Having children. Yes or no?

Perhaps I am not qualified to write this article. After all, I'm a
single 23 year old girl who has never even gone steady with a good man
before.

I am often sceptical about having children. For one thing, the
childbirth must be painful. For another, I imagine their teenage years
when they will be wilful and rebellious. I also imagine all the money
that I can save if not for them. All my money will be spent just on
myself. Isn't that great?

I have often questioned couples' decisions to have children. Is it
because of religion or their upbringing from their parents? That this
is the natural cycle, and that this is the normal route? Or is it
because they just want to feel fulfilled as a human being, to go forth
and multiply, then they will feel complete? Or is it because deep
within them, they have cherished hopes and dreams that were destroyed
along the way at some point or other? Hopes and dreams......that they
can fulfil through their children, perhaps?

These are my doubts. And I often ponder. And think. And ponder again.

I mean, even if one gets married, isn't a couple world that just
belongs to two magnificicent? In fact, I was so sceptical that I wrote
in my blog a response to emotional letters addressed "Dear Mummy"
written by pro-life activists. This is what I wrote:

Dear Mummy,

I am your little baby and I am in Heaven now. It's nice in Heaven
Mummy. Since I will go back to Heaven when I'm dead if I'm good, can't
I remain in Heaven, Mummy?

It's not that I don't love you Mummy. I do. It's just that I may
become obsessed with money, Mummy. Or be aroused by sex and go around
as I like every night. I also want to save you all the heartaches that
I may bring to you and Daddy. I want to save you all the stabs in the
heart and the tears in your eyes. So why not just let me be, Mummy?
Where I will remain in Heaven.

Love,

Your baby

I wrote this. And read it again. And again. But then there was just
one night when I was alone in my room. And I heard the patter of tiny
feet. A baby crying. Laughter in the house. A whole family playing
together.

That flash came. Just a flash. But it left an ache. A ache that I still remember.

Does this flash come to you too? Just at these little moments and
times? Sometimes I wonder, what if my baby was in hell now? And he or
she had been good in hell and now had a chance to go Heaven. Was my
letter wrong then? Or what if my child went to another mother and had
to suffer because I didn't give birth to him?

I suppose I am thinking too much. Yet, further on, as I grow up more
and grow wiser, perhaps I will start thinking and tell my baby:" My
dear baby, you must learn how to live on Earth. Mummy will teach you
how. And that's because Mummy loves you very very much."

And then a family will be formed. And another and another. The best
way that each and every one of us know how, when we use our own
experiences to guide our little ones.