Families of 5?

[Lena3]

Hi Ladies,

It's me again. So I thought we made our mind up about trying again but now we have some doubts.
OH spoke to his friend last night (dad of 3) who tried all night to persuade him not to have more then 2.
His arguments were that it's impossible to get a hotel room for 5 and they always end up taking two rooms which costs a fortune and means he and his wife are in seperate rooms (quite important in our case as we travel lots), that the dynamics of 3 just doesn't work and two are always fighting with 1, that's in general everything is design for families of 4 not of 5.
He said he enjoyed having 2 but with 3 it's just hard work.
Now DH got cold feet about trying again....
I am also in two minds - sometimes I do want another but at other times are just happy as we are now.
Any opinions?

Love

Lena xx

I have 4 and there's a lot of truth in what your dad said (sorry).

Your dad forgot about the ruddy car (lucky him from the generation whose children didn't even use seatbelts). See all the threads on here about fitting 3 seats across the back of an ordinary size car.

We just don't travel any more, lol, that's how we solved the hotel thing! All supposed to be at a London wedding today but only 2 went in the end due to tummy bug.

Speaking of which, Tummy bugs take forever to travel around the family.

Laundry is ceaseless and keeping organised becomes paramount.

Woman's career tends to die (mine did).

If you already have 2 of one flavour, and 3rd child turns out the other gender, a whole new set of costs present themselves.

But otoh, (sorry to be morbid), for me it would be less devastating if I lost one of them and had 2 or more left (as opposed to just one or none left).

And I like a busy family atmosphere, the fact that when I grow old the siblings will have more of each other to share the burden with of looking after me, we get some very family jokes and wit going, they keep each other company, they all become experts in negotiation.

We are trying to TTC No.3 at the moment and what I would say to the other dads statement

"that the dynamics of 3 just doesn't work and two are always fighting with 1"

Maybe so in his family but that doesn't need to be that way for yours, it certainly isn't for many other families.
I wouldn't base such an important decision on what 1 person says he's bound to be very biased to his own viewpoint and experience.

Traveling well many hotels are now offering large family accommodation especially in the USA if you travel there a lot. Plus their is inter connecting rooms, or you can stay in Villas.

I agree with what Thediaryofanobody says. It would be quite odd to base such an important decision on what one person has said - as with most of us, and this post included I suppose! - opinions are partially shared as a means of justifying decisions that we've made/not made.From my own experience (I have 4 DCs and am ttc-ing no.5) my career has actually stepped up a gear since having no.4 - partly because my determination not to dissolve into career death (would be very easy) has spurred me on. Not wanting to blow my own trumpet in the least, but wanted to balance out LLJK's point about women and work. Everyone's different.I've also found that things seemed no more difficult with no.4 than having no.2 - of course it's a relentless slog most of the time,and yesn nthings like washing make me feel like crying at the impossibility of it all, but the good bits do outweigh the bad (just ) Otherwise we wouldn't be ttc-ing no.5. Oh and one other thing - unless you have a dh/dp that shares the slog (and I mean 50/50, not just 'helping') then it will be really, really hard... Luckily mine got the message after dd2 was born and is pretty 'good' though does need refresher courses from time to time . Good luck whatever you decide