Over the next five years, we put off parenthood and did what we could to shed the debt. I lost my job twice in the process. The economy was in crisis, and the legal market was no different. But with each setback, we managed to recover and redouble our efforts. By our five-year anniversary, we were almost debt-free and ready to take the leap into parenthood. I was 30 years old and working as a government attorney. We still didn’t have much savings, but my job was generous (by American standards) in providing 12 weeks of paid maternity leave. I stopped obsessing over interest rates and loan amortization schedules and dove into researching daycares and car seats instead.