As time passed, the initial excitement of becoming a parent began to fade for one father. Now, he’s facing unexpected challenges and second thoughts, testing their decision.

Here’s what happened.
I (36F) am a neurologist, and I absolutely love my patients and my job. I believe there’s no greater honor than helping others. Getting my medical degree wasn’t easy and involved many rejections.

In high school, I had a lot of problems and didn’t get accepted into any colleges my senior year. I had to start with remedial classes at my local community college. When I finally got into medical school at 26, I was absolutely thrilled.
I met my husband (37M) in my third year of medical school, and we have been married for four years now. My husband works in marketing, and I earn three times his salary. From the start, I told him I wasn’t sure about having biological children. My dream was always to adopt from foster care, and he seemed to understand this.

However, after his best friend had a baby boy last year, he started pushing me to have children. I was against the idea at first because I was just starting my career and wanted to wait a few more years. In August of last year, I found out I was unexpectedly pregnant.

At first, I thought about having an abortion, but after many heartfelt talks with my husband, we decided to keep the baby. He would quit his job and stay home until our daughter was old enough to start preschool.

There were several reasons we decided he should stay home with our daughter:
I make significantly more money than him, so financially it just made more sense.
I am in the first few years of my career as an attending physician. After 4 years of med school and a 4-year residency, I am just starting to practice on my own, whereas my husband has been in his career for 15 years.
I was very clear I had absolutely ZERO desire to stay home and be a housewife. I respect stay-at-home mothers, but my work is my life, and I would go crazy at home all day. This just isn’t a lifestyle I want whatsoever.