Godless Mom in the Bible Belt

Scott and I thought long and hard about having a child. For many years we vacillated between going through our lives childless or taking the plunge and going for it.

I'm currently a stay-at-home mom, but in my past life I worked in veterinary medicine. When you talk about domestic companion animals they generally fall into one of two categories, show quality and pet quality. You breed the show quality animals in hopes of bettering the genetic line of the animals, you spay and neuter the pet quality ones to prevent unwanted traits from being passed on to future generations.

Well, if you look at Scott and me as physical specimines we both definitely fall into the pet-quality category. Both of us come from long lines of heart-disease and cancer ridden people, there is even the occasional schizophrenic or manic-depressive that pops up in the genetic line. If we were dogs you wouldn't want to breed us.

And, more importantly the world REALLY doesn't need more people. We are already crawling over the surface of this planet like termites on a fallen oak, destroying everything we touch and killing each other over the limited resources our planet has to offer.

So, after much agonizing and much debate we did the deed and had a child. We didn't make the decision lightly and quite frankly if we had waited another year to we would have found ourselves in a post September 11th world and probably would have elected not to have a child at all. But, fortunately for us we didn't wait and now Liz is as much a part of our lives as the air we breath.

Liz will be the only child we have, mostly for the above mentioned world-overpopulation reason. But, on a more personal note, I don't know if I have it in me to be the kind of mother I want to be to more than one child. I guess I'm going for quality rather than quantity. Grin.

So here are my two cents regarding the decision to have a child. I completely understand and respect those who choose not to have children, it is a responsible and wise decision and affords certain freedoms that you can never have as a parent. I also completely understand those who choose to have one child, parenthood is an amazing thing and if you feel like you have what it takes to be a great parent then having one child can be very rewarding for both parent and child. If you feel the need to have two children because you think that kids need siblings, I suggest you do some research on single children families, both Scott and I were raised in families where we were the only child and neither one of us feel like we missed out on anything by not having another kid around. However, if after you have really looked into the possibility of having only one and you still want two, go for it. But you must stop there.

At two children you have replaced yourself and your mate, it is time to stop. I honestly have a problem with people who have three or more children, it is irresponsible and selfish. Now, I have friends that have three or more and I don't go waving this opinion under their noses but I wish that they had stopped to think about the consequences of their actions before they elected to peel that birth control patch off their asses. I have an aunt in Utah who is in her seventies, she had eight children, those eight in turn grew up and started having kids and now those kids are starting to hit the age where they are beginning to reproduce Thus far my aunt has 32 individuals running around on this planet that are the direct result of her unchecked breeding back in the 40s and 50s and many of those people haven't yet reached reproductive age.

I love my aunt and my cousins but PULEEEZ!!!

If you're going to have children give some thought to the consequences of your actions and act accordingly. Childlessness isn't for everyone but it IS an option and a kid can grow up happy and healthy in a one child family.