Recently, Superman and I got together and the subject of kids came up. He asked a pretty straightforward question about me wanting kids and I gave a very evasive answer. My standard answer, when asked, is: “If I have kids, I have kids. If I don’t, I don’t”.
At this point in my life (unmarried, single, early 40’s) I think it’s kind of a strange question. You might as well ask me if I want to be The President Of The United States. Right now, I’m not headed down a path that would make either of these two situations possible.
I think the essence of the question is whether or not I’d be able to handle the situation. As for the President, no, I have no aspirations in this area. As for children, let me see if I can answer this one in a round-about way.
Let’s start this with an overview of the children in my life and my dealings with them so far. Obviously, I have no children of my own.
My older brother, Dan: While he’s the oldest sibling in the family, his children are the youngest (he was a late starter). He has two children, a daughter who is his oldest and a son, his youngest.
My oldest sister, Dee: She has 4 children from 3 different men. Hers go – Boy, Girl, Boy, Boy. Her oldest boy is in his early 20’s and her youngest is in his teens. The teenager is the only one living at home, presently.
My next older sister, Kay: Her household is a LOT more complex, let me see if I can break this down in a way that is easy to understand (probably not). Kay was married to a man for a number of year and had 3 children with him… a boy and two girls. She then divorced him and married a man that had two daughters. The oldest of that man’s two daughters got married and
moved away pretty quickly, so she was never really part of the picture.
This man’s younger daughter, I’ll call her Hannah, had twin girls when she was 18. A little more than a year later, she had another daughter.
While this is all going on, my sister is in the throes of trying to adopt a little girl who was born by a friend of her oldest daughter. Confused yet?
Now picture all of those people in the same house. Hilarity ensues.
Okay, now that you’ve got the general idea of the population I’m dealing with, let me tell you how I fit into all this. For many years, while I was still living at home with my parents, both of my sisters – at different times – came to live with us. Now, you can argue that the children weren’t mine to care for, but I had to live through all the drama and diatribes that come with living with children. At times I had to baby-sit and since I was not working at the time, I would quiet crying children at all hours of the night.
A certain memory of this sticks out in my mind. I had taken one of my nieces out of her crib in the wee hours of the morning because she was crying. I grabbed a bottle of milk from the fridge and began feeding her, but she wanted none of that. I tried the pacifier without luck. She wasn’t really crying she just seemed really uncomfortable. I checked the diaper but it came up clean. This was a mystery to be solved.
I ended up taking her out of her ‘onesie’ to see if that would make her happy and that seemed to work. She started calming down almost immediately. At some point my sister must have heard the fussiness and ran into the child’s room to find an empty crib. She ran out to the living room (where I was) in a panic with eyes wide open to find me holding her daughter.
My sister’s aggressive attitude towards wanting to help the child actually woke her up and the child started acting up again… but eventually got settled, and I went back to bed.
There was a time in my life I really wanted children of my own but each day that goes by I fear this will never happen. Even if I had a child today, I would be pushing 60 as my child would be graduating high school. I call that “being behind the curve”.
Back to my conversation with Superman, he asks “How would you feel if you DID have a child? Would you be happy or not?”
I think I gave my standard “I don’t know…” response. I also threw in that it would probably be an ‘accident’ child at this point. If that happened, I would certainly step up and take responsibility – that’s not at issue at all.
The reality of the question comes down to planning. Am I PLANNING on having children. At this point the answer is ‘no’.
The cold hard question is raised again: “Do you WANT children?”. The obvious answer is ‘yes’ I would want to have children but it becomes a matter of having a partner. It’s true what they say “it takes two to tango”.
This is where the stars aligning comes into play: she’d have to be of child-bearing age, have the mindset she actually WANTS children, and then whether or not she wants to have children WITH ME.
It’s like winning the lottery: I want it to happen but the likelihood of it happening is very low. And, yes, I know you have to meet them halfway.
I’m working on the partner. Then the question becomes “Do you want to get married?”
Ugh, I’ll save that one for a later date.
At this point in my life (unmarried, single, early 40’s) I think it’s kind of a strange question. You might as well ask me if I want to be The President Of The United States. Right now, I’m not headed down a path that would make either of these two situations possible.
I think the essence of the question is whether or not I’d be able to handle the situation. As for the President, no, I have no aspirations in this area. As for children, let me see if I can answer this one in a round-about way.
Let’s start this with an overview of the children in my life and my dealings with them so far. Obviously, I have no children of my own.My older brother, Dan: While he’s the oldest sibling in the family, his children are the youngest (he was a late starter). He has two children, a daughter who is his oldest and a son, his youngest.
My oldest sister, Dee: She has 4 children from 3 different men. Hers go – Boy, Girl, Boy, Boy. Her oldest boy is in his early 20’s and her youngest is in his teens. The teenager is the only one living at home, presently.
My next older sister, Kay: Her household is a LOT more complex, let me see if I can break this down in a way that is easy to understand (probably not). Kay was married to a man for a number of year and had 3 children with him… a boy and two girls. She then divorced him and married a man that had two daughters. The oldest of that man’s two daughters got married and
moved away pretty quickly, so she was never really part of the picture.This man’s younger daughter, I’ll call her Hannah, had twin girls when she was 18. A little more than a year later, she had another daughter.
While this is all going on, my sister is in the throes of trying to adopt a little girl who was born by a friend of her oldest daughter. Confused yet?
Now picture all of those people in the same house. Hilarity ensues.
Okay, now that you’ve got the general idea of the population I’m dealing with, let me tell you how I fit into all this. For many years, while I was still living at home with my parents, both of my sisters – at different times – came to live with us. Now, you can argue that the children weren’t mine to care for, but I had to live through all the drama and diatribes that come with living with children. At times I had to baby-sit and since I was not working at the time, I would quiet crying children at all hours of the night.A certain memory of this sticks out in my mind. I had taken one of my nieces out of her crib in the wee hours of the morning because she was crying. I grabbed a bottle of milk from the fridge and began feeding her, but she wanted none of that. I tried the pacifier without luck. She wasn’t really crying she just seemed really uncomfortable. I checked the diaper but it came up clean. This was a mystery to be solved.
I ended up taking her out of her ‘onesie’ to see if that would make her happy and that seemed to work. She started calming down almost immediately. At some point my sister must have heard the fussiness and ran into the child’s room to find an empty crib. She ran out to the living room (where I was) in a panic with eyes wide open to find me holding her daughter.
My sister’s aggressive attitude towards wanting to help the child actually woke her up and the child started acting up again… but eventually got settled, and I went back to bed.
There was a time in my life I really wanted children of my own but each day that goes by I fear this will never happen. Even if I had a child today, I would be pushing 60 as my child would be graduating high school. I call that “being behind the curve”.
Back to my conversation with Superman, he asks “How would you feel if you DID have a child? Would you be happy or not?”
I think I gave my standard “I don’t know…” response. I also threw in that it would probably be an ‘accident’ child at this point. If that happened, I would certainly step up and take responsibility – that’s not at issue at all.
The reality of the question comes down to planning. Am I PLANNING on having children. At this point the answer is ‘no’.
The cold hard question is raised again: “Do you WANT children?”. The obvious answer is ‘yes’ I would want to have children but it becomes a matter of having a partner. It’s true what they say “it takes two to tango”.This is where the stars aligning comes into play: she’d have to be of child-bearing age, have the mindset she actually WANTS children, and then whether or not she wants to have children WITH ME.
It’s like winning the lottery: I want it to happen but the likelihood of it happening is very low. And, yes, I know you have to meet them halfway.
I’m working on the partner. Then the question becomes “Do you want to get married?”
Ugh, I’ll save that one for a later date.