Preparing for Parenting

A thought struck me this morning. In many ways, preparing for a child is like preparing for a wedding. But preparing for a wedding is nothing like preparing for a marriage, and preparing for a child, I would imagine, is nothing like preparing to parent.

So often in todays day and age, it is the wedding day that has the most time and effort spent on it in the run up to the big day, and hardly a thought is given to the lifelong marriage this is to occur from that point on. And it seems to be the same where having children are concerned. A lot of time and effort (in some cases) is spent learning how to get pregnant in the first place, what the pregnancy will be like, how to cope with being pregnant and then of course there is the birth itself. Like marriage preparation classes and wedding fayres, there are birthing classes to attend so that you can be as prepared as you can be for the Big Day. But what is there for after the Big Day? How many people prepare for the task of parenting post birth? And when do they start that preparation? The week before the baby is born?

Among Christian circles (and this has become more evident to me as I have read through the Web over the last few years), young women and men are encouraged to prepare for marriage before they even meet the person they will spend the rest of their life with. How much more should we prepare for parenthood? We do not only have another heart in our hands, but a whole life and soul that is fully dependent on us.

So I am going to start my preparations for parenthood. I believe that someday, sooner or later, God will grant Hubby and I the blessing of being parents. I don't know when that will be, but I want to honour God in the way we parent, and the best way to do that I feel is to start the preparations now.