“I feel like I’m giving up something,” I said. It was the truth. Everybody I talked to said your life changes so much when you have a baby, but I LOVED my life. It was great! Why mess with it? I didn’t want things to change. What my anxiety kept me from realizing at the time was that a lot of that change is positive.
“I also feel like having a child is a potential for something to go wrong,” I told the therapist.
“So you’ll feel like you’re not in control?” she asked.
Bingo! She nailed it again. My name is Cam and I’m a control freak. For heaven’s sake, y’all, I can’t be a passenger in a car unless I really know the driver—actually, I can’t be a passenger in a car, period—and when you have a child you are NOT in the driver’s seat. You have to totally give up control in your life. Just thinking about that made me sweat.
“Let’s put it this way,” I told the therapist. “If I found out I was pregnant tomorrow, I would be terrified. I’d think my life was over.”
I knew my mother was dying to be a grandmother. God bless her, she’d already saved up an overflowing Ziploc bag of trinkets for that future grandchild—all very small objects that could easily be lodged in a kid’s throat, like marbles, coins and McDonald’s Happy Meal toys. (I don’t think Palmer will be sticking her hand in my mom’s bag of choking hazard treasures until she’s a teenager.) But despite this, my mom was very supportive when I shared what I’d discussed with the therapist.
“That tells you right there that you’re certainly not leaning toward having a child,” she said.
“And you don’t think that’s weird?” I asked.
“Heck no,” she said emphatically.
“Everyone I know keeps saying, ‘Do it now. You’ll be so great.’ ”
“Honey, there’s nothing wrong with people who choose not to have children. My friends who are childless by choice are really happy,” she said. “In fact, they are very intelligent and thoughtful. Any fool can have a baby. Don’t go by what you feel society is telling you to do. You are the only one who can make up your mind about this.” Yup, my mama has always had my back.
“Aren’t you having a good time in your life?” she added.
“Yes. I love my life. And without a kid, I’ll have more money to put you in a really nice nursing home,” I joked.
Whenever I have to make a hard decision, I write a pro/con list. It’s something I’ve been doing since I was a child. So one day I was making a kids-versus-no-kids list when Jason asked what I was doing. When I told him, he also made a list of what he thought our life would be WITH kids and WITHOUT. It was mind-opening to compare my list to his. Jason had written: “With kids, our lives would be enriched, our lives would be more meaningful and our lives would be busier. Without kids, our lives would be lonely, simple and unfulfilled.” Wow. That really woke me up. This was something Jason really wanted, something he’d feel empty without. And the truth was, reading Jason’s pro-kids list did make me feel happy.
On Christmas morning, Jason and I opened the presents we’d gotten for one another and I remember feeling kind of sad, like something was missing. Is this how it’s going to be forever? Just the two of us? I wondered. It felt like a child should be in the room with us.
Shortly after that, I went to a dinner party at Patricia Altschul’s house. Patricia was the matriarch of our show and Whitney’s mom. She is the total embodiment of a Southern grande dame and I love her dearly. She’d hired a psychic for the night and we were all supposed to ask her questions about one another.
“Will Cameran have children?” someone asked. Guess I wasn’t the only one whose mind was on my uterus.
“Yes,” the psychic responded. “By the end of 2017.” (She actually said I would have three children, but even today it would take a big change of heart for me to let two more children come through this vagina.) I couldn’t breathe when she told me her vision for my future, and I couldn’t stop thinking about it afterward. What if I’m putting off what is supposed to be my greatest job or my greatest purpose? What am I doing? I wondered.
About a week or two after that dinner, I got home from work and saw that Jason was sitting out at the end of the dock behind our house. The sun was setting, and I walked outside and sat beside him. He seemed very deep in thought and maybe even a little bit upset.
“What’s going on? What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I was just thinking how nice it would be if I had a child who I could come out here with and teach how to fish,” he said. My heart broke into a million pieces. Jason would be the best dad anybody could possibly have, and here I was robbing a child of that opportunity. He is patient, smart and caring. If our child turned out like him, how lucky would I be?
I made another appointment with the therapist.
“A lot of this comes from childhood stuff,” she explained. “I’m not blaming your parents, but I suspect there was a time in your life where you didn’t have control and you carried that into adulthood. In that case, your indecision is not necessarily a desire not to have a child, it’s fear.”
She was right. I have suffered with fear my whole life and it’s a son of a bitch. I’ve also dealt with anxiety, and both can rob you of your best life. I realized then and there that I didn’t want to be controlled by those emotions anymore. Another reality hit me: If I truly didn’t want to have kids, I wouldn’t have been sitting in that therapist’s office. I wouldn’t be thinking about this over and over and over again. Maybe this won’t be so awful, I thought. Slowly, my perception shifted and I threw away my birth control.
One day when my mom came over, I shared this with her. I think I told her because I knew how badly she wanted a grandchild, and there would be no turning back once the cat was out of the bag.
“Thinking about it makes me nauseous,” I said.
“Maybe it’s just babies that you’re scared of,” she said. OMG. Yes! Yes! Yes! Another lightbulb moment.
“You’re right! I’m not a baby person. I’m more of a little kid person,” I said.
“Cam, before I had you and your sister, I didn’t like babies, either,” my mom said. Wow.
When I resolved to talk about my baby indecision on national television on Southern Charm, I made a conscious choice to be authentic and honest and express my true feelings. People in the South don’t discuss this kind of stuff, but I wanted to help other women because I knew I couldn’t be the only one struggling with this issue. A lot of viewers said things like, “You shouldn’t be having this baby for your husband,” and I agree. That is a dumb reason to bring a child into this world. But it wasn’t just for Jason. In fact, despite really wanting a child, he never pushed me or made me feel like his clock was ticking. Imagining our lives passing us by without a child felt selfish to me. I also came to the realization that I was probably never going to regret HAVING a child (how can you regret something you love unconditionally?), but I might regret NOT having one.
Despite getting some hate from viewers about my indecision, the positive response was much, much more overwhelming. A lot of women DM’d me and said, “I feel the same way, but I felt bad talking about it” or “You have every right to put this amount of thought into your decision.” This validation meant the world. And ever since I had Palmer in November of 2017 (can you believe the psychic was right about the timing?), I’ve been getting at least five messages a day from women saying things like, “I’m in the same boat you were when you were thinking about having a baby. Are you happy with your decision?” Yes, I’m happy. Thrilled, actually. But buyer beware: despite what social media may suggest, it ain’t all roses. Not by a long shot.
I learned that becoming a mom doesn’t have to totally rock your world. You choose how you react to change, so ultimately I found myself excited about the next chapter in my life and looking forward to the opportunity to be less selfish. People message me all the time on Instagram and say, “Be honest. Do you ever regret having Palmer?” or “My husband really wants a baby but I’m
not sure I do. What do you think I should do?” Do I sometimes look at my friends who don’t have children and get a little jealous because they’re going out on a Saturday night? Absolutely! Do I scroll past their vacay pics and wish that I were the one sipping a glass of rosé in front of the Eiffel Tower in Paris? Yes! I’m not going to lie about that. But I think that once you have a kid, and once you love that child for the first time, you’re never going to regret having them, because at that point you can’t imagine your life without them. (That said, if you’re serious about going on vacation four times a year and enjoy peeing by yourself, don’t have a kid.)
All in all, having a child is surely one of life’s greatest experiences, and the best thing I’ve ever done is be a mama to my little angel. I can’t imagine my life without Palmer or without getting to see Jason as a father. I now understand the sorcery that makes women want another baby. (Well, kinda… but more on that later.) Still, something as life-changing as having a kid is a really personal decision, and we have to bust the myth that women need to procreate to be fulfilled or happy. I think there’s a lot to be said for those who choose not to have children. Heck, they probably live longer and have a lot more money, a lot less stress and better relationships with their significant others. I can only tell you my experience, and that doesn’t mean it will be yours. You can talk to those nearest and dearest to you, but take their advice with a grain of salt because only you know what’s best for you.
Chapter Four WHAT BEING PREGGERS IS REALLY LIKE
The amazing thing about becoming a parent is that you will never again be your own first priority.
—OLIVIA WILDE, MOTHER OF TWO
Once I decided to go for it, I got knocked up really, really quickly. So quickly, y’all, that some of the first words out of Jason’s mouth when I told him were, “Have you been cheating on me?” I guess my body had been waiting all along for my mind to catch up.
Here’s what happened. Everyone told me it would take my system months and months to rid itself of birth control and, as a result, months and months to get pregnant. So when my pill prescription ran out, I thought, I’m thirty-three and Jason is forty-one and we have been married for three years. I’m not totally sold on a baby, but since it will take several months to get the process started, maybe I just won’t refill it. Also, my very best friend, Lynn, had just found out she was pregnant, so if I did get knocked up soon, at least I’d be cooking my kid along with my best friend. Fun, right?
(Just a side note: once I started to take the idea of having a baby very seriously, I decided to have full genetic testing done before getting pregnant. My mother’s brother died of cystic fibrosis when he was two years old, so I wanted to be informed if I carried any genes for genetic disease. Luckily, I was fine. There was nothing genetically wrong to make me question the decision to become a mom.)
Well, let me tell you that it’s a complete MYTH that it takes lots of time for your body to regulate after being on the pill. I had been on birth control since I was eighteen years old—that’s fifteen years—and I got pregnant the month I stopped it. Yes, the same month! My first period after stopping birth control was due in two weeks and, even though it seemed totally crazy and against the odds, for some reason I just knew that I was pregnant. So I googled, “How soon can you test for pregnancy?” and found out that some drugstore tests will show results as early as two weeks before you miss your period. This is crazy, I thought as I searched for my car keys. I literally just became sorta okay with the idea of having a child. Am I seriously driving to the pharmacy to buy pregnancy tests? But my trusty inner voice was persistent. “You are pregnant,” it told me. “Go get the tests.” Oh, let me add that at this point I had told Jason none of this. I obviously knew he wanted a baby, but he would have thought I was crazy to be so sure of myself so soon.
I returned home with three different kinds of pregnancy tests. I was testing so early that I wanted options and felt like more than one test might be needed to confirm my hunch. Even though Jason was back from work at that point, I kept what I was doing under wraps. I yelled “Hi” to him and then went straight upstairs to the bathroom. The first test I peed on was the traditional one with the lines. One line means you’re not pregnant; two lines means you are. After waiting two minutes, one line appeared. Not pregnant. It didn’t matter, because my intuition was still raging. “You ARE pregnant,” it was saying. So I moved on to the next test, a digital option. Instead of lines, this one actually says “Pregnant” or “Not pregnant.” (Genius idea!) I peed on the stick and then went to put a load of laundry in the dryer while I waited. When I came back to the bathroom and picked up the test, there was no question about the result. In bold black letters, it read very clearly, “Pregnant.” I sat there shocked, but not shocked, if that makes any sense to you. I knew I was pregnant, but I hadn’t even missed my period yet. This is crazy, I thought. (What’s funny is that I bought that test from the dollar store—several of my friends swore by these—and it said I was pregnant when the one that cost more than twenty bucks at the drugstore said I wasn’t! I’m a bargain hunter anyway, so it’s just more proof that expensive doesn’t mean better. You’re welcome.)
I decided to take the third test before I told Jason. You know, just to REALLY confirm. Again, the result was clear as day: pregnant.
Holy shit, I thought. Jason was downstairs casually watching a football game with no idea how his life was about to change. He’s not going to believe me, I thought. I tried to think of fun ways to tell him. I’m not sure if it’s a Southern thing, but 90 percent of my friends have come up with cute, cheeky ways to tell their husbands they are with child: scavenger hunts, giving them a onesie with their favorite sports team embroidered on it, tying the pregnancy test on the damn dog’s collar and putting literal buns in their ovens for him to open and see. One girl I know even had a custom fortune cookie made… I could go on and on. But I can’t keep a secret for more than thirty seconds and my mind was racing, so there was no way in hell I had time to be creative. I just needed to tell somebody this news and Jason was right downstairs. It won’t be cute or original, but just go and do it, I thought. I walked into Jason’s man cave, holding my collection of pee-soaked pregnancy tests.
“Guess what?” I said, waving the tests in the air. “I’m pregnant.”
“No you aren’t,” he said, barely looking in my direction and instead craning his neck around me to catch an instant replay. “You just got off birth control.”
“I took three tests,” I told him, handing him one. He looked at me, but it was clear that this life-changing news had not registered.
“Come on,” he said. “This is one of those prank tests you can order online.” Now, don’t think Jason is insensitive or a jerk, y’all, because that part was my fault. Over the years, I had pranked Jason about some really stupid stuff. One time I told him I’d dropped my engagement ring down the drain, which was believable because I normally clean my rings in the sink. I can totally keep a straight face when pranking someone. That’s a skill of mine. He looked at me and said, “Well, it’s the only ring you are getting and that’s what you get for being careless.” Of course, a minute later his practical side came over him and he said, “Don’t run the water. I can unhook the pipes and try to find it.” Bless his heart! Another time I put a dead lizard on his pillow, and I even bought fake poop and put it on the floor by our toilet. When we were engaged, I told him I was part of the 1 percent of women who get pregnant while on birth control and that I would be sporting a big old belly at the wedding.
“OMG. This is NOT A PRANK! I swear to you I’m pregnant.” He then took the cap off one test, and that’s when the lightbulb went off (or maybe some pee got on his hand).
“Holy shit! What? How?” he said.
“I don’t know,” I said, laughing. “But we are having a baby!” We hugged, and then just like that, with three pee-soaked pregnancy tests in hand, our journey to parenthood started.
From the moment I f
ound out I was pregnant, I KNEW I was having a girl. I honestly didn’t desire one sex over the other. All I cared about was that the baby was healthy. If anything, I might have wanted a boy slightly more, only because I knew I was probably only going to have one child and figured Jason might naturally want a son. (A lot of men do.) But the moment I found out I was pregnant, I instantly envisioned a little girl. I would have dreams about her, and I know it sounds crazy, but Palmer ended up looking just like the little girl who came to me in my dreams. At ten weeks pregnant, I opted to do the blood test to find out the gender. A few people tried to convince me to wait until the baby was born. “There are so few surprises in life,” they said. That may be true, but for me, finding out what I was having ASAP was a given since I naturally have zero patience. I also had to confirm that I was having a girl so I could start throwing my money away on clothes immediately. (This kid wasn’t even born and soon she would have a wardrobe bigger than my own! Dressing a little girl is so much fun.) A week after I did the test, I called the lab for the verdict.
“We can mail you the results so it can be a surprise for you and your husband,” the nurse told me.
“No thanks. Just tell me now,” I said.
“You want me to tell you over the phone?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said. What part of “just tell me now” did this lady not understand?
“You don’t want to wait for your husband?”
“No, no. Just tell me.”
“It’s a girl!” the nurse exclaimed. I knew it!
When Jason got home from work a couple of hours later, I told him that my suspicions had been correct. Jason is one of three boys, so a girl would be a new experience for him, but one he was super excited about. So no gender reveal party, no fancy cake that’s colored inside or popping balloons to reveal blue or pink confetti. Do I regret finding out alone and over the phone? Well, um… kinda. Why can’t I ever be patient?
One Day You'll Thank Me Page 4
