Let me begin by saying that I am not pregnant. But what if I wanted to be? The idea of starting a family often niggles at the back of my mind, but is usually accompanied by feelings of anxiety. I used to think I could mark the ideal time to get knocked up on my calendar and sit back and wait a few years for that day to arrive, but these days the mere thought of procreating brings with it a lot more complicated and confusing thoughts.

I recently spent an awesome 3 weeks of vacation back in the U.S. of A., and most of that time was spent with my family and my husband’s family. The fun thing about my husband’s family is that his two siblings are both quite a bit ahead of us in the game of life—they each now have 3 children, well, one is still a fetus the size of a banana, but it counts. It’s always super fun to visit our nephews and niece; I love playing with them, cuddling them, and listening to all the cute things they say. And during this vacation we definitely got our fill of the cute kid-ness. Holding the newest baby, or worse, watching my husband hold her, tended to evoke warm, fuzzy feelings about how nice it would be to have one of our own. But then her older brother would poop his pants, and that rosy romantic idea would vanish. In fact, after living with the whole family and all those youngsters for seven straight days, there were moments when I was ready to swear off the idea of kids forever. Not because I don’t love them, but because there were so many painfully obvious differences between the relatively, fun, easy life I currently live and the lives my brothers and sisters-in-law were living. We slept in—they were up half the night with an infant or woken at the crack of dawn by restless toddlers. We kept our stuff neat, organized, and accounted for—they drove themselves crazy searching for the diaper bag that somehow went missing right before we were supposed to leave the house. We spent our days doing whatever we pleased—they were slaves to the schedules, moods, and needs of their kids.

Observing this dichotomy made me feel like I had two warring voices in my head, like if Smeagol was snuggled up against me going on about the fun blessings involved in creating and raising a new life, but meanwhile Gollum was in my other ear screaming and flinging his own feces around.

The way I see it, there are four stages a person goes through in relation to parenthood:

Up until recently I would have considered myself still in stage 1, with bigger fish to fry like enjoying being a newlywed and starting my career. But now, more than a year into my marriage, I can feel myself sliding suddenly into stage 2. If I got pregnant, would it be the end of the world? Probably not. Every month I find myself wondering…what if I didn’t start my period? Honestly, a small part of me kind of hopes that my birth control will fail.

But simultaneously, I love my life, and having a baby would irrevocably change things. No more traveling at the drop of a hat, no more free time to exercise or pursue hobbies, a huge influx in stress and responsibility…when I ponder these changes, I feel more committed than ever to waiting 4-5 years to start having kids, and maybe more!

Then you add in a variety of other considerations, such as the cost of having a baby, how many babies you want to have, and the fact that the risk of birth defects and other problems goes up the older the parents are. Do I want my kids to know my own parents? Because if I do, I should probably get started soon. But what about my career? If I start having kids before I really establish myself as a teacher, I might never go back. I think I’m too young for all this, but on the other hand it might be fun to be a young Grandma someday. It’s all so darn confusing, and there really doesn’t seem to be a perfect time.

So what’s my conclusion? Nothing really, other than that your 20’s have a nasty habit of throwing life-altering dilemmas like these in your face, and that bites sometimes. I’m sticking with birth control and the 4-5 year plan for now and trying to maximize this time in my life…but I don’t want to wait too long. I’m in stage 2. How about you?