To Firstamendment ...thanks
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| Tue, 10-12-2004 - 11:01am |
I just wanted to thank you for your advice on the "Living" board, I just didn't want to post there since I no longer feel as comfortable with the board. All of your advice was certainly good food for thought, and I like your idea of keeping tabs of the child-support board and budgeting for expenses. I guess that if we looked at all the things you need in order to have a child, then only the well-off should be having them. There would be a huge part of the American population that shouldn't be having children, but they do and I don't think we should consider them not to be good parents because they don't offer the 'perfect' lives for their kids. My mother had me at 17 yrs old, and I graduated from University and have had a great life. She certainly didn't come from a wealthy family, and I remember having hand-me-downs from my cousins and it did me no harm, but there are people that think that everything has to be totally planned and prepared for or you can't move forward. Life doesn't always want to follow our plan. My mother divorced my alcoholic father when I was 7, met and married a great man and are still together even today. In my marriage before, I weighed all the factors of where my ex and I needed to be in our lives to have a family. I analyzed it so much, I analyzed myself into never seeing the right time to start a family. This was part of the reason for the divorce. There are never any guarantees in a marriage, no matter how well you try to plan it.
I don't think it will be easy, and at this time I'm not even sure I can have children. I also have been a champion for women living on their own, a lot of my friends are in their late 30's, never married and never having had children and I don't think that they are any less of an individual. I don't think I'm less of an individual because I'm not married, or have had children. I think everyone should do what makes them happy, not what society thinks makes them happy. Thanks again for your supportive words.

You are right about there sometimes never being a good time to have kids. Money is always a problem and it is expensive. But you should know that you can cover the short term expenses, that health insurance is available and what it will cover, what you would get paid while on maternity leave and how you will pay your bills if you have reduced or less income while you are out of work, etc.
Did you give any more thought to just getting married right now? I mean, if you want to start a family and want to get married, why put off the the married part if you are going forward with the getting pregnant part? Getting married may seem like it is about the ceremony and celebration, but it is really about legal rights and obligations.