50 Periods

I didn't want a baby.

It seemed like a lot of work, what with diapers, the not being able to go out to smoky bars, and the mother-in-law who was already telling me how I should dress my daughter. It was nothing I wanted.

This was back in 2000.

I'd been married for year, and my cousin, who was one of my bridesmaids, had just given an all-natural birth to an all-natural baby girl. And she was giddy about it.

So I navel-gazed for a moment, and my uterus winked at me. Sure, it could have been gas, but I like to think that it was my biological clock asking to lend it an ear. "You want a family, don't you?," it ticked. "A kid to share quiet moments with on Sunday mornings?," it tocked. "A way to show-up other moms in supermarket aisles with your superior parenting skills?"

I wasn't exactly convinced, but I was intrigued.

When I discussed it with N, he agreed: he didn't want a baby either. Awesome. But being the smart cookies that we were, we also agreed that (1) we would want children in the future, and (2) the only way to have children in the future was to have babies now. Or at least now-ish.

Thus the plan was hatched: 50 periods.

I don't know how we decided on 50, but 50 was the number we landed on. The deal was that after 50 periods, we would agree to trade contraceptively-induced quiet for playdates and poop.

But planning to want a baby can be tricky, especially when 50 periods is the exact same time that the two of you move across the county without jobs, a car, a home, friends, family, or a plan.

And it's super-duper tricky when your relationship starts to fall apart.