when people say 'you're never ready for a baby!' or 'there's never a good time for a baby!'

The subtext is usually 'so go for it, because there'll never be a good time'.

There is a good time. And I see so many people saying that you'll never be ready but I guess that's because the people who were ready and waited to be ready don't talk about it because it comes across as bragging.

But I'll say it: you can be ready, and there is a good time to have a baby.