It’s been over three years since I’ve consistently slept through the night. Neither of our girls were decent sleepers, with the youngest (now 16 months) still rousing and shrieking for a bottle refill a couple times a night. It’s awful and I find myself despairing at the thought of just how long it’s going to be before I ever feel refreshed or rested again, what with a new baby coming in the summer.
As absurd as it is, this is part of the reason we decided to just “go for it” and have a third child close in age to the others: we are miserable and exhausted, and if the situation were to even remotely improve there is NO WAY we’d ever want to go back to this state of constant fatigue and misery. Originally I thought it would be nice to regain some sanity in between a second and third child, but now that we’re in the midst of it I am glad to just be able to plow through the sleepless nights and soiled diapers and hope to come up for air in a few years’ time with three well-adjusted, decent kids who sleep through the night and wipe their own rears. Dare to dream!
What were your original plans for spacing out your kids? Did you stick to those plans or adjust them as your lives changed and your family evolved?
Due with my 3rd in a month or so. Also a concern about car seats – have read about the ‘sunshine kids radian’ which is only about 14″ wide – really skinny. For boosters apparently the graco turbobooster and the clik are the skinniest. still waiting for my almost 5yr old to hit 40 lbs! Good luck!
We stopped at two, but had them 19 months apart. I’m so glad we had them close together. Besides the whole best of friends andf sharing toys and movies thing, Oh Good Lord, the thought of going BACK to diapers again after the second one was trained. I don’t think so. Any thoughts of a third stopped on that day.
Our 1st born was a surprise 5 years into our 10 year “plan”. Number 2 was a natural family planning surprise, born 15 months after Number 1. You know what they say, if you plan naturally, plan to be pregnant! Well number 3 will be almost exactly 5 years younger than number 1 and 3.5 years younger than number 2. My doctor asked me if this was a surprise pregnancy or if it was planned. I laughed and said that we planned to be surprised! I’m just thankful the older ones are potty trained. We have never had sleep issues (PTL), but now that I’m trying to figure out how to fit 3 car seats/booster seats into my 4 door sedan I’m beginning to wonder if we should have put a little more thought into the spacing of our children. Oh well nothing we could or would do about it now, besides I’d like to be finished having kids by the time I’m 35. I’d like to have one more so if we cram them all together this is still possible. A sane plan? maybe not, but this is a crazy wonderful frantic delightful life
Our daughter just sort of happened, but we planned for when we wanted the second. We knew we wanted them around 2 years apart or so, and I also knew I wanted my son to be born in the winter; my daughter was born September first, so I had the “pleasure” of one very hot and miserable summer awaiting her arrival. I didn’t want that misery again! We started trying in February, and the timing worked out because he was born the following March!
That is EXACTLY why we spaced 2 & 3 so close together. We were already exhausted and just decided to go for it. My 2 littles are 19 mos apart. I have absolutely no regrets. And #3 is a little charmer. Definitely worth a few (years of!) sleepless nights.
I don’t have kids yet … I always thought I would want them pretty spaced out in terms of years, but now I am reconsidering. We will see when the time comes I guess!!
My first two were thirteen months apart, so my original plan was NO MORE KIDS EVER. Because two kids thirteen months apart means that there’s a two-year period that I can’t remember, at all. I know I was there because I have pictures.
And then surprise! Baby 3. SIX YEARS after my first. My kids have been sleeping through the night and getting themselves dressed and wiping their own butts for years. And now…I’m going back to baby.
So yeah. No plan really.
My two are nearly 4 years apart for this exact reason. I never slept after #1 and couldn’t imagine adding another to the mix! Luckily #2 slept a lot better. More like a real baby waking a few times to feed and then going back to sleep instead of Monster Baby who woke to shriek and cry and lay awake for hours. He is 10 years-old and still a troubled sleeper (although an amazing kid!). Needless to say, we’re done.