Lifestyle, food and drink, and our family life and travel adventures.
Set the scene: you’re at a family wedding with your toddler and your husband. You’re doing the family rounds with the small and podgy one looking beautiful in a tulle dress with flowers across the skirt. Everyone is cooing and asking how you are and you get to one of the older relatives who asks the dreaded question:
“When is the next baby coming along then, deary?”
It’s a question that no couple wants to hear. Firstly, it’s an intrusive question that basically asks whether you plan to use protection the next time you have get a chance to have time alone with each other. Secondly, it’s very presumptuous: what if you don’t want more than one child? What if you simply don’t have the stones to go through medical help for conception again? What if you just lost a baby and are secretly grieving? It’s not a nice question to be asked, especially if you’re not ready to have more children right now. Intrusive questions are one of the things to expect when you become a parent, though it doesn’t make any of them right. Another very intrusive and rude question could come next; if you’ve said that yes, you do see more children in your future but not yet, and you have more than one child, you get:
“Are you sure you can afford another baby?”
Which usually follows an appraising glance over your children, especially if you have two. Honestly, you can’t win. If you don’t want more children, they’ll be concerned about the lack of siblings for your child. If you do want more children, you apparently can’t afford it. Insert shrug here. The thing is, this smiling – and annoying – relative thinks that they mean well. The truth of the matter is that you may have already been planning a baby and this simple question could put doubt in your head about your decision and really make you think about whether it’s the right thing to be doing. It’s one of the most discussed topics on Facebook parenting groups and in your inner social circle when the conversation turns to how many children you may want to have. People everywhere base their decisions on how many children to have in their lives on three things:
Let’s be honest with each other: no one can afford a baby. Do you know how much these things cost? When you factor in eighteen years of childcare, clothes, food, furniture replacements, toys, baby paraphernalia and all the extracurricular activities that kids want to do, you’re going to run into the tens of thousands. Add on the potential for private schooling, holidays and whether you have difficulty throughout conception in the first place which costs money, and you’re hitting the hundreds of thousands. The thing is, people saying that you should question whether you can even ‘afford’ another baby implies that households with more than two, three or even four children are struggling and scraping by. It also presumes that those with bigger families are rolling around in money – another very misguided idea.
Obviously, the prices of days out, holidays and even clothes tend to go up when you have more than the ‘set’ family of four in your house. Everything is geared to a two parent, two child family. Cars are one (trying to fit three car seats in the car? Nightmare). Package holidays are another; everything is two adults and two children before the prices drastically alter, meaning your third sprog is going to cost you more than the rest. The thing to remember is that the costs only change drastically if you fail to manage your budgets correctly. It’s all about how you live and how you manage things. Baby number two will not care if you’ve got the sleepsuits that baby number one wore from the attic and gave them a wash. They will not even care if you dress them in the hand-me-downs until the age of around six or seven. In two sentences, I have halved your clothing bill. Wasn’t that easy?
If you want to have another child, as long as you and your partner are happy about it, why wouldn’t you go for it? Conception issues aside, another baby is not going to dent your lifestyle in too many ways. Sure, they’ll mess up your sleep for an inordinate amount of time, and you may have already been planning to measure your costs on a housing loan calculator to see whether you could afford a bigger house. But that could have happened regardless of the presence of a new baby in your home. Trying to decide whether you want to go back to the beginning with nappies, breastfeeds (or bottles, depends how you roll), night waking, working out whether the baby is screaming with colic or because something is genuinely hurting their tiny bodies – it’s a big decision to make. It shouldn’t be decided because your maiden aunt has pinched your cheeks and made her assumptions about your family or what you would want for your future. Do you even know if you could be ready for a baby? You probably ask yourself this when the toddler is having the mother of all paddies in the lounge just because you used a yellow cup instead of a green one. So, if you really need to know, have a read below:
How Does HE Feel?
Of course, you may be the one to go ahead with a pregnancy and all that it entails, but you can’t do that without a little input from him indoors. If your partner isn’t fully into the idea of family expansion, then it’s best to put the brakes on right away. A lot of people picture the baby that they’re going to have, but they don’t picture themselves WITH the baby, pacing the floor into the wee hours of the morning. The best thing to do is to keep the conversation going and don’t put it entirely to bed. Hear him and his concerns, voice any concerns of your own and do it over a bottle of wine. Chances are that if he does change his mind, it’s the last bottle you’ll enjoy for a while.
How Will Your Existing Kids Handle It?
Change is usually easy to adapt to when you’re a child. You just go with whatever your parents say and do and accept it. But a new baby in the house can be a confusing time for a little love that’s always had your undivided attention. An older child could be really excited by the idea of a new brother or sister, but a toddler may be very confused and even angry with you and the new baby for taking them away from being the in spotlight. Obviously, you won’t be sitting your toddler down to hear their input and take their opinion as gospel. You’re the parent, you will decide whether to expand the family or not. You just need to ensure that you’ve done you research about what to expect emotionally from other children.
Do You Need More Room?
It doesn’t matter what your budget is currently, even if it is strained. Of course, a lot of couples prefer to wait until their income is a little healthier before going for it with a new baby. However, if you found yourself pregnant without trying, you would manage the situation and make room in the budget in the same way you could make room in the house if you’re not ready to move to a new home. It’s always nice to ensure that you have enough space for a nursery, but it’s not always possible. Work with what you’ve got at first, then work out if you need to move to create extra storage space and whether a move would work in your budget.
Can You Go Back?
Adding babies to the household is amazing, but you need to consider how your life will change. You’ve just got to the stage of having a relatively independent three-year-old, about to go to school and give you a few hours of the day again. Your sleep has returned to normal and your marriage is enjoying that freedom together. If you add another baby, that WILL change. You will be up in the night. You will be back to round the clock feeds and nappies. You will be totally dependable to a defenceless human who can only scream to communicate. If you know you will be okay with that change, then you should go for it. If you’re not sure, think on what you need to make things easier, and go for it anyway! Life may change, but all those scary moments that take your freedom are going to be so sweet: even the night feed, breathing your baby in.
It’s absolutely no one else’s business what you do with your family and how many children you end up having. Always meet questions with a smile, no matter how awkward, because in the end it’s going to be about what you both want without the pressures of others.
This is a collaborative post.
Welcome to Birds and Lilies! I'm Lou: mother, blogger and freelance writer. This is my lifestyle blog, where I talk about motherhood, infertility and IVF, beauty, my love for food and wine, as well as my thoughts about stuff, and our real-life and travel adventures.
Contact: [email protected]
