Thinking About Parenting

How can I be ready for parenting someday?

First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes a baby in the baby carriage. Have you heard that saying before? 

That statement is a societal belief about the appropriate sequence of key life events. The belief is that children are better off when their parents love each other and are in a happy healthy marriage before they’re born. What do you think about the statement? Is it outdated?

Let’s keep going. What about the following statements? Do you agree or disagree with them? Tell us why or why not. 

1. You should be finished with school and in a career before becoming a parent.
2. Two people should be in a healthy, committed relationship such as marriage and living in the same home before having children.
3. Having a child with someone is a good way to show them that you really love them.
4. People should get all of their young people's stuff out of the way so they can be a parent.
5. Both the mother and the father should contribute to the financial support of their children.

What family structure do you envision for your future? What lessons from your childhood do you want to carry forward? You have choice, flexibility, and balance to make those decisions. 

Commitment is about choice. Family is a choice for adults, but not for a child. Whenever you have sex that could result in pregnancy you may not be making a choice to have a child, but you are making a choice to be responsible for a child if you make one. 

So, although class, race, and what you’re born into aren’t choices or decisions we can make when we’re born into a family, having a child is a choice—even if you didn’t intend to have one. 

Think about these key events. Should they happen in this order before you have a kid? Give us your thoughts. 

1. Graduate from high school
2. Graduate from college / trade school
3. Start a career
4. Travel to new places
5. Get your own place 
6. Fall in love
7. Get married / enter a committed relationship

Raising kids is a full-time—and expensive—job. Having things in place, whether it’s finishing school and starting a career or being in a committed relationship, will make your parenthood journey easier. Or if you decide to have a kid but not stay in a relationship with your child’s other parent, you need to figure out how you’re going to co-parent together, become your child’s legal parent, and pay child support.

Ultimately, it’s about breaking the cycle of poverty, violence, and addiction, so your future child can have a better, more economically flexible childhood.