Are we done yet?

I originally wrote this in response to a friend's question back in January, 2004. I thought it would be easier to start a blog with some of my previous writings that my friends liked. Her question to me (the mother of 4) was, "How do I know if we're done having kids?" And this was my (lengthy!) response:

1. Babies: Babies are SOOOOOOOOOOOO sweet and adorable (well most of them - some have colic!) so don't think in terms of having another BABY, but in terms of having another child in the 2-3 age range. Do you want to do THAT again? If you really do, then that's one for the "yes" column.

2. Getting Older: Yes, as we get older pregnancy seems harder to endure, not to mention the risks of having "old" eggs. Believe me, I was quite offended to hear my eggs were old when I offered to donate them to those in need. If I had it to do over, I'd have had my babies MUCH younger. I don't regret the time to grow up and figure out how to be a wife, but I think we would have wasted far less time and money on other things if we'd have had our priorities "babified" back then. Amazing how they change your perspective! I'm only a year older than you are, and I haven't even had time to figure out how old I'll be at various stages - I can barely figure out what years they all will go to kindergarten! I would say that you can handle whatever you CHOOSE to handle. Is having a 5-year-old when you are 40 something you would choose for your family? If not, then put a check in the "no" column.

3. House Size: My grandmother raised 4 kids in an +/- 850 sq.ft. house with one bathroom. She and my grandfather slept on a sleeper sofa in the living room so the kids could share the two bedrooms. She still lives in that house. We have a 4 bedroom house that's 2600 sq.ft. and sometimes I feel so cramped! Our kids share 2 bedrooms and the other is for computers, homework, storage, etc. It's a disaster most of the time, but I'm working on it. When I feel crowded, I think of my grandmother. My girls STILL have trouble getting to sleep at night and naptime. I often have to sit with them and threaten them with bodily harm to keep them quiet long enough to fall asleep. And when one gets sick, they usually both get sick. And the closet already seems crowded - what will we do when they are teens???? I do think a 4-year spread between the first batch of kids and the second is wise - two little ones is quite enough to handle at one time. Three or four at the same time gets to be a big challenge. It really helps when at least half of the kids can use the potty independently, and it would be nice if at least one could get his own breakfast, but I think I'm preventing bigger trouble by getting all the food for everyone still. Do you think it would be a good experience for your girls to share a room?

4. Supersized:

4a. Private school: Not sure what to say here, except that it's VERY expensive and was one of the reasons we chose our school district. Even with 2, you may find it to be more than your finances can bear. We had 3 in Mother's Day Out for 2 months before we completely dropped out. It was hard to see that much money going for a few hours of relative freedom. You may want to just supplement what they are learning at home and save your money for things like college and car insurance. Seriously - we've already figured out that our kids will all have to attend the same college and we will have to buy a house for them because it will be cheaper than dorms for 4 kids. And the school tax bill is nearly the cost of private school for one child as it is, so my husband says we're going to get our money's worth out of them!

4b. Restaurants: A table for 5 is not that much of a wait - restaurants have various sizes of tables and we've never noticed a longer wait when we had the kids with us. Hotels are a whole 'nother story. We paid a huge amount of money at Disney to stay at a resort that had rooms that would accommodate our small herd. Elsewhere we would have required two rooms, and no guarantees that we could have gotten adjoining rooms or a suite.

4c. Vehicles: I drive a Suburban because nothing smaller will work. You can't get 3 full-sized carseats across anything smaller. Luckily, the Graco TurboBooster has a pretty small profile. With some shoving, I can get two booster seats and a car seat across the 3rd row, but it's tight. Usually we ride 2+2+2. We can only take 1 friend right now because I have to leave the 8th seat folded to give access to the 3rd row. Any more kids and we'd be looking at a 12-passenger van. If having everything in your life "supersized" sounds like fun, then that's another one for the "yes" column.

5. Shopping: You just learn to do it. It's the same as when you learned to go from 1 to 2 kids. Adding a third DOES dictate which grocery stores you use, though. I've found that the double-seat carts that are attached to a regular cart are practically a must. That way I can put the older girls in the two seats and the baby across the basket seat in the carrier. My usual store got rid of those and got the race car carts. These make my life more difficult and I've been shopping at night and on weekends more. Good big strollers are very heavy and hard to come by. And you need a Suburban just to take one with you, anyway. Mine is no longer made because most people found it too heavy and hard to steer. They ain't lying, but it's the only way for us to go to the mall. On the bright side, I can plod along and get more of a workout than those girls with one baby and a jogging stroller!

6. Dividing yourself: My kids seem to get more independent as we go. The youngest barely cries because he knows that if he just fusses periodically, I'll get to him eventually. If it's dire, he'll scream and get immediate attention (as immediate as I can muster.) There are times I feel terrible for him because I don't have all the time I'd like to enjoy his babyhood. Other times I feel bad for #3 because I've tried to rush her through toddlerhood and on to a more independent phase. #2 and #1 have to pick up the slack when the little ones need more attention or something needs to be done more quickly than the smaller ones can do it. I don't play with my children - it's all I can do to keep the mouths full and the diapers empty and the house from looking like a bomb went off. I envy the folks who have tea parties and play games on a regular basis. If this doesn't sound like the life for you, check the "no" column.

7. Staying home: Unless you have an MD or JD or some other REALLY high paying job, you can't afford to go back to work with more than 2 kids! I've figured out that it would cost me over $2000 a month to put my kids in daycare, and that's with #1 in full-day kinder! Don't worry about being able to stay home. 3 kids don't cost that much more than 2, and you can't afford to go anywhere anyway! If you want extra money, you have to either take in a baby or get a job watching kids at a Mother's Day Out, gym, church, or other place that will let you bring a little baby and still get paid. Play groups do become a little more difficult because your kids are not all the same age, but you can occasionally find another mom with kids the same ages as yours to play with. Things like Gymboree are completely out of the question!

8. The Right Reasons: I'm not sure about the right reasons. We planned on four kids from the beginning. There are days that I wonder what in the HECK I was thinking! There are days I say I need to go back to work and get someone in here who knows what to do with small children. And there are days I feel like the luckiest woman in the world to have four beautiful, perfect (HA!) children and be so blessed with a great husband who wants me to stay home with them and doesn't expect the house to look any better at the end of the day than it looks when he leaves. I really REALLY want to get rid of all the baby stuff. For me, this was a clear sign. I felt genuine relief on the way home from the hospital after having #4, KNOWING it was the last time we'd do that! BUT, I do feel a sense of loss that this bittersweet time in our lives is drawing to a close. I'm also looking forward to what's next. I think to myself that in two more years there will be no more diapers as far as the eye can see. No more bulky baby furniture and implements taking up every square inch of extra space. No more diaper bags to lug. Most of my kids will be able to get themselves dressed and in the truck and actually buckle their own seatbelts! The older kids will be able to help clean up around here. But I know I will miss the sweet smell of a baby's neck after a bath.

If you are really not sure after all this soul-searching, then do two things for the next year or so:

1. Use some sort of easily-reversible birth control. Not sure if I've said enough good things about the Mirena, but depending on your insurance, it would probably be cheaper than the pill and has WAY fewer side effects. After removal, women get pregnant at the same rate as those who used nothing (faster than those who took the pill.) Even if you had it removed after a year, you'd probably have spent less than on the pill for a year. For me it would be the Mirena @ $15 copay once vs. the Pill at $20/month ($240). Easy choice for me. I am VERY sure I'm done, but not 100% positive, so we thought this would be a good "fix" for a year or more. Okay that's the end of my plug for Mirena!!

2. Babysit regularly for a baby. You might even contract to provide regular daycare for an infant or other baby under the age of 1. If you can do that for a year and you really want one of your own, then it's probably for real. Otherwise, you have worked out your baby-lust vicariously without getting into the rest of the stuff I mentioned above.