EIGHT MONTHS OF EVIE
🌷The time gods refuse to slow down, and somehow, Evie’s first year is two-thirds over. I can’t help but think of how close we are to her one-year mark. Every day brings a new facial expression, a new babbling noise, a little closer to crawling. Evie looks like a different baby every morning. My parents took her for a day, and I swear, when we got her back, her hair was longer, and she was taller. Please stop this time train.
Phil and I are 39. If you asked us when we were engaged and first married, what we thought our life would look like at 39, both of us would have said we would be raising two children. It was never a question in either of our minds that we wanted two babies. We wanted our children to have a sibling. To have that unbreakable bond. That resounding friendship, and unwavering loyalty throughout life. A companion that understood what it was like to be raised by Megan and Phil and live in the Day house. I can’t wrap my head around not giving that to Evie. I see her at daycare, and I love that she has her little friends. It brings tears to my eyes thinking of what it would feel like to introduce Evie to her little brother or sister. I also can’t imagine Evie growing into an adult without a sibling to always have around, especially after Phil and I are gone.
As Evie approaches her first year, it’s impossible for me to not feel anxious. Having a child is the most difficult thing for us. It’s not as simple as timing my cycle – it’s trying to find someone that would be open to carrying for us. Someone motived for the right reasons, healthy, trustworthy, someone we know will take good care of our baby for 9 months. It is going through months of medical, legal, and psychological clearance. It is financially planning for the extreme expense of gestational surrogacy. I try to remind myself that we’ve done it before, even when I was at the lowest of low points in my life. Heartbroken and devasted by the loss of our son, only furthered by the loss of my ability to carry.
What a luxury it is to decide how many children you want to have, and especially your preferred age gap (not to mention to absurdity of deciding how many of each gender you want.) In our perfect world, Evie and her sibling will be 2 years apart. To make that happen, we would have to do a transfer in March 2026, and it would have to stick. There are so many variables that are out of our control, and thus, I am feeling the need to get more and more control now. I don’t know if 7 months is enough time to find someone and go through the all the clearance to reach a transfer by March. The reality is, it’s probably not enough time.
Baby steps. Find the oven. Wrap myself around the mindset of doing this again. Truth be told, I feel a lot less pressure this go around, because we our sweet peach puff. I feel a little less desperate than I did a couple years ago, because we no longer must wonder whether we will *actually* get a baby. We already have our daughter. But my mind still wanders. As Evie becomes more and more her own little human, leaving behind her “babiness”, I cannot fathom not having another child. I cannot accept not smelling the newborn smell of my own child. Hearing the coos. The newborn cuddles. The wonder and amazement of “what will s/he be like?” I can’t imagine not having the moment with Evie, where I say “meet “x”, your baby brother/sister.” I’m not ready to give up on my dream of having 2 children with Phil. It’s too profound. Too important. Sure, there are a million reasons not to have children (AI fear, money, age, etc.) But what does all that really matter? There’s nothing more rewarding than raising a family, and nothing more life defining than doing it with your soulmate. More money, less uncertainty, more flexibility – none of those compare to the feeling of raising our little human.
Evie is more than enough, but she deserves a sibling. And frankly, all of us deserve to have the family of our dreams.🌷
