{January Joy - 18th Jan}

The prompt for today's #JanuaryJoy post, 'Do some Family planning' definitely got me reflecting on the previous few years... 

I had a peek at Wikipedia to see what the definition of family planning is, and it's as I thought:

'the planning of when to have children and the use of birth control and other techniques to implement such plans'

I got married when I was 25 years old, and I always knew that I wanted to be a mum so it seemed natural to start trying for a baby quite soon. My husband is 4 years older than me and most of our friends were older, so we weren't the first to have children. After 11 months of trying and the disappointment after each negative pregnancy test, I remember being shocked when the result was finally positive - I couldn't quite believe it. At the time my husband wasn't with me, as I was convinced it was going to be another negative result so I took the test on my own. I couldn't contain myself and ended up calling him on his mobile to tell him the exciting news. However, he was on a train with a work associate and wasn't able to share in my delight... whoops! 

Anyway, we waited 12 weeks and had a private scan before we told any of our friends or family, the only other person that knew was a work colleague who I had to inform for health & safety reasons. I have Crohn's Disease for which I take immunosuppresant drugs every day and I was a little concerned that this might impact negatively upon the pregnancy. My early pregnancy was a breeze surprisingly enough (no sickness or anything!), but it was the latter stages that things became difficult and I developed a serious liver condition called obstetric cholestasis.

I had my son when I was 27 and it wasn't the easiest of journey's into motherhood - I went into spontaneous early labour at 33 weeks and I wasn't ready at all.  

My son, when we finally got him home from hospital aged 5 weeks!

There is just 22 months between my sister and I, and from the outset I had my heart set on having two children close together in age. My husband was on the same page, and after a traumatic year with our son we decided selfishly that if were going to have another we would do it quickly to 'get the difficult baby bit over with as soon as possible'. I ended up falling pregnant shortly after my son's first birthday, a few weeks after we decided to start trying! There was concern from my obstetrician that I would develop the liver condition again and go into labour even earlier, and I spent each week worrying that I might develop the dreaded itch. I made it to 35 weeks symptom-free and was induced at 37 weeks giving birth to a beautiful little girl when I was 29.

During all this my marriage had hit a rough patch and things were far from great. And now, here I am, aged 31 as a single mummy with two toddlers. 

I'm now not sure that there is a right time to start family planning. I believed I was being sensible and had it all thought through in my head... and look where I've ended up.

Now I'm trying to live for the moment... not worrying about the future or contemplating the past too much. What's done is done... 

{image source}