"rawr" to death i say

This was part of a conversation Neal and I had on Yahoo!Messenger in March 2004 before we offically started dating. We were doing the long distance thing from different states for awhile.

Neal: what do you look for in a guy?
Carrie: hang on and i'll send you a link to my personal ads that i've had up for years...
Neal: has it worked?
Carrie: eh
Neal: stupid question, obvious answer.
Neal: oh, ren and stempy is on
sends link
Neal: not sure if you want kids?
Carrie: i don't know. it's complicated
Neal: oh
Neal: too complicated to talk about?
Carrie: not really... just too complicated to explain on that thing
Carrie: sigh... where do i start...
Carrie: give me time to word this
Neal: i think i am definatly more than 25 mi from newark.
Carrie: lol true
Carrie: all of my life i wanted to be a mom. it's the one thing that i just felt like i was supposed to do. when i met richard, internally i started counting down the days to when i'd be pregnant and have our children. when he died... he wasn't the only one who died. our children died with him and part of me died too.
Carrie: hen we found out that he had cancer, we had some of his sperm frozen cryogenically for future use when we were ready. When he died, we went to court and saved it from being destroyed. I spent five years agonizing over what to do with it. I gave myself deadlines to make a decision by, but every year that deadline would come and go and I was never anywhere closer to a decision than I'd been before. One day, i'd be gung ho and just ready to do it, the next i'd be a ball of tears. Sometimes i'd be hell bent on just having it destroyed and the next second I'd be sick to my stomach at the thought.
Carrie: it was a hell that lived in the back of my mind everyday. i couldn't look at a child without aching for my own but for many different reasons, i was too scared to go through with it. i couldn't even fully enjoy my nieces and nephews because the "what if's" hurt too much.
Carrie: two years ago i finally had enough and had it destroyed. it was one of the hardest things i've ever had to do but i knew that i had to come to terms with the fact that i may never have kids. knowing that i could go and have it done was playing major psychological mind games with me. i know that i did the right thing, but the thought of it still hurts sometimes. Part of the reason that i was actually able to have it destroyed though was - and yes, i can admit this - i made myself build walls around my heart and not only face the fact that i there was a possibility that i'd never have a child of my own, but accept it and come to terms with it.
Carrie: But the want is still there. just today i was playing with my five-month-old nephew and i could feel that familiar ache. (I like to say that the fingers on my biological clock are flipping me off.) It's in to me have kids, i have no doubt that i'd be a wonderful mother and if i never have my own, i know that some day i'll adopt.
Carrie: The scary thing for me now is, i think i'm afraid to get my hopes up. i'm afraid that by admitting that i do want children, something will happen and i'll be thrown back into that hell that i was in before. some way, they'll be ripped away from me and i don't think i'm strong enough to go through that again. (which i'm sure is the same reason i haven't been in any serious relationship since Richard.)
Neal: wow, lot going on upstairs
Carrie: always
Neal: you sound like your expecting the worst, that you've decided that fate has it out for you
Carrie: nah... my heart is just cautious
Neal: i hope someday i have someone that means that much to me. at the rate i'm going, i'm afraid i'll never find anyone
Carrie: trust me, i understand
Neal: i guess so
Neal: i think you would be a great mom
Carrie: thanks
Neal: like i told you before, that was one of the things that really impressed me about you
Carrie: kc
Carrie: it's in me... i know it is. kids know it is... everyone who sees me with kids knows it is.
Carrie: you're not the first person to say that. i've been affectionately dubbed as the 'kid magnet'