Last week I turned 35.

It’s been an interesting wave of emotions about hitting this point in my life. I know that might sound strange. What’s so significant about 35? Mid-decade birthdays seem to hit me harder than when I officially enter that new decade. I had actually looked forward to turning 30.

If you look back at my very first blog post, I waxed poetic about how great my 30’s have been using all the clichés about finally finding yourself and being more confident than in your 20’s. Needless to say, I wasn’t really expecting this birthday to feel as momentous as it has.

These last couple of weeks notwithstanding, I’m in a good mental state. I am happy with who I am. Everyone close to me is healthy. I have my own home. And while I haven’t completely sorted out the career aspect of things, I am entering 2015 with a new position and challenge at work. I do hope that the challenge aspect of it brings some excitement to work where I feel my previous role has started to feel stagnant and repetitive. So all in all, things are good.

There are obviously things that I strive for in life that haven’t panned out yet and perhaps the emotions I’m feeling is me partly coming to terms with what may or may not be in the cards. I do want a family of my own and I don’t know anymore if it will happen in the way that I always envisioned.

I had stopped writing the blog in part because I got swept up in work again and feeling too tired to write in the evenings, which I know is a lame excuse. But I also stopped because I was holding back on sharing my true journey. I didn’t want to write about trivial things. I had said I would take you all along my new journey in adulthood, but wasn’t being completely honest. I kept debating in my mind how much or how little I wanted to share. I wasn’t sure how vulnerable I wanted to continue being and I wasn’t sure I wanted all the comments that might come my way. I’m not one who really likes everyone giving me advice or telling me what I should do…I’m stubborn like that.

As I’ve mulled over how I’ve been feeling over the last few weeks, I realized that I do want to continue sharing my journey openly with all of you. For several years I’ve had a deadline in my mind that if I turned 35 and had still not met the “one” that I’d start moving forward with having a child on my own. I’ve recently learned that’s referred to as a Single Mother by Choice. One thing is saying that to yourself when you’re 30, but another thing is actually reaching the deadline and still being single.

My only ground rule for being completely open and honest with all of you is that you don’t pity me. Because I don’t pity me. Do I wish I’d met the right guy by now? Sure. Do I wish I was married and having a baby? Sure, but only if I was married to the right person. I don’t want to settle just so that I won’t be alone or just so that I can have a child in a more conventional way.

A couple of years ago, I started writing a personal essay about my desire to be a mother and my struggle with the decision process of going at it on my own. It’s a piece that I kept refining even using it in a writing class I took earlier this year. Tomorrow I’ll share that essay with you guys so that you can see what led me to this point and then I’ll let you know where I am today.