Another baby?

[fatcathatmat]

Preface this by saying, I know I'm incredibly lucky.

We have one baby, 4mo. He has been a very easy baby from birth, who sleeps and feeds well and is a happy chappy most of the time. DP is a very equal parent, we alternate being 'on duty' overnight, he does every nappy because I breastfeed, we split awake time with baby if we're not all together so we each get time to ourselves to do stuff we want, and he will be taking 6 months off work parental leave when I go back when baby hits 6mo. We've got lots of supportive family. I found weeks 6-12ish very hard when my partner was working, just a bit relentless, but now ds is a bit more interactive I'm enjoying him again.

We are both from large families- I have 4 siblings and DP has 3. We always envisaged a big family with lots of kids. We're not rich, but we earn well and if we are careful with money could afford this (so probably not expensive foreign holidays and bedrooms would be shared, but we grew up camping and sharing rooms and are happy with that).

Now our baby is here, I'm torn about whether to have another. We try not to be all pfb, but I know we won't be able to give a second, third etc the same attention ds now gets, I worry we won't cope if the next baby is a terrible sleeper, and I don't want to spoil the great set up we have. But also we love our siblings and I kind of want that joy for him. How did you decide on how many to have, and what would you advise?

It's way too early to even be considering a second.

Even if you want an 18 month gap, as you say, you have another 5 months! That's your current baby's entire lifetime plus another month! They'll be an entirely different baby by then, eating, crawling, maybe even sleeping better. Who knows?! And they will a different baby again be by the time your second would come along anyway.

My two are 2yr6mo apart. 4 and just turned 2. Most of the time, they're thick as thieves. Occasionally they do squabble, but what siblings don't? My own siblings are: 2yr2mo, 3yr11mo, 6yr8mo, and 12yr9mo younger than me, and I've found that personality is more of a determining factor to getting on, rather than sex or age gap. If I were to have a 3rd, I would be aiming for around a 3 year gap. Maybe a little less.

Unless your age is a limiter to how big your family is going to be, relax, enjoy your current little one, and wait for a bit.

My DC1 was a dream baby and we quickly decided that we wanted another close in age as if you're changing 1 nappy, you might as well change 2.

I was pregnant with DC2 within 3 months & there is a 12 month age gap between them.

I love having them so close & they have grown up together and are still close as adults. They are girl - boy so being a different sex hasn't affected their bond either.

DC2 was not a good a baby as DC1 but it was all manageable.

The only thing I'd change is that I wish I'd had DC3 a year after DC2, rather than wait another 10 years - that was way harder than a 12 month gap!

You’re literally brand new to parenting and you’re in the easy bit. Why the rush to decide? You don’t have to replicate what your parents did. Enjoy this child fully before getting distracted with another.

There are pros and cons to each gap of course, and everyone can only speak from their own experiences. I have a 2.5 year gap (so got pregnant when eldest was still 1, it’s not like I’m suggesting to wait years and years), and then a 4.5 year gap. So 7 years between oldest and youngest. They all get on so so well. It’s more about temperaments and family culture than age gaps IMO.

You need to do what works for you. But I don’t think it’s sustainable to split every task 50-50. BIL does this, they bottle feed so they each do 50%, the resentment building up is insane (from both sides). I don’t usually know who was last to change our DC. But I do know today because this morning DC1 (toddler) woke up wanting a poo and DH took DC2 to get dressed, which included a nappy change. When you cook a meal do you each chop a carrot each?

Anyway, we have a 23 month gap. I think in the same way you’re never ready for a baby you’re not ready for a second. But it’s much easier going from 1 to 2 than 0 to 1. We decided to see what happened and decided that 3 years was the maximum age gap we were happy with (both in families of around the 24 month mark), if no pregnancy by then then we’d stick at one (and we were very happy with one). Your second is a different experience.

DP works from home, only does 3 days a week, and doesn't have many meetings so he's almost always available to take a 5 minute nappy break. He's also way more committed to actually equal parenting than any of the other new dads in our circle, and will keep track of eg how much time we've spent on solo childcare each (including me breastfeeding) outside his working hours so he doesn't 'get behind' and he's proactively asked how I'd feel about him giving a bottle when he's doing bedtime so he can do the whole routine, and I get those evenings off childcare from the start of bedtime. He also does most of the housework, as he's prepping to become a sahd

@PurBal if everything is 50:50 I don't understand where the resentment comes from, can you explain a bit more please? For us having clear division of labour and an expectation that time is shared means no one is knackered and we're more able to be generous when one of us needs it

This is a good point about health needs not being apparent in babies My DC2 didn't get diagnosed with joint hypermobility until he was 17 months and then a hip condition on top when he was about 21 months. He wasn't walking until 21 months and even now at 2.5 has delayed gross motor skills so needs more hands on support than other children his age.

@fatcathatmat

DP works from home, only does 3 days a week, and doesn't have many meetings so he's almost always available to take a 5 minute nappy break. He's also way more committed to actually equal parenting than any of the other new dads in our circle, and will keep track of eg how much time we've spent on solo childcare each (including me breastfeeding) outside his working hours so he doesn't 'get behind' and he's proactively asked how I'd feel about him giving a bottle when he's doing bedtime so he can do the whole routine, and I get those evenings off childcare from the start of bedtime. He also does most of the housework, as he's prepping to become a sahd

If it works for you both, then great. It's a really unusual way to divide labour. As a PP said, do you chop half a carrot each when you're cooking dinner?

My husband works from home too. I wouldn't think to get him out of the office to change a nappy when I'm already there with my child. Sometimes he's floating about getting his lunch or a cup of tea and he'll see that toddler needs his nappy changed so he'll do it, but I wouldn't announce a nappy needed changing to him.

When he's a stay at home dad will he be calling on you to change all the nappies? I'm being facetious of course, but there are other ways to do "actually equal parenting" than this. Most people aren't making spreadsheets of the time spent with their children. You may face resentment in future if that's the mindset you take to sharing the load.

In 2 and a half years there have been periods where I've taken on most of the load, and at other times it has been my husband. And most of the time, well we're a team. When sleep regressions hit, fussy eating kicks in, toddler tantrums start, it's 2 against one and a healthy partnership isn't tallying up how many hours you've spent with your child compared to your partner.

All this with only one child, let alone two. Your 4 month old is no indication of the 2 year old you're yet to have. I'd maybe ease up on rigid ideas of what constitutes 50/50 parenting. It's like getting a ruler out to measure and cut the last rolo in half.

Because you have rigid ideas of what constitutes 50/50 rather than fluidly working as a team.

Eventually resentment kicks in as you're keeping a constant tally of who's done what. It's not a natural way to raise a child.

A better mindset is to have a more general division of labour and for both of you to always come from the starting point of "how can I help make my partner's life easier", and then you're always doing your best together. Then, if someone drops the ball because they're tired and stressed or ill, or baby is ill, the other person isn't resenting them for not doing the chores on their list.

Also, the child's needs change as they get older. So you're constantly re-dividing up tasks. It's better to get your head out of the minute details and look at the bigger picture of raising a child.

@Yourethebeerthief

Because you have rigid ideas of what constitutes 50/50 rather than fluidly working as a team

That might be what's going on with your BIL but it's(fortunately!) not what's going on for us- we have a division of labour that works right now where we jokingly say I'm responsible for what goes in, and DP is responsible for what comes out. But that division is what works for now, we know it's not forever! Our keeping track is gentle and much more about making sure we each pull our own weight than about ensuring the other person is pulling theirs. We've found with housework etc that keeping track of what we do and comparing makes it much harder to get into a situation where each person feels they're doing loads but one is doing much more of what's critical. It's too easy for a couple to end up with an accidental imbalance which runs on gendered lines if you're not conscious of it; this is how we stay conscious of it.

Part of the reason we do this is we both have disabilities which mean we can at times need to drop responsibilities and we both need to manage our energy to ensure we don't either of us get to the point of overwhelm. We see all the work as work for our team, and try and allocate it fairly from the start so that it's then easier for us to prioritise and someone to pick up more as needed. The whole thing only works because it's based on generosity and wanting to be a good team, it sounds like your BIL's situation is based on not wanting their partner to 'get away' with doing less. I can't help thinking it's the underlying attitude that's the problem there rather than the specific division of labour?

50:50 is great I would be slightly concerned by keeping score. Maybe it's because you are new and trying to do it right. In the longer term you need to find a way to just trust that things are about right.
We split things up as close to 50:50 as we can. I have no idea how close we get to it. Some weeks I do a bit more and other weeks my partner does. My partner did more of the nappy changes for a while too. I had severe depression and for a while breastfeeding was all I could manage. If my partner was in the house he generally did the nappy changes. Once I got better and stronger we split them based on whoever was most available. This is generally how we split things. If the parent is available they do it. We split days off when she is sick but logistics means that I do more. My partner leaves for work before she wakes up so I'm usually the one to find she's not well enough to go in so take the first day off. My partner takes the second day off but often. She only needs one day. If it's clear that she is going to need the next day off we split it based on who would be the least inconvenienced by the day off. It might not be exactly equal but it is generally fair and this is always our goal

There'll be a 3.5yr age gap between mine. I wish they were closer. Hoping to have my next ones closer together. If you feel good and recovered then do what feels right. There will always be difficult times with children.

@Yourethebeerthief
@Superscientist

I think that's a helpful distinction actually- we're keeping track, we're not keeping score. And sorry I got distracted, I was only really using the nappies thing as an example to make it clear that I'm parenting in a team, I'm not asking about having another baby with a DP who does nothing for his existing kids. Thanks everyone for the advice and experiences, lovely to hear about all the different age gaps that work for people.

5 year gap for us.
Oldest started reception 6 month before she was born.
It's worked out great for us, he's busy with school through the week, the baby has our full attention through the day and he gets it when in from school, we tag team between them.

Baby stage is a lot easier than toddlers IMO, so I couldn't see myself have a small gap.

It's another poster who has a brother in law in that situation.

I would say that if you both have disabilities that necessitate this amount of rigid division of childcare in order to cope, definitely wait a while and see how you feel about having another child.

Your "what goes in/what goes out" split sounds just as workable as any other, don't stress about that.

You don't say how old you are so I assume you're no older than early 30s.

I'm 42 with a 3 month old and would love to have another but not loving the feeling of needing to rush it. Finding time for sex is still a challenge!

I didn't think I could love a second as much as I loved my first but every time I look at my second baby my heart just bursts. She's the love of my life. But more than that, she's the love of my firstborn's life and seeing them play together is more joy than I could ever have hoped for. (Caveat to say that I know I'm lucky and lots of siblings are flipping awful to each other!) Anyway, yep, you manage and they get a little less of you but a little more of their sibling and it's great to have two if you can afford it!

Thanks @PoppingTomorrow, I think people have assumed a rigidity we just aren't doing, someone up thread said something about us having spreadsheets and I have no idea where that's coming from! It's more on an individual day or over a week my partner will initiate a check in to make sure we've each had a fair amount of time off.

And @Yourethebeerthief (sorry I keep tagging you also when I think I've meant other people up thread, I am new to this!) no he won't interrupt me to change nappies when he's a sahd, but he will be bringing baby to me to breastfeed if I'm available or I will be pumping during my working day, so I'll still have that work to do?

I’d also say wait until your baby is at least a year to make any decisions. Get to a point of a bit more “normality” where you are both back at work and see what life is like then. Maternity/parental leave is a bit of a bubble to be completely honest and not an indication of how real, everyday family life will be once the leave is over. He’s also still so young and may not end his first year as “easy” as he started it. PPD and PND can also appear at anytime in the first year. Of course people do have them back to back and manage, but I wouldn’t make any permanent decisions in the first year. Get into the proper swing of it, where your hormones are back to a bit of normality as well and then see how you feel. At that point you could still have them very close in age with two under two of that’s what you want, but there is no rush right now. Just enjoy your baby.

I stressed about this a lot when mine was tiny, they were also an easy baby and I worried I'd never cope with one more demanding.

They stopped sleeping at 5 months and a multitude of health problems emerged. We are now 1 and done. I would not have coped with a small age gap.

However now they're 3 I couldn't be arsed to do teething, weaning, nappies again anyway so waiting wouldn't have worked either 😆

I'd give it 2 months and think about it then, 2 months to enjoy your current one and moving into the next phase of parenting with weaning and your return to work. 2 months not to overthink things. You don't need to make a decision at that point but it'll give you a bit of space, and plenty of time for a small age gap if that's what you decide.

I said spreadsheets. I'm just being facetious.

I don't classify things like breastfeeding as "work" but if you do then divide things in a way that suits you. I do think you could both benefit from relaxing a bit on the 50/50 thing and giving yourself a good bit more time before considering a second. Honestly, the baby has barely been in the world. Let your body heal and give yourself time to settle into things more.

Enjoy the baby you've got.

You don't have to make any decisions for years to come. Your opinion may change.

I only have 1 dd, not by choice but actually I think it was a blessing in disguise. I have a wonderful relationship with her and I can't imagine having 2, and the time it would take away from my dd. I know that each child comes with their own love, but I think there are lots of things I've done and experienced with dd that I wouldn't be able to have done if I had 2.

I also had a dreadful relationship with my brother, so have no issues with her not having a sibling

There's almost exactly 2yrs between mine. Lovely gap. Got pregnant again when DD1 was 15 months.

@fatcathatmat because one of them is on parental leave and the other is working full time. All night times are shared 50:50. But one person needs to get up for work (and drive) and the other person can nap when the baby naps. So 50:50 overnight doesn’t work. The one that’s at home all day feels they do it all on their own and they need a break overnight. There’s no “winning”. Doing your share is more nuanced than splitting everything down the middle. Does that make sense?

Jobs need doing, so the person best place to do that job does it. If DS is on my knee and does a poo, I don’t find DH and ask him to do it. I just sort it myself and vice versa. I do every nursery drop off and pick up because I’m driving to work and DH works from home.

But I understand you were trying to get across “were a team”.