Sophia Money-Courts

 My biological clock is ticking.

But maybe not for a baby ...

When Sophia Money-Courts was single she had her eggs frozen and researched Danish sperm banks. 

Four years later, she's  39 years of age and in a relationship  — but having second thoughts. 

Could it be that what she really wants is a puppy? 

(With her mother's dog, Beano.)

I have a friend, let's call her Julie, who lives nearby and sometimes we stroll around the local park together. But it always takes quite a long time, a lap of the park with Julie, because we have to stop and talk to every dog we see. At the approach of a spaniel or an elderly terrier, or even something menacing that could have been the news last week for having a small child's arm off, Julie stops, bends over and puts on her dog voice. "Whosagoodboythen? Yes, whosagoodboy?"

I used to think, every dog? Every one?That one barely looks like a dog. It looks like a gerbil. And yet there we would stand for several minutes while Julie discussed the dog - favourite toy, snack of choice, bowel movements - with its owner.

I am afraid to say, I have recently become one of those people. At the age of 39, it is as if my biological clock has gone off not for babies but for dogs, and I now also walk around my local park making peculiar noises. Just last night, taking advantage of the lighter evenings, I   gurgled at a chestnut-coloured poodle puppy. The day before, it was a bouncy retriever. The day before that, an arthritic West Highland terrier waddling slowly behind its owner. If you scrolled through my recent photos, you would think I had become some sort of ankle pervert because I keep trying to take surreptitious snaps of other people's dogs to send to my other half.

[I've met someone I'm crazy about. Luckily - he's on the same page regarding dogs]

I have been dithering over children for nearly a decade. Do I want them? Do I not want them? Four years ago, during the first year of Covid, I froze my eggs to hold off making that decision. Freezing your eggs is not a guarantee of a baby, but it gave me breathing space. Park that question for now; think about it when I meet someone. I briefly entertained the idea of solo motherhood and spent sometime loitering on Danish sperm bank websites, but eventually discounted that on the basis I didn't want a baby enough to do it by myself. Friends who have gone down that route always knew they wanted a child. That has never been me.

I feel like I have been holding off making the decision for as long as I can and now I am wondering whether that is not a decision in itself. Particularly because I have met someone I am crazy about, Paul, but I still don't feel the impulse to have children with him. So here is a radical idea: perhaps I do not need to have a baby simply because that is what most people do. I could just ... get a dog.

People who refer to their dogs as their child substitutes give me the ick, but it is a thing. One fifty something friend who got a labradoodle when her children went to university says she misses the dog more than her husband when the dog isn't there. Beano, my mother's beloved terrier, is essentially my dim youngest sibling. I increasingly walk past women carting their dogs in slings or backpacks. In the park, I often see an immaculate woman probably in her seventies, pushing along an old pug in what looks like a buggy. Some men post pictures of themselves on dating apps with borrowed babies - their nephew or a godchild - but I reckon more post snaps with dogs as bait in the belief it makes them seem sensitive and caring. 

As the dog population has grown, so the birth rate has plunged because fewer and fewer of us are having babies, but then again, doggie daycare does not cost as much as childcare. Puppy training is  easier to arrange than getting your child a into a decent local school. Dogs will not aget addicted to their phones and start watching violent porn (will they?). I could give the next 10 or 15 years of my life to a nice dog and he or she will always be grateful, or I could give birth to something that demands an allowance for several years and rudely flounces off as soon as it is independent. You don't get to choose what your baby looks like either, whereas now, while I walk around the park, think, big or small? Smooth or shaggy? One that does manageable poos, ideally, which in another thing that seems less predictable with a child.

[ Beano featured on a cake ]

I do fear becoming one of those people who breaks off conversations with friends to point out something hilarious their dog doing. Will I post endless photos of it online because I believe it is better than all other dogs? I am insistent that it will not sleep on my bed, but how long will that last? 

 It helps that Paul as me regarding dogs in general and being or on the bed. (Who are those weirdos who allow them under the duvet?)  We