We're becoming a nation of only children: do you agree? And have a butcher's at our guest blog, too

[HelenMumsnet]

Hello.

There's an article in The Telegraph today saying that we're becoming a nation of only children, with almost half of all parents having just one child.

The Telegraph article suggests that many parents are "stopping at one" largely because of the mounting cost of bringing up children.

Do you think this is true?

If you're a parent, do you only have one child? If so, is that by choice or not? And if it was by choice, how big a part did your family finances play in that choice?

And what are the implications, if any, of a generation of onlies who've had no siblings to squabble play with?

MNHQ STOP PRESS: In a guest blog today, MN blogger and mother of one Stephanie Pomfrett (who blogs over here) writes about her decision to be a one-child family - and why she won't be adding a sibling to the mix.

Do read what she has to say, too - and post your comments here or over on our Bloggers thread.

Some of my favourite friends are onlies . .

Isn't the Telegraph's usual party line that it's selfish to have children you can't afford? But now it's also selfish to only have one child if that's what you can afford? Gotcha.

Agree, some of my favourite friends are onlies. And some of the most spoilt, entitled, selfish people I know come from big families

I can't read the article as I know it will upset me - they always do.

We have dd an only, she's 4 next week. We have TTC for #2 since she was 1 but with no luck sadly. We gave up recently and decided to focus on the fact that we are so lucky to have her, and lots of people can't even have 1.

We still get a lot of "When are you having another?" but I have started being honest and saying "We can't!". That usually finishes the conversation pretty quickly.

I don't recognise the statistics at all where we live - we feel in the minority definitely. In her class of 17, I think there is 1 other only child, mostly 2's and a couple of 3's. Most of our friends have 2 or 3.

DD is certainly not spoilt and we are bringing her up to value good manners and kindness/sharing

As an aside I have 1 sister, but we don't even speak and live at opposite ends of the country!

That's an obnoxious article all the 'spoilt singletons' 'little Emperors' bollocks with a little bit at the end about the 6 onlies they found on wiki who they reckon are ok (and even then it includes Lance Armstrong!). I'm also aware of quite a few parents of more than one who foist extra tuition, piano lessons etc on their kids when the children probably don't want it.

Onlies aren't a new phenomenon in any case: DS is '4th generation' only - 2 of my grandparents were onlies as a result of WW1/the father dying young of other causes, both my parents are onlies (presumably in part because each had one parent who at least had grown up realising onlies aren't freaks), I'm an only and so is DS.

We could have afforded more children but just didn't feel the need/desire to have them. The security to trust that feeling undoubtedly came from the fact that to me only children are nothing unusual, grow up well adjusted (the proof being generations of my family seem to have the social skills which enable them to find a partner and go on to have a child), and all of the onlies in my family have happy memories of our childhoods.

First of all calling it China syndrome raised an from me.

As did the reference that only the wealthy have large families or the very poor who don't cut their cloth. Especially as the article claims only the very poor choose to have large families as they get state support. This seems to be another kick to those who use the support available to them to brand them as criminal in accepting it. Not a very sensible thing to do when so many families would struggle without that support. We should be more understanding especially as that support is changing dramatically for them, I don't think they need to be vilified at this time.

When we decided to have dc I was 23 we never considered salary or how many dc we planned to have, we have an age gap of around 20 months between our dc and now I'm 30 I think this is the right time to complete our family. My main reason to have dc at 23 were that I wanted my mum to be a younger grandma and I wanted my grandma my children's great grandma to meet my dc and have a role in their lives. I also wanted to be young when my dc were in the 20s.

We have 4 dc, we are on a decent salary. Earning around 36,000 I am a SAHM, and yes I take the child benefit and child tax that is available. If I didn't life would be impossibly hard. Althought my dh is changing jobs next year and is predicting his salary will be around the 50-60k mark. Meaning we will no longer need to child benefit or child tax. Hopefully I will return to work part time in 4 years when my youngest dc returns to school. The change in childcare provisions is infuriating but we will be able to afford extra preschool sessions without it.

I think the advantages to a large family are never ending. I know my children will always have someone to play with and be creative with, I know it helps them develop empathy and understanding for other people, it also helps them develop maturity and it gives them an understanding of budgeting.

My dc know that we don't have holidays and we follow a budget because they have siblings, I have taught them that a sibling is a precious and an amazing thing to have and that holidays will come later. We have special days out and treats at the weekend. I don't think my dc miss out on anything by having siblings in fact I think as they grow older they will have far more than an only child.

I also don't believe this trend is as uncommon as the article makes out, as many of our friends on simillar salaries have large families. Of between 3 and 5 children. This article feels as though its written to justify the reasons of having only one child and to reassure those with only one child that their decision was best for their child, rather than themselves. How many parents with an only child try to borrow a playmate for the summer holidays or to trips away or to the cinema. Not many of these negatives were included in the article nor were successful adults from large families.

In my area (educated, middle class, not rich) most families have 2. Mothers around here are probably older than in other parts of the city & most of the families I know who have stopped at one are families where the mother was around 40 when she had her first.

So I would suggest that professional/highly educated women tend to start their families later, making a small or single child family more likely.

I know it helps them develop empathy and understanding for other people, it also helps them develop maturity and it gives them an understanding of budgeting.[...]This article feels as though its written to justify the reasons of having only one child and to reassure those with only one child that their decision was best for their child, rather than themselves. How many parents with an only child try to borrow a playmate for the summer holidays or to trips away or to the cinema. Not many of these negatives were included in the article nor were successful adults from large families.

Just goes to show how we all interpret things differently and also how you should select your words carefully. Did you mean to imply that my family don't have empathy, understanding, are immature and crap at budgeting? Most of the parents of onlies commenting here found the article pretty nasty and negative about onlies, not reassuring.

Do your children never go to the cinema with friends or have friends round to play? I'm mystified by that comment as DS is regularly asked round to play with friends, go on outings etc with his friends who have siblings?

No we often don't have friends round to play, not in the holidays at least.

And I was just giving the alternative to the article commenting that only children develop maturity because they have a lot of adult interaction.
Dc from large families develop the maturity because they are around younger children and often have to help out a bit by being more independent, even if they don't have a lot of adult interaction.

The comment about budgeting was trying to be a positive about a negative, the article claimed that dc in only families often made the decision to have one child because they wanted fewer money worries and to give their dc the best possible in life. Larger families need to be strict with money which is often seen as a negative, I was only trying to imply that it's a positive in a negative, yes we have less but hopefully it will teach dc about budgeting and money when they are older.

The comment on empathy was in regard to the article saying dc in only families did lots of extra curricula activities and went to lots of groups, my dc don't do that, we can't afford summer holiday groups or extra tuition but I hope they develop skills they miss out on from group event because they have siblings.

Some people here may find the article nasty, which it is. It is a puzzling article but some parents may equally who read it may find it backs up the reasons to have one child.

I wasn't trying to be hurtful, just to counter some of the points in the article. I apologise about it coming across as hurtful. I hope I have made my point clearer.

I am surprised that you see the article as that much in favour of only children. Did you not read the comments such as:

• Are we to become a nation of little emperors and empresses?
• Economics aside, should we worry about British mothers turning out a generation of spoilt singletons
• Otherwise they don?t learn sharing or other social skills
• There can be a lot of pressure for the only child to do well, and to make their parents happy
• the only child who is the sole repository of two parents? aspirations and hopes

etc

Every only child I know has developed empathy and understanding, btw, not just children with siblings. Children rarely live in a bubble and will encounter other children and adults every day.

It's interesting that you chose not to have friends round to play with your children though. As a child, with siblings, growing up I found that I really wanted to play with my own friends, not just my siblings.
Almost all of DD's friends have siblings - and they enjoy playing with their friends just as much as DD does.

We have only one, I would dearly love another but we just can't afford another child right now. DD is 4.5 so I guess there is still time, but I think we are past the stage where another baby will be a good playmate as the age gap will be too big IMO. Not sure if we will ever be able to afford another child, things are pretty grim right now! I am an only child and it breaks my heart to think of DD growing up without siblings but unfortunately that may well be what happens!

If the fruit of your loins is a repository for your hopes and ambitions, you've got problems whether you've got one child or ten, methinks. I like to have hopes and ambitions for myself, weirdly.

OhMyNoReally - thank you for clarifying, I get where you're coming from now; you can chuckle at the irony but I hadn't really thought about the fact that if you have more than one, you can probably also interpret the article as having a go at your choices and making sweeping assumptions about how they will turn out. You're right in that it can be seen that way from the parents of more than one aspect too - top work from the Telegraph in apparently managing to piss us all off .

I guess I'm a bit prickly about the whole assigning characteristics (and generally negative ones) to anyone because they are an only which that article does a splendid job of - as a parent of an only you do get it a lot, even the backhanded 'I'd never have realised he was an only child' type compliment. I shouldn't have seized so much on your comments though - sorry!

Surely "becoming a nation of only children" is not something that one could agree with or disagree with - it's a question of numbers and statistics.

Either there are more only children than ever before or there are not. Someone has probably counted.

Agreeing has nothing to do with it.

Fair point Trills but the statistics over the 20th Century posted above don't show huge variation and the average completed family size is skewed more by the reduction of >4 kids rather than increasing onlies up to the sixties.

I don't have the article to hand but I read one once which made the very valid point that until some Psych professor wrote about the only child (I think possibly pre WW2, maybe just after it) there was no real 'obsession' with them. The guy kick started the whole schtick around the negative stereotypes (selfish, pushed by parents, lonely etc); even though studies since have shown that it's not true the twaddle he came up with has stuck in the general mindset. Incredibly frustrating as it's no more scientifically proven than the 'medical' bollocks of previous generations like women can't enjoy sex etc.

There have always been only children, secondary infertility isn't a modern phenomenon as far as I'm aware and my own family's experience was that 'circumstance' with fathers dying in wars etc has a lot to do with it. WW1 and WW2 also created families where they had to stop at 1 as plenty of woment either delayed having families or ran out of time (so to speak) to have subsequent children whilst their husbands were away fighting.

It's the whole 'this is a modern phenomena' (with the implication that it's a problem/there will be dire consequences) that is irritating.

I will try to dig out the article/reference for the stuff above, running out of time at the moment thought.

If it is the case that there are more single-child families than before maybe it's for the same reason that more people are choosing not to have children at all - people are actually thinking about what they want rather than doing the thing that is done.

Maybe societal pressure has eased up a bit, so people who want 2 children can have 2 children, people who want one child can have one child, people who want no children can have no children, rather than there being a pressure and expectation that all adults will find themselves an opposite-sex partner and have two children, and that anyone who doesn't is not normal.

I have an only child but I feel very much in the minority amongst my friends - most have 2 or 3, or have remained childless. It was by choice in my case, but not for financial reasons, more our own lifestyle reasons. My life has more in common with my child-free friends than my friends with larger families - we've continued to live in a city centre location, we travel a lot, I have a good social life and a lot of time for my own interests. DS is happy and sociable, and I'm glad that he's able to have opportunities that he wouldn't have if I'd had more children (not just because of finances but with amount of time I could give as a parent).

I'm lucky that I don't feel I've been criticised or judged for it though. I think my friends with more children have tended to be a bit as I'm not juggling as many things as them, and my friends without dc are just impressed that I even have one child as they often say that they've never been ready for the responsibility of having a family.

"Try to borrow a child I'm the holidays" as a NEGATIVE point? In our circle of families and friends arranging outings with a friend in tow is entirely normal and the children are v keen on it. Especially as in our case all DS's friends have two younger sisters. Their parents often 'try' to get me to take all the boys to an older/boy friendly activity so they can do likewise with the younger girls. Sometimes big families 'borrow' ds to gookeep his friend company, sometimes we all do things together, sometimes I have all the kids from a bigger family to offer childcare.

You make parents of on lies sound predatory and desperate, we find the arrangement is part of being a community.

I find this quite surprising. I have one DD but we are very much in the minority among people in our circle/DD's school etc - the only other families I know with just one child have not had more because of marriage breakups or similar.

I do feel there's still a stigma attached to only children - people tell me how much easier life must be for us and strangers have been known to blatantly ask why we don't have any more without any thought that I might find that offensive. On the other hand my friend who has 5 children gets similar remarks about her family so maybe it's just not conforming to the usual 2.4 that bothers people .

Our reasons for having one are a mixture - MC followed by failing to conceive combined with my DH not really wanting another (partly because he's not really a natural parent but also, I think, because of money).

In some ways I wish we had been able to have more. I often feel as though we are not really a proper family and I do worry that DD will resent not having siblings although she seems very happy as she is.

I am paranoid about her being seen as a typical only child though, and go out of my way not to spoil her, but inevitably she does have advantages over kids from bigger families. I don't feel as though we have either much spare time or spare cash but I am able to do things with her 1 on 1 that I couldn't if we had more, and can get more or less what she needs in the way of toys/clothes/activities etc without it being too much of a struggle.

I think there are pros and cons to having one child - just like there are to having more - and don't see why it needs to be a discussion point really, it's just a different family set up like any other.

We have one ds for financial reasons. We would have loved to have had more but dh lost his job and has only found short-term or part-time contracts ever since. I feel sad about it but we do work hard to make sure ds spends lots of time playing with other children, neighbours or school friends and family - he has a very close relationship with his cousin.

Btw, it is a tad tiresome when people slag off a news story just because it doesn't chime with their personal experience. The Telegraph is covering a perfectly reasonable story based on ONS statistics showing nearly half of all families are one-child affairs, the number has increased by almost 700,000 in 15 years to 3.7 million, and one-child families are likely to be in the majority within a decade. That's not 'shoddy journalism' by any standard, it's perfectly legitimate.

There are several onlys in my sons school classes.
They are 9 and 4 respectively.

I imagine where you are geographically may make a big difference.

We live in London and have 1 DD. Property prices are huge even for a postage stamp - to move to a bigger flat we would need to double our budget and that's before looking at stamp duty, estate agents etc.

Basically you only have a decent sized place to live if you are a council tenant or a lottery winner round here.

I'm in my 40's, had terrible HG and then was lucky to survive DD's birth so DH is very against our having another. DH works very long hours and we don't have any family nearby so all the childcare falls to me.

We both come from large families and the idea of an only is a bit frightening to me.

However, with just one we can offer her everything. Private education, university paid up front and help with getting on the housing ladder etc. With 2 it would be a very different story as we couldn't afford any of that for 2 children.

Of all our friends I would say that onlies are about 50/50.

Edam, the statistics make a story - especially if there is a credible attempt to look below the numbers and see what might be behind a trend.

However, I think it's fair enough to slag off the writing in a feature if it makes repeated references to 'mothers' instead of 'parents', repeatedly uses language which accepts a negative stereotype of only children and restricts itself to speculation rather than actual fact finding.

I'm an only and I have an only, but most of my friends have 2. I had a rough pregnancy and a bad birth and I just couldn't face it again.

My parents are dead and DH's are quite a distance away so no family help.

I would be surprised if this was the case. In my area, quite middle class, the usual family unit is 2 - 3 children. There were only 2 children in my dd's class that were only children...snowballjr and a friend up the road. I had wanted more, but dd's friend's mum never did. Personally, if my womb had been less rubbish, I'd have happily had a handful or more. Love being a mum and had enough resources to be a mum to many. If I could take DH into fostering or adopting, I'd do that like a shot, but he just won't get on board :(