Well, it's decided! The so-called "mom gene" apparently really exists, thanks to a new study that showed female mice have a genetic link to nurturing traits.
If you talk to a group of human females, though, you'll get as many responses as there are women. Do we have the mom gene? Science may have only proven that it exists in the rodents, but I think the answer is clear: some of us do, some of us don't. And I know this without a doubt because of a very scary realization.
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About a month ago, it hit me like a piano falling off of a high-rise building: I have to be a mom. No, seriously, I HAVE to be a mom. It's not actually an option for me. It's something that absolutely positively must happen, no matter what! At the time that I came to this conclusion, I was having coffee with a new friend who was single, nearing 40 and seriously considering her options because her biological clock started ticking–and ticking LOUDLY. Even so, I have to admit that it freaked me out to realize my own determination to have babies.
Why was this such a frightening thought for me? Well, for one thing, I'm only 26 and nowhere near emotionally or financially prepared to raise a child. That's not even to mention that I am unmarried and living with a roommate. Like I said, I am just NOT ready right now. The thing about not being ready right now, though, is that I realized that one day I WILL be ready to take that step–and the scariest realization was that I want to be a mom whether or not I have someone to share parental duties with.
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So what's going to happen when I'm 35 (well, maybe 38) and not married? I'm planning to have a child anyway. I don't know yet if I'll adopt or get artificial insemination but I do know that I will have a baby, one way or another. I have friends now who are married and don't want any children, saying they never have and never will. I guess they just don't have that "mom gene". I've always been good with kids, though, and I've always known I wanted them. Realizing that I would have a child even without a husband was a scary realization, but I guess that's just more proof that, at least for me, the "mom gene" is VERY real.
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