Ask most people what a person should consider before becoming a parent, and perhaps the most common response would be, "Are you reasonably financially stable?" Most people recognize that it is not necessary to be extremely wealthy before bringing a child into the world, but that parents who struggle to feed and shelter themselves should not add a third (and innocent) person. The fact is a person's income level has nothing to do with the kind of parent he will be, but a basic level of financial stability cushions the parent and child from some of the destructive forces of poverty.
Poverty is not just a matter of who has to buy the cheap paper towels and store-label bread. It's about who can't afford to rent a two-bedroom apartment to set up a nice little home, or who has to live in subsidized housing in neighborhoods not fit for raising a child. Serious financial struggles permeate the mood of a parent, and if they go on long enough they can inevitably exhaust a parent to the point where she is incapable of giving her child the time and attention he needs.
Most people realize that there isn't often any such thing as a guarantee of financial stability, and most know if they wait for the ideal financial situation to have a child they may never have that child. Still, the fact is that somewhere between a guarantee of abundant wealth and permanent stability and "dirt poor", there is level of reasonable stability that a parent to offer his child what all children deserve. That level may not offer a parent life of never having to budget to pay the heating bill, but it will not result in a child's living with life's triple punch of a parent too stressed out to meet a child's emotional needs, an environment that doesn't always meet a child's needs for physical comfort and safety, and the mix of toxic factors contribute to a general feeling of being a "have not" in this world.
So, financial stability is an important consideration. There are, however, other, equally important considerations. Right up there with financial stability are the matters of emotional and mental stability. As with financial stability, it isn't necessarily required that any potential parent be a perfect specimen of emotional and mental health. No human being is a "perfect specimen". There is, though, that basic level of solid emotional and mental health that is a child needs in a parent, and one of the vital ingredients to strong emotional and mental stability is always maturity.
The human being is not completely finished maturing until close to twenty five years old. Maturation, of course, is a gradual process; and a twenty-three-old person is usually more mature than an eighteen-year-old. Still, bones are not finished with the growth process until about twenty-five. More important, the brain is not completely finished developing until early- to mid- twenties. The prefrontal cortex is finishes developing around that time. Before that time, an immature prefrontal cortex can affect the way a young person thinks. Growth is a gradual process, so obviously the almost-completely-mature twenty-two-year-old would make a better parent than the sixteen-year-old, who is eight or nine years away from reaching full maturity. Then, too, there are different types of maturity; and that means that there can be a particularly responsible sixteen-year-old or one who is particularly "good with babies". Isolated areas of maturity, however, do not a whole, mature, parent make.
Waiting to reach a good age before having a child provides that child with the example of a good age to begin a family. Kids whose mothers were sixteen when they were born often think "that's how things are done". Kids with mothers were twenty-nine when they were born are more likely to realize that there is plenty of time for having a child.
While age may be a minimal prerequisite for some areas of maturity, it is not the only one.
There are also forty-year-olds who have never quite reached emotional maturity and/or mental stability. Any person who realizes he has "issues" (beyond the normal inadequacies or flaws of being a well adjusted human being) should address those issues before considering becoming a parent. A child needs a parent who is whole.
Another important consideration is whether a person has a maternal/parental instinct. There are people who show that instinct even as young children. This instinct is a combination of a natural tendency to want to protect a child and a natural ability to put one's own needs second. It is the natural realization that even the smallest of infants is an individual little human being with feelings. This instinct is also the one that makes a normal mother naturally hold her infant in a way that allows both to gaze into the eyes of the other and "communicate" long before the child will talk.
This instinct is also the one that makes a parent respect and admire his child for the "little person" he is, rather than because the child "belongs to" him or shares his genetic material.
Some people show signs of a natural tendency to have this instinct even as very young children, themselves. Others have little opportunity to demonstrate this instinct until they have a child and discover they have this powerful instinct. There are, though, people (some who have several children) who are woefully lacking this instinct.
Yet another important consideration before becoming a parent is whether a person has a basic understanding of child development, beyond just whether she knows how to change a diaper or give a baby a bath. Those tasks are matters of "child care". Child development is a different matter. Many potential parents will try to educate themselves on child development (although some don't bother until a baby is on the way). Many don't look to reputable sources of information and instead are either content to listen to other parents in their lives, or else committed to do things their "own, better, way". Those who do make the effort to educate themselves about child development, however, often focus on the matters of when a child may walk, get teeth, or use language. Those are all things that show up in the average child development book. What most of the parenting books omit the matter of the formation of brain connections in the first few years of life, and while others may include a cursory discussion of the subject, an awful lot of children have their brain connections formed long before their parents pay any attention the child's brain development
An awful lot of parents believe their child's brain development isn't anything to think much about until it's time to start teaching the letters of the alphabet.
So, the important consideration here - before embarking on the challenge of "building a person" - is for potential parents to ask, exactly, how much have they educated themselves about child development, including the impact nurturing has on the development of brain connections from the day the child is born. A parent doesn't need to have an advanced degree in neurology or child development, but being a parent and "building a child" requires a whole lot more education that just learning how to meet the physical needs of a child and memorizing a few rules from a book (or any other source) that may apply to a child of one age, but not another. Anyone who is considering bringing a child into the world (or adopting one) should make it a point to educate himself by reading material written by reputable people associated with well known, well regarded institutions/agencies.
Related to maturity and parental instinct, but worthy of mention separately, is the consideration of whether a person is open to the likelihood that becoming a parent may well water down, or completely change, what one views as important in life. More than one mother who has worked hard to build a career discovers that once her baby is born she'd rather stay home with him. More than one couple who wanted very much to experience world travel "before they die" have discovered that something like the desire to travel either goes away once a child is born or must be put on the back burner for a couple of decades.
When a person is truly ready to become a parent he won't care much about the ways in which a child changes his whole world (and sometimes life plans). The person who has more "self-building" or "life building" to do may find postponing becoming a parent is a better way to "have it all".
The opposite consideration of not being quite mature enough to be the best parent one could be are the matters of both the biological clock and the maximum likely number of years left in a potential parents life. While having a child too young is not usually the best situation, having a child as the biological clock is winding down can mean higher risk of problems in the pregnancy and for the child. While children usually benefit from having "good-and-mature" parents, considering how old one will be (if all goes well) when the child is twenty is a good idea. It can be a myth that a parent in his fifties may not "have the energy" for a ten-year-old child. Many people have more energy in their fifties than they did in their thirties. Not all do, of course. It does depend on the person.
A larger concern related to being older before having a child is the increased risk of dying before that child is really ready (if one ever is) to lose his parent, but also missing out on seeing one's future grandchildren and giving them the benefit of having their grandparent. (In spite of not being ready to lose either of my parents, I was far more emotionally prepared to lose my seventy-seven-year-old mother in my forties than lose my sixty-two-year-old father at twenty-one.) There are never guarantees that we will not leave a child far too early, but being too far at the end of the age spectrum before having a child does increase the chances of dying when a child is still young enough to feel "short-changed" at losing so many years with his parent.
One consideration that may be among the most talked about by parents is the matter of being prepared to (at least for a time) give up any number of things that, before having children, we usually just assume we'll always have. Sleep may be the best example of one of these things. A parent must be prepared to do without sleep. Having the time to sleep as much we want or need is something that can just disappear once a child arrives. Being exhausted and sleeping no longer go together. More importantly, a potential parent needs to know she can do without sleep for, perhaps, years and be happy about it. Sitting down and eating a leisurely meal can be a rare luxury. Showers sometimes must be fit in when a child sleeps or taken quickly as an infant sits in his seat on the fluffy bath rug.
A parent often finds that friends who are parents often must retreat into their own parental worlds, and friends who have no children eventually seem to disappear for all but holidays and birthdays. Being a parent can mean not getting the professional manicure because Santa Claus is coming, and it also happens that a child decided to be born three days after Christmas. It can mean being patient and gracious enough to be "projectile-vomited-on" several times a day and be ok with that. It can mean no longer always wearing wool jackets or satin blouses and only wearing them after safely leaving the baby with Grandma. It's difficult to name all the things that often go by the wayside (at least sometimes, sometimes for only a while, but often forever), but these are things that we just kind of grow up taking for granted - only to discover that they are often rare luxuries for parents.
A person considering becoming a parent needs to ask himself whether he's some who generally has a lot of common sense. Common sense is something that is often too rare in parents, and it is the thing that a child often needs most from his parents. Not only does common sense help a person be a better parent, but it takes common sense to raise a child who has it too. Common sense helps a parent know how to keep his child safe. It helps him recognize when to get that child to a doctor. Common sense helps a parent recognize, too, when to listen to the experts and when to think for himself. Common sense also helps a parent figure out how to manage some of the overwhelming worry that sets in before the child is born and sometimes seems to grow more and more overwhelming as the child grows to, and beyond, adulthood.
An often overlooked consideration is whether or not a couple is married. There is something to be said for a relationship a couple believes is so permanent and stable they aren't afraid to commit to it by getting married. There is also something caring about at least trying to offer one's children the very normal thing of having two married parents who share his name. Divorces happen, and they happen more than they should. They are difficult and certainly create challenges and issues with which to be dealt. As in the case of financial stability, there are not always guarantees that a marriage that seems stable will stay that way. Still, even with all its challenges, some believe that a ten-year-old child who grew up looking at his now divorced parents' wedding picture on the mantel is usually better off than the four-year-old whose never-married mother has gone through two boyfriends (including the present live-in one), and whose father now has gone through three girlfriends (one whom is now the mother of the two-year-old's half-sister).
If nothing else, being married before having a child provides that child with an example of the most ideal circumstances under which a child should be brought into the world.
An extremely important consideration before becoming a parent is this: It is important for a potential parent to ask why it is he's considering having (or adopting) a baby. If the answer to that question is, "I have all kinds of love and other things to share with a child" that's a good answer. On the other hand, if - even if left unspoken - the answer to that question is any of the following, re-thinking the idea of becoming a parent is necessary:
"I want a baby because I love babies and think it would fun."
"Maybe a baby is what my husband and I need right now."
"I admire pretty young mothers with babies and all those cute baby things and want to be like them."
"I would like someone who will love me."
"I'd love to be pregnant."
"My boyfriend will probably marry me if we have a baby."
"People would know I'm a grown up if I had a baby."
"My spouse and I have such good genes it is our responsibility to contribute to the gene pool."
and last not but least:
"I see what a bad job a lot of parents do, and I want to have a baby and show people what a good parent I am."
It is never possible to convey - even in a whole lot words - all the things a person should consider before becoming a parent. Just as we cannot put into words the love a parent has for a child, it is not possible to describe the demands, worries, and changes that occur once we become parents.
The irony is that the better prepared and capable we are, the fewer demands and challenges sometimes are. Another irony is that while we should be completely mature before becoming parents, the fact is we grow beyond our wildest imagination once we do have a child.
Being a parent is an amazingly wonderful experience, but is also one that means worrying and never quite being completely carefree again in our lives. The presence of the need to worry about getting getting coats for three or four people before we leave the house goes away as each child grows; but the presence of that child's existence and needs never, ever, leaves that part of our minds and hearts we have reserved for that child and any siblings he happens to have.
Becoming a parent and "building a person" (and a family and a future for that family) is a huge responsibility and requires a lot of work and thought. It can make whole people discover they can be more whole, but it can also make not-quite-whole people raise not-quite-whole children.
Becoming a parent is often something worth waiting for and always something requiring lots and lots of consideration. In the movie, "Forrest Gump," Forrest remarks to his friend, Jenny (the young woman whose perfectly pretty appearance hid beneath it the enormous scars of a broken childhood) that he is not a smart man but that he knows what love is. Perhaps the most important consideration for anyone considering becoming a parent (or considering risking becoming a parent through carelessness) is whether or not that person knows what love is (truly knows what real love - complete with all the aspects of it - is), and whether that person is capable of feeling and sharing that love with a helpless, inconvenient, worrisome, needy, exhausting, sometimes adorable, and sometimes not-so-adorable child.