overcoming the guilt

[CurlyWurlyGirly]

Hi i'm new to all this,
my DD is now 3 and is an only child. all of my friends who have children the same age either have had another or one is on the way. i had a tough time having dd - 3yrs to conceive, fatty liver during pregnancy, dd born 6wks early, severe pnd - and i feel my life has now never been better. I am an only child and hated it - i felt alone and i promised myself i would never have only 1. i try to console myself with the fact that my school was 30mins away so i never had any nearby friends and i already take dd to local dance class etc. but now 30 yrs later i'm doing exactly what i said i wouldn't and the guilt of doing this to my dd is constant. i'm not broody at all and i love having time to myself now (just finished my ou degree, run own business etc) and us going on family days out. this makes me sound really miserable but i'm not - its just that my friends with 2 or more don't really understand. sorry, bit of a ramble

[Blu]

But you know exactly what to do and what not to do in order to make sure that your dd does not feel alone!
It could have been as much the circumstances of your upbinging that made you feel alone as the lack of brothers or sisters.
Make sure you do spend lots of family time with your dd, include as many members of your extended family as you can. We actually moved house to be closer to DS's school s that all his good school friends are within a very short distance - two are over the road, none more than 600m away.
When he was younger he often said he would like a brother or sister - now he is adamant that he is happy without.
I don't feel guilty in the slightest - I think bigger families are great - but I certainly don't think people should struggle through having another child in order to be a sibling to the first - have another if you want that child for his or her own sake...otherwie you just give yourself a different feeling of guilt!

[teafortwo]

curlywurlygirly - Funny, my Mother-in-law was an only child and wanted two children, I have a sister and wouldn't want dd to be one of two, while a dear friend of mine is one of four and wants to have two children. I suppose we all think the grass is greener... in reality each family size has good and bad points.

In my opinion... Having been an only child yourself I think you will parent an only child with incredible insight and your daughter will grow up to be a very well-balanced and incredibly rounded woman. Don't beat yourself up... you sound like a fab Mum!!!

[CurlyWurlyGirly]

thanks Blu and teafortwo. its nice to know there are people out there doing the same thing and its working. i am certainly now considering distances to friends houses when looking at schools. i suppose we all deep down don't want to make the same mistakes we think our parents made and dd will think the same etc!

[DontKillMeBaby]

You have an advantage over some of us - you are an only, and an unhappy only, you have an insight into what can make an only child an unhappy child. The rest of us are maybe guessing.

Mind you, I'm fairly sure the only reason I'm not an only is because my mum was (is) - she wasn't happy with her childhood, so had two children to prevent history repeating itself. Maybe if, for whatever reason, she'd had an only herself, she'd would have had to really address what made her childhood unhappy.