To have, or not to have: that was the question

By Kelly

More than a decade ago, I tried, and then stopped trying, to salvage my failing marriage to the father of my 13-year-old son. After that I spent five years trying to make a new long-distance relationship into something permanent and solid. During these tumultuous years, and often for the wrong reasons, I wished for another child. I knew adding another person to the complex equation of an unhappy marriage would complicate my problems rather than solve them. The same factors applied to a partnership in which the parties lived 500 miles away from each other.

Even knowing that, I still obsessed over it. I know now that I believed a successful pregnancy and the birth of a new child meant that I was getting something right. By the time of the divorce, I had miscarried three pregnancies. Looking back, I can't feel anything but relief that I exited the marriage with only one child whose heart needed to be put back together again.

When Chris and I conceived Lila, I was at another crossroads -- ready for a day-to-day partnership again, but unable to make the drastic move across the country that would hurt my son and his father. I guess I hadn't really learned anything from my past experiences yet, because it was nothing short of miraculous relief when I felt the decision taken from my hands and made for me by the pregnancy. And so we moved.

We have all adjusted to the changes and are thriving, and this child has awakened a new level of intense love in all three of us: her parents and big brother. The day-to-day family routine I so craved is enough to handle, often more than enough. Yet, the question of another child has hovered in my thoughts since her birth. Would she be a happier child with a sibling closer to her own age? Shouldn't we just do it now while she's still a toddler, and get the hard part over with before I'm 40?

Well, I turn 39 in May, and I've been doing a lot of thinking about our family and about my past. It has taken me an awful lot of kicking myself in the rear end to admit that the only concrete reason I have for wanting another child is for the pleasure of trying one more time to get it right. Rather than put that energy and love into a whole new person, I am humbly put on notice that I need to give it to the two beauties who already grace my life.

Motherhood is a journey we take across space and time without a map or a guide, often making up the language and the customs as we go. So often it feels like we're traveling solo, even when we're tripping over little people at every turn. How can we pay attention to the landscape when we have so much baggage to keep track of? The path of each mother's voyage takes its own shape on the map of life, even though we all end up at the same destination. I'm just grateful to discover how much smoother my own ride can be because I finally know that what I already have is more than enough.

Kelly Ferry lives in Northeast Ohio with her husband, teen son, and toddler daughter. She writes when she can, thinks about writing when she can't, and knows more will be revealed.

Comments

[katherine]

gorgeous post girl :) . . . and you are so enough . . . you are fabulous . . .

[Cathy B]

Kelly—What lovely insight so beautifully put. We're never lacking anything when we stay in the place of gratitude for the amazing gifts of our children. Thanks for this.

Cathy