Before we were ‘one and done’ parents, my husband and I totally wanted two children.
We both come from a family of 4, and each have an older sibling. It was what we pictured to be the quintessential family – not too many, not too few. Also, it was pretty great having someone around when your parents were driving you bonkers (sorry, Amma & Appa).
I had a pretty easy, drama-free pregnancy. I loved everything that came with it – my bump, maternity clothes (hello, stretchy pants!) and the total freedom to have mint chocolate chip ice cream as many times as I wanted! Of course, it did come with sciatica and stretchmarks.
But, then again, mint chocolate chip!
After what seemed like the longest labor known in history, followed by 2 hours of pushing, my epidural falling out, and then a C-section, out came this beautiful little baby girl. So perfect. And she was ours to keep!
Cut to week 2.
Exhaustion had reached an all-time high. We had no idea what we were doing. A mild form of postpartum depression had set in. Breastfeeding was not even slightly going as planned. She was crying pretty much all day. We felt incompetent.
We questioned parenting as a whole.
Now, I know our story isn’t unique. Every parent goes through what we went through. The absolute confusion and chaos that comes with the first year of life wasn’t worse for us than it was for other parents (at least, I’d like to think that that’s true).
Going from a family of 2 to a family of 3 was turning out to be a bigger change than we expected. Much bigger. Holy moly.
I hope that it goes without saying that while we were shoveling our way through dirty diapers and daycare germs, there is nothing in the world that will compare to the love that we have for Aria. Nothing.
Cut to almost 5 years later, every time someone asks me if we were planning to have another child or give Aria a sibling, I proudly reply, “Nope. One and done.”
We have made the very intentional decision to stick with just the one. And far be it for me to question anyone else’s parenting decisions as it pertains to the number of children they decide to have, we are extremely satisfied with our decision, for us. For our family.
For the past 5 years, people have asked us if we would ever consider changing our minds.
“Won’t Aria feel lonely?”
“Every kid needs a sibling.”
“Wasn’t having an older brother great?”
“When I have kids, I’m definitely going to have at least 2.”
It’s funny how people tell us the things we’ve already asked each other. Many, many times. The decision was obviously not an easy one to make. And we still second-guess it when we see other babies, and especially when we see Aria playing by herself.
But, what about us? Our marriage? What about me? What about him?
This may sound completely selfish, but I missed my life before becoming a mom. I missed my independence. I missed the closeness between my husband and me.
It was around Aria’s 3rd birthday when I felt like I could breathe again. I felt like a huge weight had been lifted – this weight of constant worry and dependence.
Slowly but surely, she started to do more things that didn’t require my focused supervision. I didn’t feel the urge to message the babysitter on the few times my husband and I went out about whether they were doing okay. I could focus my attention on him and talk about our days that didn’t pertain to Aria. We talked less about how tired we both were and more about what we wanted out of our lives.
We even took our first kid-free vacation to Cancun!
One and done started to look really good right about now!
While Aria would love having a sibling and would be a wonderful big sister, she thrives and will continue to thrive as our only child. Of course, it would be really great for her to have someone to play with (instead of dressing me up in tiaras & wands), but with time, she will learn how to access her imagination more to keep herself busy.
By not adding more children to our family, we are realistically pursuing our lives knowing what we are and are not capable of. Our attention spans aren’t limitless, and we’d like to give as much of it as possible to Aria. As we get older and are now in our 30’s, we don’t have the limitless energy we used to and we prefer to have enough to go around between both of our careers (that we’re both very passionate about) as well to have fun with her.
I know we have another couple years or so to go with people asking us whether we plan to have another baby.
And who knows? Maybe if more of my friends decide to have children (hint, hint), it’ll spark some baby fever in us.
But for now, our response to the question stands – one and done. And that is what works extremely well for us.
