So yesterday I wrote about why having a baby is a great idea, today is the other side: reasons you might not want to have a baby.

1. You can pop out to buy a pint of milk in less than 5 minutes. I can get out the house pretty quickly with the baby, it’s my 4 year old that takes forever to get appropriately attired. Even so I have to make sure I have the changing bag with all the right things in, I have to get the baby in the sling or buggy, and a last minute nappy change or crying for milk throws everything off. Even if you just need one thing from the shop down the road having a baby turns it into a mission.

2. You no longer get to control when and how much you sleep. Not only do babies stop you sleeping at night, and stop you having a lie in, but they also prevent you having naps during the day.

3. Have you seen those pictures of what happens to your organs at 9 months pregnant? Basically everything is squished right down or all the way up to make space for the baby. Even if everything goes back into place on the inside, the outside will change. Stretch marks are likely as are deflated boobs (whether you breastfeed or not). You may end up with scarring either on your lady bits or bikini line and fat seems to decide it wants to hang out on new locations on your body. 

4. It's expensive. It’s estimated that a child born this year will cost parents around £230,000 to support to the age of 21. And that only includes c£9000 for toys and hobbies. Buy them their own iPad and you’ve used up a years worth of that already. £11.5k of that is in year 1. Just think what you could do with all that money. More info in this article.

5. You get to see more of your family, and your partners family, whether you want to or not (admittedly mine are all lovely, but I have friends with stories which explain the inlays jokes).

6. You get less presents at Christmas because everyone wants to buy for baby instead. Children are much more fun to buy gifts for than adults and they get presents for all sorts of occasions: birth, christening, birthday, Christmas. At least while they are small you get to open the presents, but after the age of 1 you just have to write all the thank you letters.

Christmas for a 1 year old!

7. You never get any me time. On the rare occasions you are baby free you are likely to spend that time sleeping, cleaning or shopping. You might get a handful of nights out in the first year, but remember that hangover will be accompanied by shrieks, shouting and giggles, probably and an extra early hour.

8. You stop being you. “What’s your name?”, “Kate”. 5 minutes later “see you later M’s mummy”. It’s hard to remember all the names of people you meet and their children’s names so you are often just referred to as mummy. While it’s cute from your kids it does sometimes feel like you have lost part of your identity. My ex once said “thanks Mummy” when I gave him his Valentine’s card!

9. It is impossible to get through the first 6 months without having conversations about poo: the colour, the texture, the frequency. What starts with the midwife continues into social conversations. Fortunately poop is pretty inoffensive before they are on solids, but the conversations don't stop when they are weaned or even when they are toilet trained. You will ask countless times: do you need a poo? Have you done a poo in your pants? If talking about it isn’t fun enough for you, you also get to scrub it out of clothes. Top tip sunlight is brilliant at fading newborn baby poo.