the story so far...

I have always wanted babies. When I was little I was obsessed with pregnancy, shoving teddies up my top and pretending to give birth to them. When people ask me if I want kids, I tell them I’ve been broody since I was about 5. And it’s true. There’s natural, girly, nurturing instinct and there’s an overwhelming desire to mummy. I think I have always had the latter.

Growing up I loved being around babies and looking after little ones. I did work experience at a nursery when I was 16 and my favourite little one (it’s fine to have favourites if they’re not yours!) was a boy called Rees. He fell over one day and I vividly remember him crying and holding his arms out for me to give him a cuddle. It was the best feeling EVER. I remember that feeling even now, 20 years later.

The first time I thought about the reality of having a baby myself was when my best friend had a surprise baby when we were 24. In spite of the shock, she was the best thing that happened to all of us. Since then I have settled my maternal urges vicariously through my friends’ babies. And there are plenty of them! I’ve watched with absolute joy as baby after baby has appeared in my life, whilst I remained single and wondering when the right man (or failing that, the right situation) would turn up for me.

In my early 30s, still single and working hard (don’t get me started on the ‘career woman’ assumptions) my mum declared that she’d support me in having a baby if I wanted to go it alone. But I knew deep down that I wanted to hold out a little longer in the hope of the more traditional route… the right man.

And come along he did, when I was 33 and he was 22 (yeh, that’s not a typo). Given the age gap I put it on the table straightaway – if you can’t consider settling down and having a baby in the next 5 years, I need to walk away. He could and I didn’t.

I delightedly told everyone that I knew he’d be an amazing dad – based solely on studying him with his dog. And I was proved right when we looked after our baby niece for the first time and they pretty much imprinted on each other (a love affair that almost four years on shows no signs of waning). She woke in the night and wouldn’t settle so we brought her in with us. She kept popping up like a meercat and the way he scooped her up, snuggled her into him and kissed her head literally made my ovaries ache. That was it. I was done for, and so was he.

We married in April 2016 and I came off the pill, full of excitement at the new adventure we were bound to embark on over the coming months. It was fun at first, the not knowing, and I started to plan life with the view that we were bound to have a baby by ‘this time next year’. But nothing happened. So I got to know my body better, I read lots of books, I peed on lots of sticks. I quizzed my friends about their own journeys and recommendations. And I started to realise how un-simple the whole baby-making thing is. Seriously, it’s a wonder anyone gets pregnant!

Last night we finally went to the doctor to start having some tests. I feel like there might be a long road ahead of us… or maybe we’ll be lucky and get pregnant next month. Either way, it feels like a new realm we’re entering – away from the ‘it’ll happen’ into the ‘how can we make it happen’, trying our best to avoid the ‘what if it doesn’t happen’.

I’m charting our course for my own benefit, and also for those in a similar position. With a bit of luck this blog will end up short and sweet – we’ll get pregnant and it will be abandoned because I’ll be far too busy figuring out how the hell to put up a buggy and wondering when I might sleep again. But if that’s not the case, at least I’ll have somewhere to go, to share my feelings and the ups and downs along the way. You are very welcome to join me…