Should I Wait to Get Pregnant After a Couple of Vacations? What Real Parents Need to Consider
Last Tuesday, my friend Lila dragged her dented carry-on into my kitchen after flying home from their second big trip in two months, dropped it by the shoe rack, and grabbed a glass of iced tea before she even kicked off her sandals. She pulled up a photo on her phone of her and her husband Mike, both pink from the Greek sun, leaning against a white stone wall, then looked up at me. “Everyone keeps asking when we’re going to start trying for a baby now that we checked our trips off the list,” she said. “But I keep going back to this question: should I wait to get pregnant after having these two vacations? What if I rush it and regret it later?”
Lila and Mike put off trying for two full years to make these trips happen. They skipped buying a new car when Lila’s old sedan hit 150,000 miles, took on extra side projects walking dogs and editing freelance resumes, and stayed at friends’ apartments instead of hotels whenever they could to cut costs. Lila’s mom had been telling her since she got married that you’ll never get carefree travel again once you have kids, so they made it a priority to get those big trips out of the way first. Now that they’re home, their laundry pile is still spilling over the couch, Lila’s got a faint tan line around her watch, and everyone from her coworkers to her Great-Aunt Mabel has an opinion on when she should start trying. Half say she’s 32, she shouldn’t wait any longer. The other half say she should do one more big trip before her body changes forever.
I’ve been in that exact spot. I got pregnant with my son three months after my husband and I wrapped up back-to-back trips: our honeymoon in Costa Rica and a cross-country road trip to visit old college friends. I spent six weeks after we got home spiraling over the same question: did I wait long enough? Should I push it back another year to fit in that trip to Japan I’d always wanted? I’d read all the same blogs and social media posts saying you need to check every last travel dream off your list before you have kids, because it’s all diaper changes and 2-hour car rides to the next town over after that.
I ended up starting when we planned anyway, and what I found out was that most of that hype was wrong. I didn’t resent my son for cutting my travel days short. I didn’t sit around wishing I’d done one more big trip before getting pregnant. What I did have was a lot of unexpected travel that was just as good, just different. We took my son to the beach when he was 7 months old, just carried him in a wrap and ate fish tacos while he napped. I went on a low-key babymoon with a friend when I was pregnant with my second, just a long weekend in a cabin two hours away, and it was way more relaxed than any big international trip I took before kids.
That said, there are some good, solid reasons to wait after your vacations, and it’s worth sorting those out from the noise. When Lila and I sat at my kitchen table picking at blueberry muffins and sorting through her options, we started with a really simple exercise I wish someone had told me to do when I was in her spot: pull out your notes app and write down exactly why you want to wait. No vague lines about wanting more adventure, just the real, practical stuff.
Lila’s first bullet was “we spent all our extra savings on these two trips, and we don’t have anything set aside for prenatal copays or a crib or time off work if I have to stop working early.” That’s a great reason to wait. That’s not just FOMO from Instagram, that’s a real practical issue. If that’s your reason too, waiting 6 to 12 months to rebuild a $1,000 baby emergency fund after paying for trips is a totally reasonable call. You don’t have to start trying the second you unpack your suitcase just to meet someone else’s timeline.
Her second bullet was “I’m scared I’ll never get to go to Japan, the big trip I’ve always wanted, once I have a baby.” That’s the one we talked through the most. I told her what I tell everyone: the idea that you can’t travel with kids is a myth we’ve all bought into because of social media, where everyone posts their perfect pre-baby beach photos and complains about how hard traveling with kids is. You don’t have to do a 12-hour international flight to Tokyo with a toddler if you don’t want to, but you can absolutely go in a few years, when your kids are old enough to actually enjoy the temples and the food too. Or, if you really want to go before you have kids, you don’t have to wait a whole year to start trying: you can plan the trip for your first or second trimester, when most people feel pretty good and can still fly easily. Most doctors clear you for international travel until 28 weeks, so you can fit the trip in after you’re already pregnant if you want.
A month after that kitchen table talk, Lila texted me. She and Mike decided they’ll start trying in four months. They booked a cheap long weekend trip to the Blue Ridge Mountains for October, to fit one more low-key trip in before they start, and they’re putting $500 a month into savings to build back their buffer after that. She said she still worries sometimes: what if she waits too long, what if she starts too soon and regrets not going to Japan? That’s normal, I told her. There’s no perfect timeline here. Some people are ready to start trying the day they get home from their last trip. Some people need a year to get their bearings and their savings back. The only bad choice is picking a timeline that doesn’t fit you, just because your aunt or a random influencer on the internet said that’s what you should do.
Last week, she sent me a photo of them picking strawberries at a local farm, sun on their faces, and captioned it “taking it one week at a time.” That’s all any of us can do, right?
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