BellaOnline Forums Relationships Married No Kids Reactions to the book “Maybe Baby"

Hi again to all!

In addition to reading the posts here (and yes, TMC) at least once a day for the past several months, I just read �Childfree and Loving It� (it was as good as everyone here has said). I am almost done with �Maybe Baby� and had to turn on the computer to post this b/c I am having so many thoughts. I am deep in the �had kids and it is the most wonderful thing in the world blah blah blah� section, just finished the essay by the woman who has to have a drink every day to deal with being around her kids (no euphemizing for me). On one level I feel these essays are great, honest, gripping wonderfully written etc and they validate the part of me that does want kids (still �officially� confused on the issue) and thinks I will love it and it will be the most wonderful thing I was so glad I didn�t miss out on (to paraphrase my mother earlier this week� grrr). But then there is a part of me that keeps thinking: all these essays have the common thread that feels it is truly a total, complete crock, that I am being fed the same lines these folks were fed etc etc. Do I see this b/c it is what I want to see in them to validate the other half (no kids, no way, never, not in a million years and deep down I know it). I was curious as to others� reactions to this book and these essays. I was so irritated by the preachy woman declaring that with one kid she could hold onto remnants of her CF life, but at two it was officially over. I loved the essay Surprise Baby (about adopting a newborn and the one by the ex-bank robber).

That's the book I chose to help me figure out which side of the line I was really on! When reading the essays about how wonderful it is to have kids, I kept thinking, yeah, right. When reading the ones about having kids and wishing they didn't, I thought, maybe you didn't think hard enough first. It was a very validating read. It's been a while since I read it and so I don't have very specific examples to site - but for me, it was a tool to help me read my feelings and it worked.