NationStates Jolt Archive

How do parents that have had one baby, raised it to a year or year and a half, go back and have another?? (not the physiological part silly) My wife and I have a son who turned 1 this month, and while I love him to death and wouldnt trade a single second I have spent doing something for him, with him, etc. for anything, I must admit it is reallllllly labor intensive... We both work, and it just seems nearly impossible to even consider another one anytime soon. Your thoughts???

-a little background, I am 30, she is 28, we both have pretty decent jobs, I recently got my Masters..... but it seems really tough....

I can't imagine being a single parent.... (not looking to debate morality, it just seems that 1 would be wayy tougher than 2)

My younger brother and sister were born 11 months apart. My mum recently admitted that she had to go on prozac afterwards to deal with it all.

my children are 22 months apart to the day, they were both.......surprises.

I know women around who have children less than a year apart, I don't understand either.

my children are 22 months apart to the day, they were both.......surprises.

I know women around who have children less than a year apart, I don't understand either.

My little brother was also a "surprise."

My two sons were born about 18 months apart and both are grown, of and gone now. My wife was a stay at home Mom and is still a stay at home wife. By the time the younger son was born, the older one was almost out of diapers. As the younger one got older, they two of them would keep each other entertained allowing my wife to relax a little. Yes, they had their little arguments and sometimes the wife or I felt like they wouldn't live to see another birthday. :p But all in all they were and still are great kids and I wouldn't change a thing if I could go back in time. Now that they are both adults they are even closer than they were as kids.

You and your wife have to decide how many children you want. No one can decide that for you. My wife and I originally wanted four, but for financial reasons decided to stop at two.

ah ha..... a solution... enough said :)

How do they do it? Unintentionally I imagine.

My two sons were born about 18 months apart and both are grown, of and gone now. My wife was a stay at home Mom and is still a stay at home wife. By the time the younger son was born, the older one was almost out of diapers. As the younger one got older, they two of them would keep each other entertained allowing my wife to relax a little. Yes, they had their little arguments and sometimes the wife or I felt like they wouldn't live to see another birthday. :p But all in all they were and still are great kids and I wouldn't change a thing if I could go back in time. Now that they are both adults they are even closer than they were as kids.

You and your wife have to decide how many children you want. No one can decide that for you. My wife and I originally wanted four, but for financial reasons decided to stop at two.

You make a very valid point.. it may just be a thing of the times... My mom was a stay at home mother as well, and she was able to keep some semblence of sanity raising my brother and I (identical twins) and we grew up to be as close as can be... We originally discussed the options, and we definitely need to both keep working for now anyway.. very good post.

My bro and I are 18 months apart.

Honestly, from what I've been told, if you get both kids on the same schedule so you're feeding, bathing, changing, etc at roughly the same time it ain't all bad.

Esp. once you have them trained to sleep through the night. ;)

did I mention that we have the cutest baby ever?? I know I know, some other people may feel their adorable children are THE cutest, but I am quite certain... :) Thank you everyone..

My brothers are about 2 years apart and quite a few of my cousins were born a year from each other. I never really thought about that, since it was normal in my extended family.

Esp. once you have them trained to sleep through the night. ;)

Oh, yes. But at 11 to 18 months apart the older one will already sleep through the night.

my mother in law had 5 children in ....6 or 7 years....this means she didnt sleep through the night for at least 10 years. i can't imagine being able to deal with that much stress.

but i dont quite know what your question is. are you asking how people DARE to have a second after finding out how much work there is in that first year? the answer to that has to be that they know they WANT 2 kids, they WANT those 2 kids to be close enough in age to be companions, and they DONT want to prolong the childraising years by seperating the births by a more reasonable 5 years.

and perhaps they have family to help them out. it makes a world of difference if you have someone you can have babysit now and then without worrying that they will kill the baby.

I noticed this a month or so ago when taking a friend to the hospital - tons of women with kids about 10-18 months apart. I mean, tons. Maybe even more than the number with kids five years apart.

I think it saves money on clothing and baby supplies. :p Hooray for Irish Twins! :p

What really gets me are the mommies in my program that are having a really hard time because they're young or poor or don't know how to raise a child (usually all three), and then they get pregnant AGAIN. Again. Drives us up the goddamn wall.

I noticed this a month or so ago when taking a friend to the hospital - tons of women with kids about 10-18 months apart. I mean, tons. Maybe even more than the number with kids five years apart.

I think it saves money on clothing and baby supplies. :p Hooray for Irish Twins! :p

Is your baby growing out of his or her baby clothes? Don't throw them out, get pregnant again!

Is your baby growing out of his or her baby clothes? Don't throw them out, get pregnant again!

Exactly! Saves garage space, too! :p

My parents had their first three children with in one year of each other. For a short time they had three in diapers. Dreadfull. But sibling #4 wasn't born until four year later and I was another 4 years after her. But this was in the 50's-60's and not at all unuaual at that time.

My step mother was the oldest of 15 kids. I don't really know her family, but I would guess that they were all pretty close together in timing.

I was born two years before my sister, and my other sister two years after that. My parents did it somehow.

I was going to add that my first kid wasn't out of diapers before the second was born.......and doing double duty on diapers just wasn't that hard. What was hard was getting the older back on schedule after the younger was born, with the baby sleeping at odd hours and waking up at 2am for food and the oldest being a light sleeper, for a while, she would get up on the baby's schedule, only I couldn't nurse her and send her back to bed, so I had to try to get her back to sleep robbing me of even more sleep.

Other than that, you aren't much more tired with another one once they sleep through the night, and once they are potty trained it's basically the same as having one kid.......if they are close in age, they entertain each other and play with the same toys. The only real problem is balancing attention and when one gets to a different stage than the other (like recently when the older doesn't need an afternoon nap anymore but the younger does)