Hi all

I'm new to the forum *waves hi* and new to the whole concept of pregnancy and babies and all that carry-on.

I'm 23, going on 24 in September, my partner has just turned 31.

We have a house, a business and a steady income, we're planning to get married as soon as we can be bothered to basically LOL.

In the last little while, my clock ticking has taken me by surprise - I'm not generally a child-friendly person at all - in fact, my hubby-to-be's sis said to me at a very recent barbeque we had at our house - are you sure you want to go in that gazebo, it's full of children? She's been away for around a year, but I still felt a little bit strange about her comments... I'm not great with children but it's not as if I scare them to death either LOL, I hope!

I don't like other people's children - the thought of baby-sitting half the brats in my hubby-to-be's family leaves me totally cold - but I can't quite shake the idea of having my own. I've always secretly harboured the idea, but the timing has never been right, ever - I've always either been at uni, graduating, trying to convince my dad I can make my business work, working too hard at the business, trying to fix/sell a flat, or some other thing that has meant it hasn't been right for babies to come along. All those things have been done now (other than the business thing, which is mainly why I'm posting)

We have a house, and my gorgeous hubs is keen - but I'm a bit terrified LOL. I can't afford to stop working - and I never will be able to stop working - anyone else out there managed the concept of 'pop it out, strap it to your front, get back to work'? As there's no chance I can ever take more than one week at absolute maximum off.....

Hi Saara, welcome!

You own your own business correct? While I can't say I'm in the same situation, is it possible to delegate the work to trusted employees for a few weeks while you would take a maternity leave? There has to be a solution!

Nope, can't delegate, we only have one employee and they work in the shop - I'm single-handedly responsible for all of our internet and eBay orders, listing, packing, stock control, office management, dealing with the finances and accountants, ordering and processing new stock - my office is chaos and our stock is an accumulation of five years worth of orders - the only person who knows where anything is (and has any hope of finding anything in my office LOL) is me - and with in excess of 100 internet orders a day, it's pretty important that things are kept on top of.

We haven't been away from home for longer than five days at a time in the last three or four years, at all. I don't have days off, if I'm ill I just have to work through it and do as much as I can.

It's a bit hectic, but it's the way we live our life at the moment - my hubby's family keeps lecturing me about needing to take time off to relax and let your brain switch off, but it doesn't work like that when you work for yourself, not for me at least - if I'm forced to be away, my brain's in over-drive worrying about what's going on, are we losing customers because their queries aren't being answered, what if parcels are lost or broken and nobody is responding to complaints etc etc, what's sold, how many parcels will I have to pack when I get back and so on. Blackberry and laptop accompany me everywhere if I have to leave the PC lol (including hospital - I'm not above sneaking the Blackberry under my covers and checking my e-mails when the nurses aren't watching!)

Hi,

Thought i would send you a message cos you seem to be in a similar situation as me, well kind of! I don't have the business concerns that you do as am not self employed but i have recently started to hear my biological clock ticking and cannot get it out of my head! Lots of my friends are having babies as well which makes me think about it even more!

I am older than you (28) and have been with my husband for 8 years, we have our own house and both have good jobs. There is nothing really stopping us just getting on and doing it - it's just me - the whole thing terrify's me! From the morning sickness to the labour - i don't do pain very well! Everyone says you forget about it and it's all worth it but it is still really frightening!

The thing is i am just expecting it to happen straight away when some people takes months to conceive. I think we both are just gonna have to bite the bullet and just do it! there never is an ideal time in your life - always be something going on! I wish in a way it would just happen out of the blue then the choice has been taken out of my hands!

Let me know what you decide to do!

Julie

Hi,
im 22 and my oh is 32 and while i dont have my own business, iv just started a new career which has a 2 year probationary period, so was a bit unsure about ttc during it...but 2 be honest weve jst decided to go 4 it next year anyway!!!
Im sure youl work out what's best to do, you might need to take on extra help with your business..member of the family maybe?
sorry i cant be much help, youl get lots of support here though!!xx

Hi Welcome to BnB!

Hi there! While being a tad older than you, our situations are quite similar, I think! I never used to particularly like kids, and had almost no experience of babies at all - I don't think I had ever even held one, but always knew that I wanted my own, and was pretty (sure I would actually like them too LOL!)

I run my own business, but with my husband, so that did make things a bit easier, but it is still bloody hard work trying to keep the business going smoothly. The week after I had my pg confirmed by the doc, I had a threatened miscarriage and had to go into hospital for a week. DH soldiered on on his own and is what absolute hell, but we got through it.

I think you're just going to have to accept that it will be hard, and that at times it will seem impossible, but you have to remember that it never actually is impossible! There is always a way round things!

BTW of course I am totally in love with my own daughter, and since having kids I have also discovered that I like other people's too!

Good luck hun!

I've already started to think of a way around things lol - see my second post on the topic! Perversely, as soon as I started a second one, this one got bumped back up LOL