Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Child Spacing

I had a pregnancy scare today, so I've been thinking a lot about this.


With intense babies that don't sleep and seem to need a lot of stimulation... what is ideal child spacing? People keep telling me my second one will be easy because DD is not, but I know it could go either way.

Here is what I've been thinking.

1.) I should just accept being a mommy, accept I get no free time and my house is a mess and make sure DD has all she needs from me and gets to BF until at least age 2 like I want her to. And I should accept I will be raising babies for 4-6 years continually.

2.)Admit that my pregnancy, delivery and recovery were very hard. The first few months were extremely hard, and my idealistic visions of lying in bed with newborn #2 while DD plays happily in the playroom with her father are total bunk. It is going to be hard and I will just need to get through it. This is a reason for me to "get it over with" so I can heal again and get to the business of raising my children (and get healthy /in shape again, find a routine, etc.)

3.)I love writing. I love working on my sites. I see that this is going be a constant source of frustration for me until all my babies are somewhat independent. I can just give it all up and be a dedicated mommy and do only that, but the writing has kept me sane. You guys have seen my posts before, so you know I am feeling a little in-sane.

I know we want 2 kids. DH wants 3 kids. I love this time with DD but I look forward to getting through all the physical pain of pregnancy and recovery so I can put that part behind me...

So.. Perspectives? A lot of you are past the toddler stage, so you can probably look back on it with more wisdom that I can muster.

Oh and.. Edit: DD is 9 months, but acts like she is 12-18 months in just about every way. I feel that I have a toddler and she acts like one. I don't feel like I can make predictions about what DD will be like when she is, say, 2 years old, because her milestones have been 30-50% ahead on everything. How do I know she won't be acting more like a 3 year old? Or maybe she'll be exactly like you would expect a 2 year old to be, so I can expect that.

9 years apart.

Ours are back to back and I wouldnt want it any other way. DD6 and DS4 are 16 months apart and DS4 and DD3 are 18 months apart. We got in and out of the baby phase relatively quickly. Sure it was hard sometimes, but we just went with it. We are both very relaxed parents though. We also practice Attachment Parenting which in my eyes makes things easier. They were also BFed through my next pregnancy. I did wean DD3 "early" at 14 months as I had to go through IVF for my 4th pregnancy and did not want her exposed to the added horomones that are necessary for IVF.

She may act like a 3 year old, or maybe like a 2 year old. but in my eyes that shouldnt make much of a difference.

ETA: That may have been confusing. I am a surrogate and did have a 4th child a year ago, but she is not mine.

I have just heard some things about how 3 years is sooo much better than 2 years, or about how much they can understand at certain ages and how jealous toddlers act depending on their age. So I thought it might make a difference.

We also AP and I think it has helped us with preventing tantrums / melt-downs with DD, but it can be draining at times for sure. I have heard some moms lose their milk during pregnancy, so I was worried about that.

Are you saying yours are, or that you think that is a good interval in general?

We have three girls, 4yrs4mths then 3yrs8mths apart. The first gap was due to infertility and I was so upset about it, right up until I actually got pregnant and it stuck and I realised what an ideal gap it was going to be for us. Second gap was planned, we got pregnant first cycle so that was the minimum gap we were prepared to consider.

upside: although #2 and #3 have to get dragged around in their sister/s wake all three girls have, for the most part, been parented as babies very much in the same way. Attachment style, extended breastfeeding, lots of attention (not that they would tolerate anything else).

downside - 9+ years straight of parenting babies/small children.

My pregnancies got worse every time, the third was truly hellish. But my deliveries and recoveries have been better each time. Anything could happen, you can't count on it, but for most women subsequent births and recoveries DO get easier.

You get better at parenting hard to parent kids, you find ways to get more into your day. You also have more kids though...My youngest is 18 months and it's harder now than when she was 6 months old. I would estimate that 12-24mths is the hardest age for me, practically speaking, in terms of trying to get anything else done (ie work). I cannot imagine being pregnant with with another baby while she is this age, let alone having another baby with her like this. Of course I think another pregnancy might kill me so, um, my yardstick might be off.

We had planned to have two or three children, at least. We stopped at one after contemplating what it would be like to go through another pregnancy and delivery like the first one (maternal autoimmune disease, on bedrest from 5 months, 4 weeks early delivery with 36 hour hard labor and maternal hemorrhage thrown in, and a total of two weeks with the baby in neonatal ICU in the first month) and then contemplating caring for another high-needs infant while still trying to stay sane and raise our high-maintenance son. We knew that we had to plan for a worst-case scenario, and couldn't see a way to manage if that came to pass. It was a good decision, I think.

The universe, however, had other plans for us, and we ended up raising my niece, who was six years older than our son, from the time she was thirteen. We are currently in the middle of twelve years straight of teenagers living in the house - woohoo! (Something else to consider when spacing children).

ETA: I think any time to have children is probably the worst possible time, except for all the others.

For us, a little over two years between the girls worked great. DD#1 was a relatively easy baby/toddler though. If DD#2 had been first, we may have needed a six to seven year gap. We knew we wanted at least two kids and were contemplating three or four, but decided we were done after DD#2.

I am a big fan of the six year age span between my two kidlets. After #1 we were adamant that we were NEVER going to have anymore kids! Terrible pregnancy, bedrest at 26 weeks, premature delivery at 32 weeks through a traumatic abruption, 4 weeks in the NICU, 6 months of colic, two full years of exhaustion with a child that would not sleep nor slow down.

Our lovely 5 year old DD sat sweetly on Santa' lap and asked for a baby for Christmas. He winked at me and said that he would see what he could do. I loudly told him not to bother... bring her a pony or something else. I was pregnant within the month. Best Christmas present I ever got!!

I don't know if things were easier the second time around because DS is such a relaxed and different child or because, as someone said above, I got better at parenting an intense child. What I can say for sure was that much of the problem with DD's first year was that learning how to incorporate a baby into your life is hard in the best of situations, but when you have an intense baby it beats your self-esteem down and makes you feel like a failure. I wish I could go back and redo DD's babyhood knowing what I do now! I bet it would be so different.

Age span preferences are very individual. For and OCD mom like me who was right in the middle of graduate studies (and lacking in the patience department), having kids too close together would have pushed me right over the edge!

Ha!

Ours are 4 years apart. This was entirely intentional--we weren't even slightly ready to contemplate #2 till DD was 3, and even then we really only went for it because we didn't want a 5-year+ gap. In retrospect I think 3 years is likely a perfect gap if that works for pepole, but there are many reasons it might not. I'm happy with the gap we have for the most part, although it has made little-kidhood stretch on and on. DS just dropped his nap and this is the first time we have not had to worry about someone's nap since DD was born in '04.

That.

Also, my first was my hardest baby, followed by my third. My third was actually a harder baby, but I had the wisdom of experiencing the first and knowing for a fact that everything is a stage and everything passes, even the good stuff. Whoever said your next one would be easier because the first one was hard is an idiot. You get what you get. They might be easier, they might be harder... We were fooled by #2, who was easier, into thinking that we were better parents now. #3 came along to prove how wrong we were...