Wherein the Husband Makes the Occasional Post on a "Family" Blog

Oh, you know how it is.

The husband (or simply "DH") drops by these blogs occasionally, writing a brief, disjointed comment or two, and then disappears for weeks at a time, with virtually no input.

You know, I just may end up doing that. It is, after all, tradition, and far be it from me to ignore tradition.

Which isn't to say I'm exactly a "traditional" guy on these blogs. I have no Utah roots by blood, and, culturally speaking, I suppose you could say I straddle the line somewhere between the South and the "Mormon culture" of Utah. I'm not sure what my role is here. Having met far too many sociology majors, I don't really buy into the sociological explanations as much, but I don't feel quite the same sense of "role" as many do.

As the "traditional" husband, and setting aside the grief for the moment, my feelings, thoughts, and concerns lay along the following lines:

1) A constant sense of arrested development

I'll be 28 at the end of this month. This certainly doesn't make me an "old" man by any stretch of the imagination. But I sure am a bit old to, say, go to the in-laws for Christmas. Every. Year.

Don't get me wrong - I have fantastic in-laws. And I've always enjoyed spending time with them, including holidays. But we're really getting to that point where it's time to leave the nest, to strike out on our own, to form our own "family". And, we do have our own "family". We are, of course, married, living together in the holy bonds of matrimony and what have you. But, as our roles in the home aren't particularly well-defined (thanks, 1960's!) and as there is little to structure to our days, we often seem to find ourselves slowly shifting from being "spouses" to being in some ways, like, well, roommates. Obviously, there are some pretty significant differences, but the basic concept is there.

Being a parent, on the other hand, brings meaning. It defines roles, creates expectations, and gives couples a reason for structure cause to rally behind. It brings you together in a way that wasn't possible before.

I think we're ready to be brought together like that - we just can't at this point. And that bothers me.

2) Pessimism and detachment

As if two people who have gone to law school and are only a year away from becoming full-fledged lawyers needed any more of this. Let's just say that "optimism" isn't exactly a word we've heard a lot lately. Lawyers make horrible businessmen. To the extent that lawyers recognize this, they succeed. Lawyers are trained to see risk, not opportunity; to look for problems, not solutions.

We've been here - twice. We've lost - twice.

When the third time comes around, I just don't see it being a happy event at this point. Not a time to ponder the joy that will happen in 9 months, but the pain that is certain to come around in a few weeks. And how to handle that inevitable pain. Sonograms and ultrasounds, those traditionally happy moments for parents, won't be opportunities to see the baby but to wait for the ax to fall. And why bother setting anything up if you're going to have to take it down? Why spread the "good news" if you've got to go through the awkward-for-all-parties reversal in just a few weeks?

And how will this affect attachment? Should we avoid giving out names? Thinking about the future? Wondering if "it" will be a boy or a girl? Will I view "it" as a wonderful person in utero or a devastating disappointment on the horizon?

I don't know.

3) Uncertainty

We're at a bit of a crossroads right now.

I was recently given a (conditional) offer to join the Foreign Service. To say that this process was long and difficult would be an understatement. But it's also been a dream of mine to join up and see the world, learn languages, and serve my country.

The problem, of course, is that I have no idea where we'll be sent. I know that we'll be in D.C. for 2-10 months, and then to the four winds. This means that access to fertility treatments and adoption processes will be unpredictable, to say the least.

As the side panel of the blog points out, we've been married for quite some time now. We're both ready to have a family. We don't want to delay this unnecessarily. This does not work well with the Foreign Service life of living in third world countries with little basic medical care, let alone fertility specialists. In some countries, I imagine the only fertility treatments available to us would involve dancing and chanting...

So the road to joining the Foreign Service may well have been a long, hard road to nowhere. If the service will effectively prevent us from having kids for the next five years (a not-unlikely conclusion), then, well, it just might not be for us.

But where does that leave us? What are we to do? What about the dream?

I don't know. A lot can happen between now and August 2010, the earliest I would ship out for training. But that also makes it hard for me to (honestly) shop for private sector jobs or plan anything. We've put off purchasing furniture, electronics, most any "heavy" objects, a car and a lot of other things all because we might be shipped to a country in 18 months where we couldn't take them with us. But that "might" is really bothering me right now. I don't like not knowing where I'll be. I don't like looking at an unruly stack of books on my desk and remembering that I might be moving across the country and across the world in a year's time, so I better not buy that bookcase.

And what if we stay here? Where will I work? Where will we live? How will we pay the bills? At what point do we decide the Foreign Service is a go, or not?

I have no idea. With the possible need for fertility treatments or adoption procedures ahead of us, I just can't say where we'll be or what we'll be doing in the next year, which has effectively put our lives on hold yet again - and may torpedo a dream.


So, those are the "DH"'s sily, selfish, decidedly male thoughts. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll let the missus wander back in here and fix things up.