No pressure?

Jennifer and Mike Erickson

These days I’m finding it hard not to laugh when people bring up the subject of babies.

For one, I’m almost afraid to drink the water around my friends. We’re into the double-digits of people we know having babies. I suppose in our early 30s we should have expected it, but I’ve been a bit surprised just how common the “we’re pregnant” calls and Facebook updates have become.

Having reached 10 months of marriage and four years together overall, I can’t even tell you the number of times we get the question of when we’re going to have kids. You can almost predict by the look people get when the question is coming as they decide whether to take a subtle or more obvious approach.

But really, for me, the amusing part comes when the person almost always follows the question with an inevitable “no pressure” comment and chuckle. Because of course by bringing it up you are exerting not-so-subtle pressure. It isn’t just friends and family. Coworkers, strangers and even my doctor have made comments.

I poured through magazine after magazine preparing for our wedding and I don’t recall seeing any articles forewarning brides that the minute the I Do’s are said the baby questions begin. What about the newlywed bliss? Or getting through the adjustments of the first year of marriage without adding another life-changing event to it? It seems like a pretty abrupt switch to immediately move from gowns and place settings to onesies and car seat specifications. Catching up on sleep after the wedding alone was imperative without adding pregnancy-induced insomnia to the mix.

I’ll cop to the fact that we probably encourage the question because we both clearly love kids and seem to be surrounded by adorable, smiling, happy children ALL THE TIME. I admit we both get goofy grins and melt at a cute baby or toddler. From hanging out with friends with kiddos to being seated near cute children in restaurants we’ve somehow avoided seeing tantrums or anything to dissuade us of the possibilities of having kids. And that does make parenthood seem pretty appealing, though we know it’s not that easy all the time.

Despite all that, we’re pretty happy settling into married life and looking forward to holding (and handing back) all the adorable babies due to bless our friends' lives in the next nine months. So for now, we’ll just smile and laugh along with the “no pressure” comments and continue working on formulating snappy answers to the kids question. If you came up with a great retort before having kids, or have one you use today, please share. Cause I know we’ll get the question again real soon.

Jennifer Erickson
Sr. Public Relations Specialist
Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital Hurst-Euless-Bedford