When someone asks me how long I’ve been trying to get pregnant, I never really know what to tell them. Sure, there’s the obvious answer—yes. But the other details are hazy. Do I tell them that we’ve been trying since 2018? It wouldn’t be a lie. Our first time, if you will, with a baby in mind was back in October of that year. God, what a fun time that was…but not for obvious reasons. Rather, it was fun thinking about bringing a baby into our fold.

We stopped for a little in November, when the grief I had from losing my mom became too overwhelming. December was fine, before stopping again in January, after my dad was diagnosed with cancer.

Truthfully, that’s where the timeline starts getting funky.

It’d be easy to say that we kept at it while he was sick, but as his disease progressed, the desire for freedom outweighed the desire for parenthood. After describing all we had been doing for him, our friend (who had a 1-year-old at the time) said, “Geez, it sounds like you already have a kid.”

And he wasn’t wrong. My dad was very demanding at all hours. My husband would even get up in the middle of the night to lift him back up in his chair when he started to slip. We applied cream to his bottom. Bought adult diapers. Mashed food up so it was easier to swallow. Gave him a bath. None of this is to embarrass my dad, but rather, to paint a picture of what caretaking was like. We were exhausted. Mentally. Physically. The drain was felt all around.

And then, of course, logistically, how often can you be intimate when your elderly father is sleeping right outside your bedroom door in your one-bedroom apartment?

I felt relief when he died.

About a week after, I remember enthusiastically saying to my husband, “Oh my god, we can finally get back to trying!”

The future, for a moment, seemed clear.

And then I had to get a hysteroscopic metroplasty.

Recovery time for a hysteroscopic metroplasty is short—only a few weeks—but by the time I healed, I found myself deep in the throes of clearing out my parents’ house and being an executor.

But it was fine because we planned to move to Florida. When all the bills were paid, we were outta there. Florida had become a beacon of hope. It was where we could try for a baby again, without reminders of grief and despair. It was where we could start fresh. Finally!

But those dreams came to a screeching halt when I found out that, despite any debts that had been paid, I would have had to wait a full nine months before I could close his estate. The irony of waiting nine months for something you want.

At this point, that was another six months. And I didn’t have another six months left in me.

The deepest depression I’ve ever sunk into occurred over the following year. I’m talking not being able to shower. Not being able to brush my teeth. Not taking the dog out until my husband got home. Living in squalor.

I wanted to get better. I tried taking a vacation, letting someone dogsit for me. I tried cleaning, and thought things were okay. And, then I returned home to see how it looked. Realized how it smelled. I had never been more ashamed of myself in my life.

I’ve said it before, but living with that deep-seated depression was like being trapped behind cellophane. I could push my hand through the material—and yes, it would stretch! But never break.

After quitting my job, I enrolled in therapy. The year I had planned to be in Florida, the year I thought I’d be pregnant, was replaced with another bout of grief counseling and therapy, first to treat the grief and then to treat the severe OCD I was clinically diagnosed with. Made sense. I would say prayer rituals to ensure my dad’s safety at night. I’m surprised I wasn’t diagnosed sooner.

Treatment ensued for a year, and though things got marginally better, I still found myself feeling quite hopeless in mid-September. John came home to see me on the front stoop, depressed, yet again.

I needed to get out of there. I couldn’t heal with memory-filled walls constantly closing in on me. It was like I was digging my own grave.

Despite no money, no jobs lined up, and no real plans, we moved to Florida.

FINALLY—the fresh start I’d been needing! And it was…at first. When my in-laws came to visit last Spring, they both acknowledged how happy we looked. How much happier we seemed. Friends of mine said it, too.

But it took my husband a lot longer than expected to land full-time work. So when we tried, the ensuing financial rough patch would stop us.

Then, we’d be good—spending weekends at Disney or at the pool. And then, I’d see stretch marks on my breasts and immediately fall victim to the idea that I had breast cancer. And I’d be in a downward tumble for the next four months.

Despite feeling happier, there was still a whole lot of healing left to do.

So, sure, we’d get teary-eyed coming across cute stuffed animals or baby onesies at Goodwill.

We’d buy tests and fertility predictors.

Feel happy when we thought there was a chance, and incredibly brokenhearted when we found out the chance was nothing more than a mirage.

Cry when yet another person from high school—often from a grade below me—revealed their pregnancy news.

So yes, we’d try to get pregnant. But life, grief, improper planning, and bouts of depression and OCD would often get in the way. There was never a consistent schedule. There was no, hey, let’s follow the fertility surge, because sometimes, I couldn’t even find my surge.

Sometimes, I’d go all in on counting and planning, and other times, it felt like too much work. Life was already work.

I never know how to answer when someone asks me how long I’ve been trying because on the one hand, it hasn’t been very long.

But on the other hand, it seems like it’s been an eternity—an eternity of pushing it off, missing the window, having to prioritize family, or getting better. And in reality, an eternity of just waiting for things to be…right.

It came to a head in early February when I said to my husband, “Maybe it hasn’t happened because deep down, we don’t want it to happen.”

We were in the car waiting for our dinner reservations, both crying and feeling low about being childless at an approaching 40.

Of course, he asked me what I meant by that. And, the truth was that, while the desire for children was present—and has been for years—maybe it didn’t necessarily outweigh our wanting to get better or have a chance to breathe. At this point, we had both returned to full-time jobs.

Maybe it didn’t outweigh the desire for normalcy.

At the end of the day, that’s what we want to give our child.

Normalcy.

Normalcy in the form of parents who can manage their mental health, whether it be OCD, anxiety, or depression.

Normalcy in the form of steady paychecks, not working around the clock doing freelance.

Normalcy in the form of not being weighed down by grief. Or hopelessness.

Normalcy in the form of having two parents who can function at their fullest, despite the hurdles that come their way.

Had it happened sooner, we would have been happy. But now, the timing’s better.

But it also brings me to the point of desperation because, well, I’ve been desperate to get here. It’s why I convinced myself that I ovulated late last month and was pregnant because my period didn’t arrive. It didn’t occur to me, until this morning, when Aunty Flo finally did arrive, that I got my period on the last day of February, which lasted through the first week of March. I’m not late. I’m 30 days from the last time it arrived.

But that’s the thing when it comes to needing a baby: you’re willing to overlook common sense.

My husband and I woke up early this morning, about an hour before our alarm went off. I made us coffee, and we turned on one of the Disney sunrise episodes—watching the sun rise over top one of the 3 icons of the Disney theme parks. This morning, John chose Animal Kingdom.

We sat in bed, snuggled together with our coffee, watching the sun rise over the Tree of Life. I made a joke about how silly it is watching the sun rise on screen when we could have just walked outside.

But this was more us.

The normal thought, especially when it comes to ending a paragraph like this, would be to say that this moment was enough. It offered us enough peace and tranquility. And this is what we should do—and enjoy—more often.

But it isn’t.

Because all I kept thinking about this morning was that, despite how lovely it was, it would be so much better if there were three of us.

I don’t just want a baby.

I need one.