Is anyone here a student?

[lanyac]

Just curious how you think pregnancy will affect schooling. I'm a grad student, in my third year of a phd program. It seems like right now is the optimal time to get pregnant.... In between quals (which I passed! yay!) and defending (year 5-6.) I talked with my H, and we decided if we're not pregnant by 2014, we'll stop trying for a bit. I don't want to be pregnant or have a newborn while I'm trying to write and defend.

[tarheels]

I am. If we don't get it this month (I'm 7 DPO), we're out for at least a year, maybe 2. I'm in my final year of one program and I start a one year post-grad in September. School's an easy life (in my program at least) because you're only in class a couple hours a day and don't have to do much of anything all semester until it comes time to put in 10-12 hour days before finals. We feel like my final year is a great time to have our first because I'll have plenty of free time, and by the time I graduate and we want more kids, we'll already have a good number of kid raising "OMG, what do I do about this?!" hiccups worked out so (hopefully) things are smooth sailing with my employer.

[lauree1183]

We're waiting to start trying until I'm done with school (which is December- 5 more weeks! YAY!). I initially didn't want to wait, but it's working out and I'm only 29 so I feel like we have some time. I'm really hoping we get pregnant right away though

[lanyac]

Nov 12, 2012 10:49:05 GMT -5 lauree1183 said:

We're waiting to start trying until I'm done with school (which is December- 5 more weeks! YAY!). I initially didn't want to wait, but it's working out and I'm only 29 so I feel like we have some time. I'm really hoping we get pregnant right away though

December! That's awesome. What program are you in?

How many kids do you want?

[lanyac]

Nov 11, 2012 12:53:59 GMT -5 tarheels said:

I am. If we don't get it this month (I'm 7 DPO), we're out for at least a year, maybe 2. I'm in my final year of one program and I start a one year post-grad in September. School's an easy life (in my program at least) because you're only in class a couple hours a day and don't have to do much of anything all semester until it comes time to put in 10-12 hour days before finals. We feel like my final year is a great time to have our first because I'll have plenty of free time, and by the time I graduate and we want more kids, we'll already have a good number of kid raising "OMG, what do I do about this?!" hiccups worked out so (hopefully) things are smooth sailing with my employer.

Yeah, we only have classes 1st and 2nd year, and then one class once a week in third year. I figured this would be the best time.

Actually, its my coworkers that convinced me its time to have a kid. One is in her 60s, and has a 12 year old and a 15 year old, both girls. The others are both in their early 50s. One has two boys, 8 and 16, and the other has three kids, 15 is the oldest. I sure as heck do not want to be an old parent.

My mother is 52 (sorry, mama!) and both my brother and I are out of the house and married. She goes out most nights with her friends, has her house paid off, and she's just living her life. She had my brother at 22 and adopted me at 27.

[serendipity]

I think it would be extremely difficult to have a newborn while trying to finish school...I actually just graduated in August and don't think I could have gotten through a full time program with a baby. Good Luck!

[tarheels]

Nov 12, 2012 11:27:02 GMT -5 lanyac said:

Nov 11, 2012 12:53:59 GMT -5 tarheels said:

I am. If we don't get it this month (I'm 7 DPO), we're out for at least a year, maybe 2. I'm in my final year of one program and I start a one year post-grad in September. School's an easy life (in my program at least) because you're only in class a couple hours a day and don't have to do much of anything all semester until it comes time to put in 10-12 hour days before finals. We feel like my final year is a great time to have our first because I'll have plenty of free time, and by the time I graduate and we want more kids, we'll already have a good number of kid raising "OMG, what do I do about this?!" hiccups worked out so (hopefully) things are smooth sailing with my employer.

Yeah, we only have classes 1st and 2nd year, and then one class once a week in third year. I figured this would be the best time.

Actually, its my coworkers that convinced me its time to have a kid.

Older women in my profession actually encourage married students who are ready for children to have them in school. It's talked about often on blogs of the profession. It's so much easier on your career later, if you can swing it financially, that is.

[lanyac]

I think financially we'll be ok. I have a pretty decent stipend, we have no SL debt or credit card debt. We own both of our cars. Our monthly bills are just food, utilities, mortgage.... I can probably take 6 weeks off without an issue, and I can pick my own hours (my boss is pretty awesome.) DH is in school as well, but I figure we can stagger our schedule so we won't have to spend much on daycare. My mom is pretty baby crazy, so she might help as well.


I don't want a newborn, which is why I put a cap on when we would stop trying to get pregnant. If I graduate like I should in 2015, then I want to stop trying early 2014.

[lauree1183]

Nov 12, 2012 11:23:08 GMT -5 lanyac said:

Nov 12, 2012 10:49:05 GMT -5 lauree1183 said:

We're waiting to start trying until I'm done with school (which is December- 5 more weeks! YAY!). I initially didn't want to wait, but it's working out and I'm only 29 so I feel like we have some time. I'm really hoping we get pregnant right away though

December! That's awesome. What program are you in?

How many kids do you want?

I'm graduating with my BA in Communications. I'll be the first person in my entire family on both sides to have a college degree I've spent the last 4 years working full time and going to school year round.

We'd like to have two kids, maybe three someday, but I think we'll end up sticking with two...

[HoneySpider]

I am...I am finishing up my doctoral program and will graduate in May (but will be done by March-ish).

We probably would have started TTC a little earlier if I wasn't in school, but there was no way to do school/work FT/commute and have a baby. We waited until a point where I knew I would be done with coursework and most major requirements. If it had happened right away, it wouldn't have been the best timing ever as I would have been pretty pregnant for comps but I also knew the chances of it happening right away weren't great (and if it did, it was something we could deal with).

It ended up taking us 10 months so I'm glad we didn't delay any longer. My mom really thinks that the stress of school might have affected my ability to get pregnant - I was holding on to a lot of stress I didn't even realize. Once I got over the major hurdles, I got pregnant. So could be a coincidence, but might not be.

GL in whatever you decide to do...it's really hard to try and balance everything all at once. Most of our family was surprised by our news because they thought we'd wait until i was completely done.

[lanyac]

Nov 13, 2012 10:54:12 GMT -5 HoneySpider said:

. Most of our family was surprised by our news because they thought we'd wait until i was completely done.

My family is really unsupportive (is that a word? Lol.) They still think of me as a student, and not capable of making big decisions. It was a shitfest trying to get them to accept that I was changing cell phone carriers, getting married, getting a dog, buying a house, etc. They want me to stay a child forever.

[HoneySpider]

That really sucks, I'm sorry your family has trouble dealing with you being an adult and making your own decisions!

I am fortunate that my family has been very supportive of me, no matter what decisions I've made. They know how stressed out I was this year and how much I am looking forward to being done with school. It actually was really cool for me that my parents were surprised - this is going to sound totally bratty, but when my brother and SIL announced earlier this year that she was pregnant, it was really hard on me. I'm older, been married longer, and just always imagined I'd give my parents their first grandchild. Then they go starting TTC 8 months after getting married and get KU on the first try (we'd been trying a few months at this point). Anyway, I totally digress. I'm sorry I don't think this even has a point. I am so all over the place today.