To ask why you'd have more than one child?

[Writerwannabe83]

I'm just curious as to the reason you decided to have your 2nd child (in scenarios where the 2nd baby was planned).

I spent some time with my sister yesterday and her 2 children and bloody hell, listening to them argue and bicker constantly was just mind numbing - I could have screamed. She's there shouting at them, they're getting upset, she's telling me what a nightmare it is when they don't get on etc etc. I'm sure my sister isn't the only parent to be in this situation. I was at breaking point just listening to them, at least I had the freedom to get in my car and drive home

From my experiences of talking to parents with more than one child they always seem to have more worries - be it the cost of bringing up two children compared to one, sibling rivalry, sharing their time between them fairly, family favourites, siblings that hurt/hate each other etc. I feel exhausted just listening to some parents when they tell me the stresses of having more than one child.

All that goes through my head is, "So why have another?"

Is it that you wanted a sibling for your current child?
Or that you missed having a baby around the house?
Or that you just love having mini versions of you and your DH/DP

And is having two (or more) as stressful as I'm led to believe???

I am so grateful I grew up with my younger sister. It sounds naff, but she truly is my best friend. We've always gone on holiday together, spent lots of time together, even worked at the same place for a time. We used to fight plenty but the good outweighed the bad. I'm not saying I'm glad I'm not an only child or how happy I am to have a sibling, but how happy I am to have this particular sibling, because siblingshe's an awesome person. If she was a total ratbag, I might feel differently! Because of this, I feel that I'd like 2 children.

DH feels a bit differently - he says he'd like just one, because he's one of 5, and felt quite neglected growing up.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25035280

Interesting article here about a whole generation in China growing up without siblings

Well, my first one was so perfectly fabulous that I decided the world really needed a couple more just like him. Turns out I was right, and they are amazing! It's not too much work, and the benefits outweigh the difficulties by at least 10-1.

My 2 boys love each other very much! (33mo and 14mo).

I think people really over think this. Do what is right for you and your life as well as this desire to provide someone along side to grow up with. My ds is 19 now and has never missed out but we have always had his mates here all the time. His closest friends have one sibling but don't get on especially well and they seem to spend more time here. I am one of 4 and get on well with my sister but my brothers are completely different to us and I have nothing in common with them. I also have a really close friend atm dealing with ageing parents and her sister wants nothing to do with it. I think things have moved on from the days when siblings stayed in the same town etc and I do think its nice when they are little if you want ready made play mates but as adults there is no way you can predict what the relationship will be.But them our close friends are like family and 11 boys in ds class throughout school until about 13 were only children and we are close to all of them and their parents. I think you make extra effort to be social from personal experience but ds also brilliant on his own. My dp has one much older brother who we never see and his sister died unexpectedly quite young and so he is effectively an only child.I am no happier for having siblings. As long as you love your child(ren) little else matters.

Writerwannabe, your problem is that you are getting set on the idea that there is only one right way to live your life: either you have to be wrong about only wanting one child or all the other people who have more than one have to be wrong.

Think about it: in what other area of life does this reasoning work?

I am happy living in the UK- so that means all those people who live in Scandinavia have to be wrong?

I am happy working as an academic- so that means all the people working as doctors or journalists or musicians have to be wrong?

I enjoyed my holiday in London- so that means somebody who chose to go to Paris instead has to be wrong?

If you start a post here implying that there is something odd about somebody else's decision to do something different from you and ask how they can explain it, naturally they are going to come up with answers that make you feel defensive. It's nothing to do with the correctness of your private decision and everything to do with how your phrase the question.

If you start a post wondering how anybody could have chosen to have their holiday in London, you'd get a defensive answer to that too. If you ask if we think you are right to want to go to Paris, the answers will be phrased differently.

Assuming that the question you reall wanted to ask was "Would I be wrong to have only one child", the answer is "No, of course you wouldn't. Do what you feel is best for your family".

The day my DS was born I was so overwhelmed with love for him. I knew I wanted another.
I wanted him to have a sibling. I didn't want him to be alone growing up or when we are gone. Also, if he was an only child I'd've expected to cart some friend of his on holiday We were lucky that it happened the way wanted.
I am shattered though.but they're both still under 4

Honestly, I wanted to be preganant again, feel it kick, breastfeed again, even give birth again. I guess I missed having a baby. 3 years later my time feels torned, they both seem to need a lot of 1:1 attention which with my work and dh working long hours I struggle to give. They argue almost constantly. That said I wouldn't be without either of them, and at times they get on great and are very protective of each other outside of the home. There's nothing wrong in sticking with 1 though.

Well yes, we are all different of course.

If however the question was a genuine interest in what triggers people, then in my case the answer is:

Sibling relationships in my family tend to be happy.

I love my brothers and enjoyed our childhood together.

I had observed my nieces and nephew and how much they enjoyed each other.

I thought I would be good at juggling different people's needs and would enjoy the challenge (just like I chose a more challenging career than I might have done).

Where does the idea you will be alone growing up come from? Or when your parents die? This sounds like a very family centric way to live. Life is not a John Lewis ad for everyone if you project you can only be let down.

I was an only child and hated every second of it, so always intended to have more than one. I would rather have had none than one.
Have also recently realised the implications for me in the future when my parents get elderly, so yet another reason to make sure my children have siblings.
I also can't identify with the arguments and constant bickering that you've experienced, my two DC absolutely adore each other and mope about the house when the other is not there.

You can still be left to deal with ageing parents alone even with siblings. My closest friend is doing this now. Also my mum had 4 of us and only sees one and so he will be left to all that when she is older as the 3 of us have nothing to do with her. I think the key is not to look too far ahead. There are no crystal balls. If you feel the desire to have another then do but the constant analysing of the shortcomings of having one infuriate me as I have just never encountered it.

It's great for me that some people like having more than one, as I'm one of three. I'm glad I'm alive! But anybody who says that any other amount of children than one is categorically easier than one is only being semi truthful.

Sure, they entertain each other, and I don't underestimate the value of that. But there will be more food to buy and prepare, more laundry, more tastes in everything to cater for, more clubs and hobbies to ferry them to, more doctors apps, time of for sickness etc. More homework, more everything.

Obviously, these things aren't deal breakers or else everybody would stop at one. But one is the easiest number in any objective sense. Anything else is like saying a fiver is more than a tenner.

I felt a bit like you in that I thought it was an awful lot of needless hard work to have two.

On my husbands side of the family they have 2 children who constantly bicker. In fact it seems to be a family trait, because my mother in law tells me she used to always bicker with her only sibling.

Luckily I am from a family who have a lot of children, who also have normal squabbles but generally on the whole get on very well. I think this probably balanced the picture for me.

My uncle told me that children will pick a fight if you allow them to, that if you train it out of them and don't let them get away with it, then you have two children who have learned to rub along with each other nicely (for the most part). I think there is some truth in that.

I also have got multiple sclerosis. I spoke to a GP who also had multiple sclerosis and her mum also had it. I will never forget how she tells me she was always glad to share the burden of her ill mum with a sibling. She said she doesn't know how she would've coped without.

I had always felt it was unfair of parents to choose to have one child to deal with the illness or loss of the parents single-handedly. It's not just about the funeral, but it's also about sharing the memories with someone else who fully understands. A spouse who was never there, and he had a completely different upbringing, and to possibly hasn't even met your parents, will never really fit that criteria. As they say blood is thicker than water.

In my own hard times in life it really is family who have stuck close to me like glue. There are the odd friends to come and go as they are able to (as much as their own troubles allow) but it's never quite the same.

Now I've got two children of my own, it really isn't as bad as I expected! And it's lovely to see how they interact.

My fil said he loved being an only child. But it also made him certain that he didn't want an only child.

I have 3, all planned.

Yes, they do fight-that actually does help them in dealing with conflict in a controlled environment.
But then we have them all settling down and helping each other. Last night, I had dd1 helping ds wrap up his Christmas presents for his teacher, dd2 and ds helping dd1 by getting her things she needed for homework. And ds and dd2 playing a game together before dd1 read ds a story.
This isn't an unusual family, these happened between little spats, complaints and doing things on their own. But you may have just noticed the fights, not noticed the quiet getting on together.

Laughingeyes that is hugely insulting and you are assuming your children will want to look after you! It is never unfair to have a child and love it. You may never share memories Some people will but many won't.

I grew up as an only child and it was horrible. I felt lonely, isolated, outnumbered by my two parents. Sure, they made a big effort to make sure I had friends to play with and socialise with, but I was still alone a great deal of the time, and on holidays etc. That was just the one aspect. Then when they got older the entire burden of illness and care was landed with me, and my mum in particular made no effort to make things easier (was absolutely unable to look after herself but refused to consider moving from her 1st floor flat, although I live abroad - I ended up having to take emergency flights back whenever she got ill. Then after she died I had 11 days to organise the funeral, sort out all the paperwork, and clear out her entire crammed flat. All by myself. It would have been so much easier, not just on a practical level, but also psychologically, to have someone in the same boat. I now have no parents or siblings, and more distant relatives like my own cousins don't really care or understand in the same way. So much for family.

I really resent my mother for growing up herself with advantage of two siblings, and loving that experience, and benefitting from being able to share things with them, but denying me the same thing. It was entirely her choice - not a medical necessity which I would have course understood.

On top of that, my personal experience has been that the only children with my DDs at school on average have much more trouble socialising and fitting in, however much their parents try to encourage it. Their parents tend to identify too much with their PFBs and believe they can do no wrong. Obviously, the disclaimer is that this is only my experience (which might be very different from other people's) and it really is only a tendency, with several notable exceptions. But I would also tend not to believe a parent of an only on here who says 'my DC isn't spoiled' because, yeah, well, you would say that, wouldn't you! You're hardly the most unbiased of people.

OP, you're looking at this entirely from your perspective - how you and your DH feel right now. Obviously that's important, but you have to also be prepared that X years down the line your DC may resent your decision. Most importantly, if you do go ahead with the one-child thing, please be prepared to deal with your DC's potential feelings of loss as a consequence and don't disregard or disrespect them.

I am an only and that very much informed my decision to have more than one DC. I had a lovely childhood, and am very close to my parents, but they were older when they had me and it is now so bloody hard doing it all on my own. I am also scared that when they are both dead, I will forget stuff, and there'll be no-one to cross-reference with IYSWIM.

When my mum was dying of cancer I just can't imagine how difficult it would have been if I had been on my own. Having my siblings there to share the caring and the grief and memories was invaluable - we never felt alone. My friend went though the same thing but on her own as she was an only and her dad had already died - I'm sure it was so much harder for her.

Yes some siblings don't get on and we have our ups and downs but I was so glad we were there for each other at that time.

God I wish my son was less social at times! I don't think its that unusual though nowadays as I know many and it is on the increase. My ds went off happily to uni and there are no halls and he just got on with it. I think if the parents are quite insular it could be hard. But my parents were anti social when we were growing up and having siblings did nothing to alleviate that I wanted people to come to the house etc and we never did and my parents are like that now 4 kids between them and spending xmas alone with the one dc they can be arse with! Whereas my house will be full. It was a forced decision for me as I had serious health issues but the onlies I know it was a choice for them.

Writer your health must come first. Good luck in the rest of your pregnancy and birth. Little accidents do happen and I think the best thing is to enjoy whatever family god has given you.

In the early days of my pregnancy, DH and I did consider just stopping at one child - I'm an only, and although I had a happy childhood and I wasn't lonely per se (massive and close extended family) I now appreciate what I missed out on because it turned out that I was pregnancy with twins.

I see the closeness, the love and support that my children have and give each other and I wish that I had that for myself, that I had a sibling. I've also recently lost my mother and I feel as though my childhood has disappeared because there is no one left who has those shared memories (my father didn't feature heavily in my childhood). And I also wish that I could be pregnant one more time, I feel cheated that I don't get to do that part again despite the pain, discomfort and the c-section (actually, that did work out great for me).

Of course there are arguments and tears amongst siblings, of course only children aren't doomed to a life of loneliness. Don't back yourself into a mental corner, see how life with DC1 turns out before deciding on whether or not you can envisage life with / without DC2 or DC3.

I'm going to do something unforgivable now and paraphrase something I read that Gwynnie P (!) said: don't only focus on phases of childhood, imagine your family around the table at Christmas in 20 years' time, that's the family you want.

Best wishes for your pregnancy OP, and good luck for when baby arrives

I had 2 quite close together (would have loved lots more) because I was an only child.
My 2 get on really well and play together all the time and they would have loved more brothers and sisters.

Thats ridiculous anything can happen in 20 years! It is an idealised media construct the big family round the table laughing etc. I will have that as will my ds and he is an only. My younger brother will like last year sit round with his parents and be bored and fed up. I think its about the life you create. Our neighbours 2 boys left uni and emigrated and they never see them and they had a great life growing up lots of travel etc. I feel for them not seeing their boys but one in Oz and one in the US and they don't seem to want to come home. I think parenthood and life is hard enough without calling the choices of others unfair and selfish. Some people think having children and putting them in childcare before they can even speak is unfair or boarding school or smacking. Just don't be so sure that you have all bases covered life can bite you on the bum.