In my twenties, the thought of having children was a definite “no.” However, as I entered my thirties, my perspective softened. When my therapist inquired about my desire for a baby on a scale of one to one hundred, I spontaneously answered that I was 55% sure. Essentially, this felt like a coin flip.
My inclination towards having a child was only slightly greater than my reluctance. I created lists of pros and cons and read books such as Motherhood So Dear: Literary Mothers on Why They Chose to Become Mothers, an anthology of over two dozen writers sharing their parenting choices. I engaged in conversations with both parents and non-parents to understand their decisions. Yet, nothing significantly altered that 55% certainty.
Being only 55% certain about embracing motherhood left me feeling stuck. It didn’t help that whenever I confessed my uncertainty, I was told that I needed to really want a baby to have one. Raising children demanded sacrifice and caused hardship. It meant giving up on your aspirations, even if it was simply wanting to read a book in peace. I was constantly reminded that having a baby would fundamentally change me. I wouldn’t enjoy the things I used to. Writing would be impossible, and even reading a newspaper would be a challenge. Friends? Forget about them. Work? Don’t even consider it. I had dedicated the last three decades to shaping myself into the person I aspired to be—was I now expected to abandon her?
Back then, I was unaware that what call “maternal ambivalence”—a sense of uncertainty before pregnancy and parenthood—is actually quite common. In fact, research indicates that is . I was normal, yet I believed that the women I saw on TV, in movies, and on social media, who seemed so sure about wanting children, were the norm. I recognized that my great-grandmother, grandmother, and even my mother never had the choice to become mothers; it was simply what women did. But now, we have a language and vocabulary to describe maternal ambivalence.
It seemed absurd to me that nearly every woman I knew seemed eager to sign up for what appeared to be indentured servitude. The images we’re exposed to certainly don’t portray motherhood as enjoyable. For example, the book Woman, Eating by Claire Kohda, and the new film adaptation starring Amy Adams, tells the story of a stay-at-home mom whose postpartum experience is so surreal that she transforms into a dog. It’s no surprise that many of us are hesitant to fully embrace motherhood. I didn’t want to sacrifice myself entirely, but I also didn’t want to turn into an animal.
Everywhere I looked, mothers seemed overwhelmed, exhausted, and furious—or, at the other extreme, radiant, happily compromising, and thrilled by the identity-erasing monotony of their new lives as moms. Neither extreme felt realistic to me. Is there no middle ground?
We do a disservice to women, and everyone else, when we only showcase motherhood at the extremes. Of course, there are the early mornings, diaper explosions, and tantrums. But there are also the morning snuggles, the feeling of my daughter’s hand in mine, and the first “I love you.” A whole world exists in between, a world that is messy, real, raw, and, dare I say, human. Perhaps we don’t discuss the everyday moments because they are ordinary and difficult to capture. Maybe in today’s fast-paced world, we’re so busy that unless something is exceptionally good or bad, we don’t have the time to mention it.
When I was contemplating parenthood, I wish someone had told me that being a mother is like life itself: sometimes awful and sometimes wonderful, but mostly somewhere in between. Back then, parenting felt like something I needed to be all-in about if I were to completely transform my life to welcome a baby. It didn’t help that my husband at the time was unwavering in his desire to not have children. If I wanted to be a mother, I would have to end my marriage at 37 to figure out how to have the baby I was only 55% sure I wanted.
Some friends suggested I adopt a dog or improve my plant-caring skills before considering children. Others advised me to babysit my friend’s child for a weekend. Everyone seemed to think there was something I could do to gain more certainty.
But the truth was: I needed honesty. I needed people to stop projecting their judgments and expectations onto motherhood and simply share the truth. I needed the concept of motherhood to stop being a battleground where liberals and conservatives fought their feelings, to the detriment of real mothers. I needed to hear that when my daughter waves hello to the birds in the morning, my heart would overflow with joy. And that when she insists on dressing herself, even though it takes three times as long, I would feel frustrated.
Motherhood isn’t something you can try out to see if you’ll enjoy it. If you choose to have a baby, there are no guarantees that you’ll be good at it, that you won’t regret your decision, or that you’ll figure it all out. You simply have to have hope. It’s normal to feel uncertain about such a life-altering decision.
And it’s perfectly acceptable to decide not to become a mother. Society stigmatizes women who choose to be child-free. oscillate between whether women who are child-free are or whether the is true. Ultimately, screw the studies. It’s a personal choice.
Sitting on my therapist’s couch, I wish someone had told me that we don’t need to be completely committed to parenthood to choose to have a baby. That level of expectation adds pressure to an already complex decision. Who’s to say that my desire for a baby couldn’t grow from 55% to 150% over time? Who’s to say that I wouldn’t evolve and mature as I realized that my life is my own and I don’t have to follow anyone else’s rules? Who’s to say that our feelings are fixed and unchangeable?
I wish someone had told me that any decision aligned with our deepest desires is a good one. I wish someone had told me that I’d remain unhappy as long as I was in limbo. I wish someone had told me that 55% was as good a number as any.