To wonder why we have more than one child?

[whydowe]

I posted recently on a FB parenting group at the end of my tether with my two kids. I was honest that I like parenting them both apart but not together. Was pleasantly surprised by the kind responses and overwhelmingly the responses were ‘me too.’

I guess I’m wondering why we do it. I know a lot of people seem to have a second to give the first a brother / sister but have to admit that wasn’t my motivation; I really wanted another child, think I had a feeling of having missed out over covid.

Why do we want a second so much?

Quite. I have two cars because I need two cars. Me and my husband work in two different places of work, in opposite directions that take 1.5 hours on public transport vs 20 mins in a car. Whereas we wanted two children!

Yes, but I’m asking why you think that only applies once?

If you get why one would have a baby to experience pregnancy and birth (I’ll be honest, these were the shit bits, in my opinion, but I know lots of people loved it) and have a baby and be a mum and have a family - then why don’t you get doing it to experience pregnancy and birth again, have another baby, be a mum of two/three/whatever and have a larger family?

Even if your sole motivation is novelty, you haven’t done those things before. Pregnancies are different, births are different, and - as you know from experience - having two kids is very different to having one.

Well yes … if you really enjoy having children then I do understand that you’ll want to keep doing that but given that larger families are in the minority I suppose I wonder why for a lot of us (not you I realise) we’ve made life so very difficult!

Are you responding to me? It’s hard to tell, as you’ve stopped using the quote function.

If so, I don’t think that really addresses my point.

I was responding to you but it might be best if we left it there as it’s just an endless loop of ‘I don’t get it / this is what I mean / I still don’t get it / well it’s like this / don’t get it’ 😂

Quite. A lot of old people live well into old age and die of a short illness. None of the four of my grandparents required care. Granted two died in their 40s, one died of a heart attack on his way back from the pub and even my grandmother was independent until she died of a short illness in hospital. So it's completely not a given and if the reason you're born is so that you're required to give your eldest sibling help with a parent, it's probably not going to make you want to do it!

One was enough for me. DH doesn't get on with his brother (BIL is a prick tbf) and I never had a sibling bond as there's over a decade between me and my sister so I didn't get the whole "they need a sibling" thing.

Funnily enough as got into my 40's I was constantly having dreams (nightmares?) about being pregnant, think it was my moth eaten old ovaries wanting a last hurrah.

Another argument is having more than one child to share the burden when you get old and need help. Recently been through that with MIL and it was far easier just being DH and I making all the decisions (BIL never turned up to social work meetings so we didn'tlet him have an opinion). It also stops the daughter being the main carer with the 'Disney' sons popping by to meddle on bdays, mothers day and Xmas.

It's always interesting to me when people say they wouldn't want an only child. I was an only and it's fine. There would be times it would be nice to have a sibling and my best friend is very close to her siblings but plenty of other don't get on. My ex h and his brother haven't seen each other for a few years. they are nothing alike and once their mum passed they saw less and less of each other. I am not even sure they send cards now which does seem a shame. I have friends who don't get along with their siblings as adults.

My son is an only child and when he was younger I wanted another (biology?) but it wasn't meant to be. Looking back, there have been many advantages to him being an only child and he doesn't seem to mind. We get on great and he has good friends. He has always been great company and seemed more mature than many of his peers, perhaps down to spending more time with adults. We never fall out and once he got to school age he was very easy to be around. He is 19 now. Only having one has made it possible for me to spend more time with him but also work more. There was a period in secondary school when he was unable to attend and then I home ed through gcses. I am not sure that would have been quite so plain sailing with siblings to get to school (or home ed) as well, although of course many do it.

I think a lot of people think they should have 2. Most of his friends have one sibling, a few have more and a couple are only children. I think having them close in age is hardest. I have 2 friends who had 2 under 2 and they both really struggled in those early years but I think it got easier as they got older. Some pairs I know are close while others are not. It is never a given they will get on so having a second just so they will have someone when you are gone makes no sense. In many ways when my mum needed help/care it was easier with there just being me. I had no expectations of equal support which can cause resentment and noone to disagree with me about what was the best course of action. Yes it can be lonely (I am single) but people with no siblings can be lonely too.

Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s perfectly acceptable to just say ‘I wanted another because I wanted another.’ I think that’s why I wanted another. I didn’t realise what I was doing though.

That’s basically what this thread is, though. People telling you reasons and you arguing with them and ‘not getting it’. That was @EmeraldShamrock000’s point.

And even your own stated reasoning, carried to its rational conclusion, somehow doesn’t make sense to you.

I’m perfectly happy to leave it, however. I hope things get better for you.

Did they never need a bit of help with shopping, climbing up on a chair to change smoke alarm battery, getting xmas tree out the attic,picked up from hospital, shopping in winter weather etc?

When i think of my son helping me in my old age, I would never accept any form of personal care from DS or DIL but there will become a time when I might need a hand with smaller tasks. E.g MIL was in hospital for 3 months during Covid, I had to go in and get her laundry handed to me every few days and drop off her clean clothes. I wasn't allowed to see her, but I was allowed to wander all through the hospital, knock on ward door and get a bin bag of stinking clothes thrown at me 🤢.

I don’t think this is completely true, I am much closer and have much more in common with several of my close friends than I am with my sister. We are so different that it doesn’t even feel like we have a shared history because we remember different things.
we are getting closer now (in our fifties) but have had to work really hard at it.

Same.

I'm not even convinced my sister is interested in knowing who I am. We do the things that you do with family, because sisters. But she only contacts me outside of family things if she needs something from me, or to tell me about something exciting she just wants to feel good about.

I get no phone calls, no messages asking how I am. She claims she loves DD, her niece, but other than cards/presents for occasions or if my mum makes her tag along on a visit she doesn't see her or even ask about her.

I tried for a long time, making the effort to contact her, arrange things to do together or even just visits at home, sending photos and updates and calling etc. Got nothing back.

She is my sister and I love her because you love your siblings. But we have next to no relationship. That will come as we get older because we'll lose our parents and she'll need me. It will never be because she wants to be sisters.

Yes, that’s my experience. Our childhood was difficult and poor, and our impulse was to strike out away from the family unit in adulthood and get the hell away from one another. Some rapprochement now in middle age, but it’s slow and chancy.

It’s a shame that’s what you think because it looks to me like people having a conversation!

My circumstances are very different because my brother is significantly impaired with mental health and autism. But then I am the second so it is a good thing my parents had more than one!

I do think that there is a tendency by only children to romanticise sibling relationships but then don’t we all … my fantasy husband and children are far more loving and cooperative than the real ones!

My grandmother lived in sheltered housing so there was no attic and they did the smoke alarms for her! We lived 3 hours and her other son was an alcoholic so I'm really not sure what support he offered. Yes my parents did some things when they went down about once a month but for the vast majority of the time she managed independently on her own.

This is my exact experience too!

But that's such a inapplicable analogy for this - parenting is a relationship, not the purchase of an object. What you're actually saying is more like 'why would anyone who already had a friend want to make a new friend?'

@whydowe I kind of understand what you’re asking if you mean, ‘once you realise the reality of life with child is vastly different to the imagined life with child, why would you then go on to have another?’

I suppose most people forget about how they imagined it to be and just live with their new reality and learn to like / love it and continue on this path until it doesn’t suit them to have anymore.

True, but then so is your partner and we don’t normally have more than one partner, do we?

Sure, and you might feel that a parent-child relationship is inherently better if it's one to one, like many/most people feel about romantic relationships. That's a valid view, but it's very obviously not a majority one, which is why I think that friend is a closer analogy for most people. Maybe close friend would be better still, as some people would say it's best to have one best friend, whereas others might prefer a close knit friendship group. But both friend and partner makes a lot more sense than comparing having a child to buying a car.

It still doesn't make sense. Children and partners are different relationships. Most people who want more than one child because they want their child to have a sibling, that family relationship with each other, a play mate etc.

Choosing a romantic, life partner is an entirely different decision than choosing how many children you want. Honestly I think you're scrambling for analogies that don't really work!

I don't get why people are still trying to convince each other they are right on here.

There is no right or wrong, we are all different and what's right for one person might not be for another.
No one needs to justify why they had one child or ten children or whether they love having one child, hate having one child, love having more than one, hate having more than one.

There are some properly daft comments on here and some that could be seen as quite hurtful.
Just try to enjoy the kids you have, however many that is, because (without trying to be too sentimental) children are a precious gift that not everyone gets to have and their childhood is fleeting even though it doesn't feel like that at times.
One day you just wake up and they are moving on and it feels like only yesterday you were counting down the days until their birth. But that's life, everything is bittersweet.