What Is Parenthood Planning?

Parenthood planning is all the reflection and thinking, learning and researching, planning, discussing, agreeing, deciding, and action-taking you need to do, before you take the leap into parenthood.

Why would you need to plan parenthood?

Becoming a parent is the biggest decision most of us make in our lifetimes. It’s certainly the most irreversible decision. Planning helps us make better decisions.

Secondly, because parenthood is hard on parents, and planning makes it easier and more enjoyable.

And finally because planning helps us take control, and feel more positive about parenthood before we get there.

Let’s start from the beginning. What – exactly – is involved in parenthood planning?

What is involved in parenthood planning?

There are 5 main stages:

First, reflect on your purpose and set your goals.

The first major step is to define why you want to be a parent. What is your main motivation? Without knowing this, it's hard to plan HOW to get there.

Once you've established your purpose in becoming a parent, it's time to set your expectations and your goals. It's important to ensure you have a realistic idea of what parenthood is all about, and how it will affect you. Then, you can set more specific goals for your parent 'era' - goals that are grounded in reality, and which you can hope to achieve. Your goals needs to be aligned with your values, and not just about your future family - but also about what you want to achieve for yourself.

Next, map and strengthen your supportive foundations. 

The main two resources most people rely upon most to support them when they become parents are their relationship (if they have a partner), and their financial resources. It's important to assess where you stand on both of these. Is your relationship going to support you, and are you ready in your relationship? And are there financial goals you still need to meet before you'll be ready?

This is also the stage for strengthening your support across the whole of your life. This sometimes involves big changes. Are you living in the right place (both home and location) to have kids? Are you in the right job (or even career) to support you? And is your support network strong enough? If not, now's the time to strengthen all these foundational pieces of the parenthood jigsaw.

Now create your plan for HOW you'll do parenthood.

It's time to make some important choices about how your life will work as a parent. What's your plan for your working life? Will you go part-time or change the way you work? What's your childcare plan for your future children, and how does this fit in with your working plan? What's your plan for how to divide responsibilities at home, and how to ensure you have leisure time that works for you as a family?

Figure out if it's affordable.

Once you have your ideal plan, you need to run the numbers. What's the impact likely to be on your net household income, especially in the first 5 years, but also beyond? What will the childcare costs be, once you've taken into account all the government schemes you're eligible for? And what's the impact on your longer-term finances? How can you handle any cashflow crunches? How will you manage your finances and make sure they stay on track, and ensure that one partner's finances do not suffer disproportionately?

Make the big decisions, and implement your plan.

Finally, it's time to nail down your big decisions: are you actually going to become a parent and follow your plan? What timing is right for you, and if you plan to postpone parenthood for now, what steps will you take to make it likely to happen eventually? What's your plan for how to become a parent, and if natural conception fails, do you have a back-up plan that you're happy with? How will you get all the things done before you become a parent, to make sure you are prepared enough? And what are the final preparations that you can leave to the last minute?

It's a far cry from antenatal classes!

You're probably thinking: don't they teach any of this in antenatal classes? And the answer is no. Antenatal classes are generally about birth plans and newborn care, and they focus on what you need to know just before you give birth. It's too late at this stage to think about changing career, overhauling your finances, or moving house. 

Parenthood planning helps you put in place the fundamentals (the ‘building blocks’ of parenthood) in your life – the kind of preparations which may take time, but which have the most benefit.

Addressing these topics helps you to:

• make better decisions both about whether to be a parent, and about when and how;
• make big changes in your life that may require months or years, but which set you up for success; and
• align with your partner, and “start as you mean to go on”, increasing your chances of success as a parenting couple.

Want to get started with parenthood planning?

If you are happy exploring resources on your own, check out The Planning Hub, where you can work through educational material and useful resources on your own. 

However, if you'd like more encouragement, structure and support, check out "Parenthood by Design", my 10-week course with full support.