Celebrating one child families!

[Mulanmum]

I know that a lot of families have one child through cricumstance rather than choice and I'm really pleased that we now have a topic where they can share their sadness and frustration. But to balance it I'd like to start a thread for those of us who have one child by choice and don't feel wistful, cheated or inadequate because we don't have a second, or third, or fourth ...

I belong to a forum for inter-country adopters and one member posted about a second child joining their family "now I feel we are a proper family. When it was just the three of us I felt we were a bit lame".

There was a fab thread in the Parenting section a while ago (anyone do a link?) where people were listing the advantages of having an only child. One member posted that she and her husband "glory" in their DS. I thought that was a lovely choice of word .

It's 3.10 in the morning so I don't really feel like glorying in anything just now but wanted to get this thread started and will add to it when I'm not shattered!

pmsl @ intoxicatingly delicious neary all the time!!

My dd is currently being intoxicating delicious by buggering off and watching telly so I can mumsnet.

I do not want to "stir up trouble" I wanted to point out that the implied assumptions about multiple child familes are wrong and insulting.

At no point have I said that multiple child families are better than those with only one. Nowhere have I insulted or denigrated one child familes either directly or by implication.

The way the so called "positives of onlies" were phrased does imply that children in multiple child families do not mesh with the adult world or are not intoxicatingly delicious. The final line where it was claimed the relationship with an only child is a very special bond & relationship is perhaps the part which really wound me up to the point where I called the post "b*llocks". (I did not swear at Podrick.) The implication that only children are so much more special than those with siblings is horrid.

The sort of childhood your children have or you had has very little to do with the presence or absence of siblings and pretty much everything to do with the parenting. To claim otherwise is insulting to those whose lives and families have panned out differently.

I'm sorry if you think I was insulting you personally, that was not my intention.

I hate all this insular "them and us" approach to parenting. Parenting is parenting and very little about it depends on the number of children. Even breast & bottle feeding is one topic.

Goodbye.

WOW WOW WOW- JACKSMAMA... you have given me a fab fab idea!!!!

I like this thread too But my absolute passion on mn is (sigh, teary proud eyes) the foocs...

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/living_overseas/613580-from-our-own-correspondent

Could we set up something a bit like the foocs that is infact One child family diaries?

Where we talk about the daft funny things like loosing trousers, the wonders of duplo and almost having to be booked into a mental asylum because our precious only sneezes and coughs a bit(T42 laughs at herself - see how much a goods night sleep does!!!)... could be funny...

and informative.... as one child families, along with step families, are an evergrowing social movement of the 20th and 21st century - infact I believe, in general, our families are a bi-product of woman's lib! [womens strength emotion www.mumsnet.com/Talk/site_stuff/637752-Can-we-have-a-scared-emoticon ].

Serously - Mix a woman's right to work, with a woman's right to ownership of her fertility, plus easier divorce laws... up pops many more one child familes and step-families too!!! Let's acknowledge our one child families by writing about them!

P.S - Hatrick - I would love to read "the large family diaries" too!!!

What do you think?????

Daisy wrote: "If I understand this thread, the intention was to seek positives in the one child family because for the majority of posters it was not a choice but a situation that arose and often arose with no little heartache"

Actually that wasn't the intention when I first started this thread. Indeed my initial post stated: "I'd like to start a thread for those of us who have one child by choice and don't feel wistful, cheated or inadequate because we don't have a second, or third, or fourth ...". Clearly many mums who would have preferred to have had more than one child have also contributed - much to my delight .

Let me try to explain where I'm coming from. My mum was one of eight kids, she herself had four. I remember her saying to me "don't have more than two children, you just don't have time to enjoy them". Now before the mums-of-more-than-two who are reading this throw a paddy, she wasn't denigrating larger families - just giving me advice based on her own experience.

I actually decided not to give birth but to adopt from overseas. People usually assume that my husband and I are infertile and that adoption was a last resort or second best to a biological child. They couldn't be more wrong. The experience of parenting a child that I did not give birth to but who I would die for has been so wonderful and fulfilling that I almost feel sorry for people who have not experienced becoming a mum by adoption . If I had given birth then I would never have known Mulan - this beautiful, shining, kind, infuriating, funny, clever little Chinese girl who has brought me such filfilment.

So ... not only do I have some people feel sorry for me because I don't have my "own" child , I have others who pity me because she's an "only". However, these were my choices, I'm pleased with them, I think I'm very lucky and just wanted to celebrate that.

Thank you very much, sis, for the link to the thread I mentioned and to Podrick for starting that fab thread. I wanted it on this topic.

T4T - I don't want this thread deleted just because it's given a couple of people the hump. Look at the foul-mouthed abuse I got on the AIBU thread I started about swearing: did I quake, did I flounce, did I ask for it to be deleted? No, siree, I scurried back onto the lovely, warm, welcoming one child family topic to carry on celebrating our families

Oh my goodness, Mulanmum - your post made me cry!!!! Let's contunue to celebrate!!!!!!!!!!!

T4, you set up the thread and I'll be the correspondent from the West Coast of Canada!!
Great idea!!!!

MulanMum- brilliant post.xx

And I loved your post Mulanmum... I agree, the intent of your thread got a bit lost, I profusely apologize for my part in deviating from the original. and if I in my turn offended anybody I am truly sorry (don't think hat has forgiven and soupdragon probably thinks i meant her but i didn't)

You can be the West Coast Canada correspondent for the foocs too, Jacksmama!!!!

OK... will watch that thread too.
Is it dark in England yet and are you all going trick or treating? (Hhmmm, daisy's boys will have to find shoes and trousers before they go out...)

Tarrdaaaaarrr....

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/one_child_families/638548-The-mystery-of-the-lost-shoes-and-trousers-and-other? rnd=1225477199765

What do you think???? Is it ok????

OOOHHHHHH!!! I love it!!!!!!!!!!!

i have an only atm and love it, of course you can't give the same amount time, and attention to your first born when you have more, of course the time you can spend with your children changes.
{notice love wasn't included here]

there are many pro and cons of onlies/2/3/4+

and its a shame that some posters such a soupy and twig try to spoil a nice thread like this, they sound a bit over sensitive to me and its all in their own heads.
maybe they are a touch ?

I do think that it is worthwhile celebrating one child families because so many people assume that multiples are the only way to go. Everyone from my mother to my dry cleaner to other mothers says to me "When are you going to have another one?".

And when I say "Never, we are very happy now thank you" they say "Oh, that's not fair on her, she'll need a playmate." etc. etc.

I get it a lot and it makes me feel guilty. It's only on MN that this has been balanced out.

Hwever, my only is not "intoxicating delicious" sorry. She can be a right little sod. A lovely one though.

Hmm, I don't mean multiples really do I? I mean more than one. Agree with freespirit about there being pros and cons. So everyone go forth and celebrate inoffensively to others!

FSF, yes, people are clearly envious. They wish their second and subsequent children simply didn't exist, I'm sure.

Jacksmama - no need to apologise! Gorgeous little boy you've got there

Oh I nearly didn't bother returning to this thread and I would have missed all those amazing posts!

Mulanmum your post made me cry too, I so understand what you mean about other people's attitudes, and how people can assume that your experience as a parent is simply less fulfilling than theirs because your child is an adopted only.

Teafortwo your ideas are brilliant and I am interested in the political/feminist dimension that you link to

Everyone of the parents of only children who has posted here I feel so happy to have made contact with

Tbh posts like hunkers last one don't actually need dignifying with a reply because this is a ludicrous and hysterical comment and I am utterly bored with its ilk.

I didn't realise how much we needed a topic for only child familes - but of course we do and this thread illustrates why.

well ive only just read the first bunch of posts (not supposed to be here!) but yeah, im jealous! of course i have some jealousy for some of that stuff, having an only sounds as great as i imagined it to be.
and i dont feel that allowing myself to admit that feeling is in some way disloyal to me subsequent dc. its a feeling, its ok to have feelings. i have lots more of them and they make up a pretty complex picture of which that feeling is a dot in the ocean.

so, from a multi to the onlys; congratulations and all power to you.

Strength to you too Ladylagore....

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/larger_families/638809-Because-larger-families-are-great?rnd=1225536325755

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/one_child_families/638548-The-mystery-of-the-lost-shoes-and-trousers-and-other? rnd=1225477199765

We are having great fun over here - Mulanmum and all the other celebrating one child family Mums we would love you to join us over here too!!!!

The thing is .... only child families have generally only ever had one child. So for parents of only children to make sweeping statements about special relationships with their children and how that 'must' change is a bit laughable - because how in God's name would you know? having a second child is almost as big a shock as having your first - and it is as unimaginable beforehand. But the parents of 2 or more children usually had an only for a few years first. We remember that 'special relationship.' Indeed, we still have it. We have a special relationship with the next one too. And with however many you choose to have.

I remember thinking that I couldn't see how each of my children would get enough attention when I was pregnant with ds2, but because of the 'special relationship' mothers tend to have with their children, they each seem to get the attention they need.

Only skimmed - but I don't think anyone's linked to this lovely thread from a few years back

Well after hosting a fab birthday party for my DD and 15 of her nursery chums yesterday I know - beyond any shadow of a doubt - that I was meant to be mum to an only . It was so nice to see the guests arrive - and to see them go! Once the grandparents and godparents had finally left it was blissful to get back to being a family of 3 - and carrying on with the party!