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Tom and Sarah Hosack are both 33 years old and have spent over 10 years building a life together. Sarah is a clothing merchandiser at Scheels, and Tom is a national accounting executive at Meredith Corporation. The Hosack’s have a daughter named Evelyn who will turn 4 in May and a baby girl on the way. Evelyn has no problem being the star of the show with her bright blue eyes, long dark hair and wide smile. But Sarah’s baby bump suggests she’ll be sharing the spotlight soon. Their house is cozy and quaint — this is the picture of a traditional American family. 

Or is it? In recent months, many studies and articles have emerged that indicate that the idea of the traditional American family is shifting. According to Linda Carroll and Shamard Charles, M.D., with NBC News, women aren’t having enough babies to maintain the current American population. 

CBS News reported that 2018 saw the fewest babies born in a year since 1987. Additionally, “2017 saw the greatest year-to-year drop — about 92,000 less than the previous year.” 

Many students at Grand View are following this societal trend and waiting to get married and have kids while they pursue jobs and an education instead.

 “I could see myself potentially having one or two kids sometime after I get my masters and have a solid job,” said GV graphic design major Kaitlynn Passick. “I would also like to have kids even if I never meet someone. If it’s late in life, I’d love to adopt or find a donor. I don’t want to wait until I meet someone if I’m 40 to have kids.” 

According to the Roni Rabin with the New York Times, these changes are due to several things such as more women getting into the work force and couples wanting to thrive in their careers before settling down. Additionally, millennials and Generation Z worry about paying off student debt and finding a way to pay for the high costs of housing. In general, these generations’ attitudes about motherhood are different from those before them.

As a consequence of these trends, the marriage rate of those aged 18 to 64 dipped in 2016 to the lowest it’s ever been at 48.6 percent, according to an article by William Gibson, an editor with AARP.org.

GV student Maddy Snell said that she could easily see herself potentially having four kids but wants to wait until she’s older and more established — around age 26 or age 27. 

GV Psychology Professor Jim Hanson talks to his students about many important topics such as birth control, marriage counseling and religion. Hanson said he understands that birth rates have dropped and offered some ideas as to how and why this continues to happen. 

While society tells teens and young adults to wait to have kids, the risk for a healthy pregnancy rises if they wait too long. Hanson said that there is a misconception that women can just have a kid no matter the age. The risk is that the older a woman is, the less likely a pregnancy will be successful.

Dana Bradshaw and Tristan Onstot said they fully understand the risks associated with pregnancy and keep them in mind when talking about their future. Onstot, 18, and Bradshaw, 19, have been together for a year and seven months. The couple has lived in an apartment together in downtown Des Moines for a little over one year. Bradshaw works at Starbucks and Fareway and goes to school at GV, while Onstot works as a truck driver. The couple radiates joy and laughter as they regularly giggle at each other. 

Bradshaw and Onstot have talked a lot about their future, and although nothing is set in stone, they plan to have a family someday. 

Bradshaw said the two met through mutual friends and connected one night when they stayed up talking until the early hours of the morning. She said she knew their relationship would last after spending just a short amount of time together.

“When you don’t want to be apart from someone, obviously you want to be together,” Bradshaw said. 

Shortly after meeting, the couple moved in together as the first step of their future. 

They said that it was more logical for them to move into an apartment rather than continue living with their parents. Onstot had already planned on moving out of his parents’ home, and they also had a new pet. 

“I stayed at his house every night anyways, so why not live in the same place,” Bradshaw said. 

Before they get married and have kids, Bradshaw and Onstot’s next step is to purchase a home together. Onstot laughed as Bradshaw explained that she hopes the couple is married by the time she starts student teaching in fall 2021. 

Bradshaw and Onstot seem to be on the right track according to Hanson. Hanson offered some advice to young couples and said that couples should wait until they are older and out of college to get married. 

“The brain isn’t fully developed until you’re 25, so if you get married when you’re 17 or 18, by the time you’re 25, you’re a different person,” Hanson said. “You should wait until you’ve known somebody at least two years. Anybody can pretend to be who you want them to be for a couple years, but if you are with someone for two years, you’re going to see the real them.” 

Although Bradshaw and Onstot are not on a strict timeline to have children, Onstot said he would prefer to have kids before he is 25 years old.

“I don’t want to be old,” Bradshaw said, agreeing with her boyfriend. “Obviously, it’s not a good financial time, but for your body, you bounce back so fast when you’re younger.”

Bradshaw isn’t wrong. According to MarchOfDimes.org, as women get older, they’re more likely than younger women to have certain health conditions that can cause complications before and during pregnancy. These include fertility problems, high blood pressure, premature birth and birth defects such as down syndrome. 

Bradshaw and Onstot said they are excited to have kids and that they don’t have any direct fears when thinking about having children, but Onstot is worried about child-birth. 

“Dana has a history of mothers dying while giving birth in her family,” Onstot said. “That’s what I’m really worried about.”

The drop in birth rates may be due in part to worries like Onstot’s. According to Laura Helmuth from slate.com, in the United States today, about 15 women die in pregnancy or childbirth per 100,000 live births. Scary statistics such as this one could be part of why millennials are afraid to have children. However, Bradshaw said the decline may be even more simple than that.

“Why have a kid when you can have a dog?” Bradshaw said. “We have a dog and a cat, and they are a lot of work. We can leave the house and leave them here, but I can’t leave the house and leave a baby here. Kids are so much more work, and people don’t want to put time into that.”

Hanson said that this kind of mentality represents a shift in the attitudes of society. He explained that 100 years ago, it was perfectly normal for a 16-year-old to be married and have a child. 

“We’ve taken kids who used to be adults and made them kids again, and that messes things up,” Hanson said.

Sarah and Tom Hosack met their freshman year of college and spent five years dating before becoming engaged. The couple followed the new normal and waited until they were older to get engaged.

 After the long wait, the engagement lasted nine months before they were married. It was three years before they became pregnant with their first baby and another three years before they became pregnant with their second. 

Tom said he has found that there is no perfect time to get married or have kids. He said he was wanting to be more financially stable, but after receiving advice from Sarah’s dad, he learned that there is never going to be a “right time.” 

After being married for a few years, the Hosacks decided they wanted to try and have kids. Life “threw a wrench” in Tom and Sarah’s direction when they were preparing to conceive. 

“A couple years in, we decided that we were going to try and have kids,” Tom said. “We went to the doctor, and Sarah had some abnormal cells, and she had to have more testing done. They ended up determining that she needed to have a LEEP procedure.”

A Loop Electrosurgical Excision Procedure is a procedure that is done to treat a pre-cancerous cervix. This procedure helps the cervix stay closed during the pregnancy, helping to prevent miscarriage and pre-term labor.  

The couple then endured a seemingly long wait after Sarah had a LEEP procedure done twice. Each time the couple went through the procedure, the ability to conceive was reduced. Sarah recalled feeling a bit of panic during this time period. 

“That was a crazy feeling because we had always planned to have children, and that was like ‘I don’t even know if that’s in our plan anymore,’” Sarah said. 

However, in August 2014, the couple got good news that everything was looking back to normal, and they conceived shortly after. 

At first, the Hosacks’ plan didn’t play out, but with baby No. 2 on the way, the couple is excited about how their new plan is coming to life. They said what is important is that they had a discussion about their plan and caught what got thrown at them only to throw it back and ultimately end up happier than ever before.