family size

[percival]

cross posted from the Quill


I'd like as many children as I can have, for several reasons:

- I'm an only child, and my parents are quite fixated on me; they are lonely people, and they would never consider going into an old people's home. So I am about to start training as a holistic therapist to make sure I can create a job for myself at home if I need to in a couple of years time, because I will have to be the one to see them through their old age. I have NO cousins, aunts or uncles to help me, because my parents are only children themselves.

Parents of only children, set them free. Please don't expect them to look after you and provide for you, or if you do expect that, be flexible in where you live out your life. make sure they can be independent. They will care for you tenderly if they need to, but if they do not feel *forced* to be there for you, your relationship will be all the richer and closer for it.

- My husband and I are having fertility problems at the moment. I am 29. By the time my first comes along, I will be 30 or 31. If we take into account the normal sex life slump after child birth, and the fact that it will have taken us ages to conceive number one, I figure that we will end up with two or three children by the time I become completely infertile. I'm now so desperate that I'm ready to accept every child as a blessing from God. Thy will be done.

- I was a lonely child, and would have loved to have brothers and sisters. As a kid, I wanted to have at least four kids.

Finally, for all those parents of only kids who keep getting told that their kids will miss out or be socially challenged: PM me and I will give you some references with which you can SMAX them scientifically.

Comments

[acusa-dora.livejournal.com]

I wanted three, but after we adopted one, we decided we couldn't go through it again. I may sometime write the story of that adoption, but let's just say that it was really difficult and I was just afraid to have that much trouble again.

You know, I don't mind having an only. I do feel that he's handicapped by not having a sister because he doesn't talk to or deal with girls on a day to day basis. But, he could have had a brother and still be in the same position. And there are girls in his classes at school.

I have many friends who are only children, and they are very happy and well-adjusted.

[acusa-dora.livejournal.com]

I hit the button before finishing. I'm glad you wrote that about setting only children free. Now that I'm in the middle of caring for an older person, I realize exactly what a commitment that is. I plan to make my own arrangements for an independent living place and then an assisted living place when the time comes, especially if I'm alone. People say that nursing homes are terrible and that they don't want to be there. They aren't exactly great, but I think you can make your own experience better if you retain the right attitude (if you are still lucid enough) I'd rather save my money and go to the best one I can afford than live with my son. As long as my son is educated and has the means to make a living, an inheritance is not important, so I can go to a better home even if it means spending everything before I die. My culture pushes having parents live with their children. I just don't want to do it myself.

As for letting him be independent, I've done pretty well. My mother was very clingy and I hated that--luckily, she isn't too bad that way now.

[perceval.livejournal.com]

quite a few people who decide to go for IVF say that they have been put off by the experience of people who've decided to adopt.

Fear of losing the child to their birth mother, or older children who are severely damaged by what they have suffered, seem to be common experiences.

I'd be really interested in your adoption story, because I feel that this might also be the way out for my husband and myself - although I'm likely to follow aome's example and adopt from abroad.

Adoption

[annearchy.livejournal.com]

My husband and I adopted our daughter "domestically" (within the United States) in August 1996. We started working with our agency in April of that year and became parents on 8/22/96 when she was 2 days young. Our daughter's birthmother *has never* suggested that she wanted to reclaim her (and she cannot because a finalized adoption is legally binding on all parties, at least in the U.S.)-- in fact, if anything, birthmom has been *too distant* for our taste (we thought we were getting into an open adoption, but basically it's only been open on our end, with the result that our daughter knows only what we are able to tell her, which isn't nearly enough.
Perceval, I know you're in Scotland so of course adoption laws etc will be different. But please know that adoption is not always a nightmare - in fact, the ones you see on TV are the really bad cases. Most adoptions are nothing like that. BTW my daughter will be 7 in less than a month and has already heard HP books 1-4 twice and is now listening to me reading OotP.