When I was younger I always envisioned myself with a large family. I thought for sure I’d be a mother of four. When my husband and I talked about starting a family, he seemed to dream about a large family, too. I am currently a mother of two little girls, ages 6 and 2.
A friend of mine asked me when my youngest daughter was only six months old if we’d be adding a third to our little family. I brushed the question off with, how could I possibly think of another baby when I was just pregnant 6 months ago?!
You know what it’s like, if you are dating someone everyone always asks you “when are you going to get married?” Then, when you get married they ask “when are you going to have a baby?” After you have a few kids, “when are you going to have another baby?” What’s the next round of questions after that?
Which brings me to my next question… when do you know you are done having children?
My baby isn’t a baby anymore. She would be classified as a toddler. Her third birthday looms in the distance. I’ve come to terms that she is probably my last baby. I am operating as if she is — giving away clothes to her younger cousins, donating and giving away gear that she outgrows.
My friend gave me the advice to leave the door open with having another child until my youngest turned two. Well, she’s two now, and I feel that we are done. I told my girlfriend that the other day, she laughed and said “wait until she is three. ” My youngest daughter turns three in September. My decision today still stands.
I am 35, my sister had her last baby at 38. Some of my friends are having their first baby or haven’t had their first child yet. This day and age, women of my generation are having children much later than women of my mother’s generation. So, I guess technically there is time for me to let things marinate and change my mind.
I cried when I packed up the 0-3 months clothes after my youngest daughter outgrew them. Putting away those tiny little outfits, knowing in the back of my mind that we are done was very emotional for me.
The first time I packed them up with my oldest daughter, I knew I wasn’t saying goodbye to the outfits, I was saying I’ll catch you one more time before you go.
We put our youngest daughter in her big-girl bed this year, and it was the first time in six years that there wasn’t a crib up in our house. We gave the crib and changing table to my brother-in-law’s niece. I took extreme care in wiping it down and cleaning it before we passed it on. I knew I was really saying goodbye. Yes, I cried while I was cleaning it. I am a sap!
If I never have another baby again, here is what I’ll miss the most:
– never hearing my babies heartbeat for the first time
– never again feeling my baby move inside of me
– giving birth
– seeing my baby for the first time
– finding out the gender of the baby (my husband and I always waited to find out, we loved being surprised!)
– new baby smell
– having my newborn sleep on top of my chest
– seeing the wonder in a babies eyes when they discover something new
But, here is how I know we are done: both pregnancies I had morning sickness for 18 weeks, I had to wear maternity stockings on my right leg the whole pregnancy– despite those two major inconveniences I loved being pregnant!
My youngest daughter did not sleep through the night until she was 14 months old… the thought of sleep deprivation alone makes me snap out of it when I get the itch for another baby!
Furthermore, I home-school my children, and the one-on-one attention with the two of them is working really well for us. I think if we added another little person to the mix, I may become overwhelmed. Financially, we have a good balance with the two kids we have, having a third means more financial responsibility and we are a one income family.
Finally, I am so in love with the family we have, I don’t feel like we are lacking or missing anything. My children are growing up so fast. At the height of chaos in our day I remind myself that someday I’ll miss this.
Someday I will miss all of this.
Right now, I’ve grown accustomed to having my girls at the age they are now, enjoying the thrill of what comes with that age, I rarely (if ever) think about adding a third child to our family.
Every night I put my two-year-old to bed. I read her two or three books and always sing Hush, Little Baby to her, per her request. I tickle her back and sing the song. Later in the night, before I go to bed, I check in on my girls. I watch them sleep, cover them back up and sneak out quietly… happy for the time that I have with them. Happy that they are still so little, but sad knowing the time going by so fast.
Are you done having babies? How do you know?
This is an original post to World Moms Blog by Courtney Cappallo of Massachusetts, USA. Courtney can be found homeschooling on her blog, Table of Four.
The photographs used in this post are attributed to the author.
Your post hits home for me because I thought I’d have more kids by now, Courtney, but it just didn’t work out like that. Yes, it makes me sad sometimes, but I’m so lucky that we were able to have two healthy children. So, I’ve had to change my paradigm and think about all the things that I can do for two children and our future together. I love them so much!!
I wondered the same about the clothes. When I had my first, I celebrated when she moved on to the next size of clothing. I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to do the same for my second because she is my last. But, things are going fine. I’ve been able to pack up her clothes and give them away as I go along. I’m enjoying every little moment of her baby years, but I also look forward to her growing bigger, so we can more easily travel together to more places as a family.
I really related to this post and think that you are fantastic when you spill your heart out! 🙂
Jen 🙂
Jen, I too feel so fortunate that my girls are both healthy, happy little firecrackers! I think you have a very healthy outlook on celebrating your children growing! There is a song by Raffi titled “I wonder if I’m growing” – here is the link to listen to it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTy9uNxDe10
In the song the child reaches the faucet for the 1st time. Never ceases to amaze me that I get misty eyed every single time I hear that line in the song. I wish I had a more upbeat outlook like you when it comes to my kids growing. Don’t get me wrong, I am super proud of the little people they are becoming. I just know this time is going by so fast.
For instance, last night I was watching Emery on the swings, her little curls swaying in the breeze. She was smiling ear to ear and giggling looking at me while swinging. I said to her out loud, “oh Emery, I am going to miss you being two.”
I keep saying to myself when I watch my girls on the beach. This is the summer of 6 and 2 (the girls ages). I want to make such a mental picture of what they were like at this age. I find it harder to remember Emery as an infant because my mind is so focused on the little girl she is now.
Thanks for your kind words about my post, I am glad you enjoyed it!
Although I always pictured having at least two kids, I’m pretty content with just my son. I had a great pregnancy, and he is a really great kid. However, parenting is really hard and I really have no desire starting all over especially now that he’s at an age where he can do certain things on his own. Time does fly by, and he’s growing up fast, but my family is complete.
Jackie, nothing beats having a great kid! I completely agree, parenting is very hard. I had no concept of how hard it was until I had my own children. Good gracious, forgive me for the judgements I made on other parents before I had my own two children! ha! I agree too, that if we had a third child we’d be starting back at square one all over again. I know I am not in that frame of mind to be toting around an infant! Thanks for reading my post and commenting!
Courtney, I loved your post, it really resonated with me. I wrote about these same feelings on my blog (titled
Pandora’s BoxTranscending Typical Friendship Bonds: http://growingmuses.wordpress.com/2011/01/10/transcending-typical-friendship-bonds/) when my very close friend (whose first two children are just days apart from my own) got pregnant with her third. We’re done too, and though my husband often says he’d like to have a third, I have been very content with our decision. Until I read your article.The way you wrote about it in your article made me nostalgic and filled me with dysphoria. I’ll miss these things too. But I am also really beginning to enjoy the little troop my kids and I make up. How I can pack them into the car with increasingly less preparation and gear and go off on adventures, sometimes for days on end. I find, rather than holding on to my 2yo’s babyish ways as I worried I might, that instead I am accelerating some things (like potty training, crib-to-bed transition, eating habits) based on the role modeling and rule setting of his older sister.
I love how you’re raising your kids and admire you for homeschooling them. For me, I look forward to the days when my kids have school and I can turn my focus a little to who and how I’ll be as they depend on me less and less.
Thanks for sharing your candor. It is a juncture we all come to as mothers and have to decide in which direction to go. I think you’ve chosen a wise path for you and your family…though, as a brief afterthought, don’t you find the more people we add to the mix, the more love we have to spread around?
Growingmuses – I know exactly what you mean when you wrote you are enjoying your little troop of kids. I find my life getting a little easier, definitely with packing up and heading out the door! I really am loving that! Although, when we still go away for a night as a family, I still find myself in basically tears packing for me and the two girls. My girls just seem to know which buttons to push while I pack for us and then know right when to push them. Hence, that being the reason I loathe packing! ha!
I too can completely relate to wondering if I am rushing things with my two year old based. I am glad I am not the only mother out there that has these concerns. I do find my two year old picks up on things much faster than her big sister did, except for potty training, naturally! UGH! ha!
And, yes, many times, especially since writing this article, I find that the more people we add to the mix, the more love there is to share. I know we are done, but there is that part of me that…. you know what I mean.
This post got me right *here* (pointing at heart). For years, both me and my husband dreamed of having three kids. But then my oldest was diagnosed with autism, and the question became, “What if we have another child with autism?” We were worried about taking much-needed attention away from either of our boys. We went for genetic testing, thinking that knowing the odds would help us decide, but it was inconclusive and didn’t tell us anything.
In the end, we had to do what was best for the two kids we have, and we decided – with very heavy hearts and much shedding of tears and a ton of wondering if we were doing the right thing – to stop where we were. In retrospect, I know we made the right choice, and I have come to feel that my family is exactly the way it should be.
On the positive side, it feels totally AWESOME to be able to walk right by the diaper aisle in the store!
Kirsten
Running for autism, I am glad you enjoyed reading my post. I am sorry that you went through such a tough decision making process. I really feel for you. I am glad that you know you made the right choice for your family. You should be proud that you put your two children first. AND, my two year old is not potty trained yet… she is a stubborn one! ha! I do look forward to the day when there will be no more diaper changes!
This is a question I ponder day and night as Little Girl is going to turn two in a few months. I always invisioned my family with 3 children but I wanted to have girl – boy – girl. When Little Girl came along and we learned she was, well, a girl at birth, I sighed b/c I knew right then that it changed my “master plan”. But I have learned as Little Girl gets older, that having a sister is very special (a relationship that I never experienced). And now people ask me if I am going to “try for a boy”. But I sometimes wonder if my life is full enough and why upset the harmony. And then there is the honest part of me that knows that I may be at capacity. And I am finally learning to be “me” again and know a newborn would be a setback of sorts to the progress we are making. I just worry that I may regret not having more children when they are older and “easier”. *sigh*
Angela!! Your comment is exactly how I feel! It’s like you are inside my brain! ha! Except, when I was little I envisioned having four or five girls… like a Jane Austen novel! I love that my two little girls are sisters. They have such a special connection. But now that my girls are a little older, I sometimes ponder what having a little man in the house would be like. I don’t think I’d know what to do! ha! We are in such girl-mode here!
I too feel like we have such great harmony and truthfully I wonder if I could handle three. I know I’d be fine, but would it be fair to my two children I already have and a newborn to have a mother that would be overwhelmed? I worry too if I will regret my decision because a large family is something I always wanted when I was little. Big *sigh* here too!
Bitter sweet…that’s for sure!! We have 2 children, a girl and boy. My husband is 100% sure we are done. I am 80% sure. While I cannot imagine going through it all again, it hurts to think we are done. Either way, I am happy with our family.
I read about someone making a quilt from baby clothes. I am absolutely doing that with the clothes I saved. I have visions of me wrapped up in their baby clothes quilt, looking through pictures and scrap books when they go to college. Hopefully, I wont be crying, but we’ll see! LOL!!!!!
Maggie, a quilt with baby clothes sounds delightful. When I read that, immediately several of my favorite infant clothes my girls wore popped into my mind.
Today I was in our attic putting away clothes my sister sent the girls. I came across one of two infant car seats we own and my breast pump. I decided they both needed to go. When I looked at my breast pump today, it just seemed like eons ago that I breastfed my girls. Although it really was only a year ago, it seems worlds away.
I think there may also be a physiological aspect to all this too, not just an emotional one.
I’m finally at peace with keeping our kid count to two. But for a long time I felt like something was missing despite how happy I was with my little brood. I think for 4 years I was in a cycle where I was either pregnant or nursing. So after I weaned my youngest, my body seemed to think it was time to get pregnant again. It was weird to suddenly stop that pattern.
But maybe the body theory is all just hooey that I’ve made up–because God knows I did get SO sad putting away all the newborn onesies and receiving blankets. 🙁
I also think I just tend to have an addictive personality–if two kids are wonderful, then three must be ever BETTER! But in reality, in terms of the attention I can give to my two kids, as well as the practicalities of space in our house and paying for college, two makes more sense for us.
So I’m making my peace with it, and moving on. Trying to get my newborn baby snuggles from friend’s babies!
I feel the same way Kristen. After writing this article and reading the comments, I wonder what our life would be like with a third child. We never found out the gender of our baby until we delivered them. I wonder if we would have another girl or if we’d have a boy. The happiest days of my life were the days I had both of my girls.
What I realize is that even though having an infant is so magical it would never be *peaceful in our house because of the two girls I already have. I remember bringing my 2nd child home and being surprised that it wasn’t as calm as I pictured it to be, that is because I had a three year old running around the house.
I was watching a mother walk into our local library this week. She had an infant in her infant carrier, carrying the baby on her forearm. She had a two year old little girl following her. I smiled thinking, is that what I used to look like? Made me a little sad too, knowing those days are over.
Glad to read that you are making peace with your choice!
I am coming to terms with the idea that our family is complete too. Had things been different we may have had number four, but as they are – I am content. I think we all know when it’s time to move on, but it is a little sad, for sure.
Well said Karyn… well said!
I was thinking a lot about you and this post today and decided to come back and re-read it. It was also interesting to read my comment above and look at my thoughts from a third party perspective…Today is Little Girl’s 2nd birthday. It was my internal cut-off for deciding on the third child – or to at least put in some preventive measures if I was not pregnant by now (which I am definitely NOT) 🙂 I think about whether or not to have a third child many time every day. It is when the three of us – each holding one of my hands – are out and about, I feel good about not having a baby in a ergo attached to me, too. I just wonder if the voice in my head that is always doubting my decision will ever quiet down? My husband, although he will not come out and say this, wishes for a boy in our lives. He never imagined having girls at all. He would like someone to pass on the family name. But here we are with the cards we are dealt. So I came back to your post today looking for reassurance that life with two girls IS PERFECT and to hopefully move on. Thanks!