Those of you who have read my blog know that at 36 and 364 days (birthday 37 is tomorrow!) I’ve come to understand the giving birth to a child might not be in my life’s plan.  That’s fine with me.  I have a great life of freedom and fun.  That was until the other night …

My boyfriend Frank has been over in Afghanistan since February, which means that the only sex I’ve been having is with myself.  Enjoyable, but not as good as a ménage a deux.  All of this in mind, you can imagine how I felt when I had a dream last week that I was pregnant with Frank’s baby.  It was one of those visceral dreams – so real that I could “feel” my belly growing.  I was freaked out.  I can’t remember how in the dream that I told Frank I was pregnant, but I do remember the person I was most afraid of telling was my friend Kathleen.  I was worried that the baby was going to change my life and ruin all my fun.

I decided to email Frank about my dream.  Obviously this wasn’t just me sharing my dream with him.   My subconscious motivation was to gauge his reaction.  How would he react to me telling him that I dreamed about having his baby?  So I forged ahead and wrote the email.  To my surprise this is what came back,

“I would love to have a baby with you. Although, I assume that isn’t possible with our age group. Besides, you are so active, I wouldn’t want to adversely affect your life.”

Wow – I was flattered and insulted at the same time.  He “would love” to have a baby with me (flattering) and in the same breath he calls me old (insulted).  In all honesty, when I read the first sentence a pulse of energy rushed through my body.  Then I panicked.  What do I do now?  I politely reminded him that I wasn’t that old yet and that one can always adopt.  The part that did worry me was giving up my current lifestyle.

When I told him that I was worried about losing my freedom to a child he responded,

“The right man will be happy to watch the child while you go on drunken, debaucherous adventures. I’m sure all he’ll want is to have his brains screwed out by said drunken wench upon her return.”

Again, flattered and insulted at the same time.  I presume that he considers himself to be the “right man” for the job.

So now that I’m armed with all of this information.  What do I do?  I’m torn now.  Do I really want to have a child?  Upon sharing it with Kathleen, first she said, “Make sure he puts a ring on it.”  And then she said “I’ll forgive you.”  As long as Frank is willing to be a stay-at-home dad for the times when I want to jet off for a holiday with my friends, I might start to sway.

However, Frank and I have a long row to hoe before we get to the ‘baby talk.’  He’s been away for a year and we were only together two months before he left.  We have a lot to learn about each other and there is the possibility of having to deal with any emotional issues he brings back from Afghanistan.  Basically we will be starting over at the first date when he returns.  A year is a long time and people change.  I’m not questioning our love for each other, but will we be the same people that we fell in love with?  I’ve been in this position before, loving someone who went off to war and then came back a different person, and our relationship fell apart.

Only time will tell.  Three months until his return!

Baby’s room photo available from Shutterstock.

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    Last reviewed: 1 Dec 2011