I feel constantly stressed about money as a twin mum

I do understand. I am a bit the same. I'm always looking to put money away 'in case' rather than enjoying it.

I think part of the issue is I've been a lifelong saver and it's hard to adapt from that mindset now that we have actually bought a house etc.

I imagine you had to save for IVF etc and so are used to watching the pennies.

I don't really know what the answer is but I get it.

I also have fairly fixed ideas about what we normally spend on things and struggle when anything is significantly above this, even when we can afford it.

I have a four year age gap in mine but it took a bit of adjusting to the costs of things for a family of four rather than three. You've had that all at once which is probably part of the issue.

Plus with twins everything tends to be due together from school trips to haircuts. It's not necessarily more expensive than having two children of different ages but it's less staggered.

I try to have a small pot of treat money as I find I've already allocated it from the monthly expenditure and it stresses me out less than taking it from the main account. Or we have separate finances and I let my husband deal with more of the fun stuff and I do the bills and savings as I'm more relaxed about it that way.

@Lostsoul121 Putting away £1200 each month is a HUGE amount. You're worrying over nothing.

My second child turned out to be twins, so we had to change BOTH cars to fit 3 car seats in, and when I went back to work I earned £20 a week after childcare and petrol. Not to mention the fact we'd just bought a house and taken out a large mortgage, calculating in the fact we wanted a second child, but not anticipating a buy one get one free situation.

Things were very tight but we managed!

It sounds like you’re in an amazing position with no need to worry.

When your twins go to school you can get a job with more hours and all that money will be bonus money, as you’re already covering costs.

Maybe you need to sit down and work out whether you should adjust your pots so you can enjoy life as a family too. I had to do that with my partner recently - I pointed out that we were only putting 2% of our monthly income into our monthly shared family fun pot and we needed to re-prioritise!

Work more if you’re so worried

*just seen your update- just remember that birthdays, holidays, etc., are luxuries not essentials. They are as expensive or cheap as you make them, if at all. Sometimes things have to be cut back and that’s ok, that’s normal for most people.

Lots of people don’t even have a pot for when the car breaks down and that’s when it gets stressful. You have a pot and it sounds like you’re organised and on top of things. You’re never going to be in your optimum financial state when you have young children.

It sounds like you’re doing well but plagued by the natural anxiety of parenthood. You’re doing what you think is best, which is great. If you feel you’d like an enjoy the money a bit more then why don’t you cut the savings down a little every month- if not then carry on as it definitely doesn’t hurt!

I’m 27 and I’m about to have my second. I’ve just patted myself on the back for having managed to save £600 over the course of 3 months with us both working 40hrs a week!!

Honestly, life provides enough stress as it is without us creating worries in our own heads. Try to look at this one objectively and let it go, you’ll all be fine.

That’s a huge amount to be able to save per month. Wow!

And a lovely low amount of working days.

I suggest you either save less or work more if you want more money to play with.

You sound completely out of touch with the real world.

14K is likely to more than cover what you describe. Check how much you spent last year. Your children are very young so you should expect to be treading water a bit financially. Twins can be more expensive than two singles but not always, what you lose in no hand me downs you save on no juggling childcare or double drop offs. I haven’t read anything twins, you will take a bit longer to recover physically and financially but I wouldn’t lose sleep over it.

I still feel like £1200 is a huge amount to put away for these things. To be frank OP that's not a luxury most people have and neither is working so little.

I'm sorry but I don't really see the problem still

Mum of twins here! Mine are 15 now and I have an older DS too. It is hard when two come along at once and you have to get two of everything. And growing up, you are constantly paying out double all the time. We are not huge earners but are comfortable and our kids have had a lovely upbringing….plenty of days out, nice holidays etc. My friends always laugh at the amount of bank accounts I have but I use them as savings pots. Every month, I put money away in each pot, such as Car, Xmas, School, Holiday etc. Doing this means that my monthly outgoings are always the same but, each year when I had 3 lots of school uniform to buy or Xmas presents to get, the money was there ready. This makes me feel much more in control and I can work out how much I need to save each month to allow myself enough for those once a year things or emergency situations. I am currently putting money away each month to buy two cars for them when they turn 17! Of course, I also factored in a monthly allowance for “fun stuff”. We would probably have one day out a
month where we would go to the zoo or something, an afternoon at soft play and then parks, play dates or the beach, which didn’t cost much. As everyone else has said, don’t live too much for the future if you’re not enjoying the present. They don’t stay little for long and, before you know it, they’re teenagers that couldn’t possibly be seen out in public with you!

🙄

Get real

What’s the big fear? What is it? What are you scared might happen?

Why do you need to save £1200 yet penny pinch? What are you saving for? Half of that would be decent.

Also if you can't sleep with worrying about money, can't you do more than 6 days a month?

It's pretty normal for parents of twins IME. What you'd planned and budgeted for suddenly doubles. Also £1k/mth savings doesn't go that far in some places in London.

Just save less?

£600 savings
£600 spare to not worry so much.

Just don’t worry about saving so much.

You are in a very enviable position. Maybe speak to a counsellor if THIS is causing you to lose sleep.

This 🙄, with kindness, get a grip....

I was just going to say this, my twin sons died at birth 18 months ago. My first boy was stillborn and my second boy was taken off life support at 4 days old, he died in our arms. It's absolutely changed our lives.

Op, just like this poster said you'd kill into have them back. Stop putting away so much money, and enjoy your children. Honestly life can take such bad turns trust me and you are doing ok. I know it's easy to worry but id do anything to hold my sons one more time. You are worrying so much about the future, you'll miss out on enjoying them.

Also @Unicornmama12 I'm sorry for your loss. It's so hard.

You save £1200 a month and work 6 days a month… sorry but your post is so tone deaf to the reality of many parents

You save what I earn and I have to pay rent, council tax, bus fair, some debts and food out of that, which I've done today.

Now I'm skint yet again until 27th June.

Sorry to hear you went through rounds of IVF to finally get your twins. I think sometimes you do need different perspectives to realise how lucky you are per say to others.

£1200 is a really huge amount and achievement of being able to save. If you feel like you are constantly penny pinching and living life on a budget I would suggest upping your days at work by a couple of days a month to use as spending or putting slightly less into savings to afford things.

It is good to have a balance between savings for the future but also, having money to enjoy the now