Moms of more than 1...I need opinions please!

Those that have 2 or more children...do you like the spacing of your kids? If not would you have waited longer or not quite as long.   Do you or did you feel guilty about having another child?

Matthew will be 1 in March and my dh is wanting another baby.  He has wanted to have another one since Matthew was just a few months old.  He wants them to be close.  I definintely want another but just not sure about the spacing.  I don't want to take away from Matthew.  I want him to get to be the baby and get all the attention.  But at the same time I don't want to wait more than 2 or 3 years.  I just wish there was some way I would know when the "perfect" time would be. 

I have three (and there will NOT be another) boys- 4, 2 and almost 5 mos. I love the spacing of my kids and am loving it more and more as they get older =o)

I am thrilled that the 4 and 2 yr old play (mostly) nice together now. In the beginning it was total chaos. If you count the oldest childs overnight diapers, I have three kids in them currently. You find yourself doing things in pairs (or threes): three diapers, three sets of clothes, three jackets.  I never felt guilty about having them so close because we waited so long before we could have our first boy. We didn't want him to be an only child and I didn't know if baby #1 was a fluke- I was infertile for so many years pre op.

To be honest, when #2 was born, #1 basically ignored him other than to look over at him once in a while. The word "gentle" is used VERY often in my household. I got pregnant with #2 when #1 was 10 mos old. #2 and #3 are a little farther apart and #2 now ignores #3 but #1 is fasinated... gotta watch him like a hawk. Luckily my babies like to sleep and I have plenty of mommy time for all of them. In September, the oldest starts Kindergarten, the middle goes to preschool and there will be just 1 home- I have NO idea what I'll do with my time then! LOL

-Janine

Hi,

  My kids are 14(boy) and 16(girl)  they are 21 months apart, and they get along very well.  When I got pregnant with my son I though, oh no, but it turned out to be the best thing.  And we are actually in the process of trying to have one more.  So I guess it just depends on the family, if you raise your kids to be close, they will be close (in my opinion)
  Good luck with your decision, Kim

My son is almost 6 and we are currently TTC. I would've like to had 2 in diapers at the same time for a number of obvious reasons but my DH was not convinced.

My kids are 9,4 and 5. I love the spacing. We lost one two years ago and it took awhile to for me to get healthily enough mentally to have another one. So now we are going to have a 5 year gap between my youngest and our new little one. I am not thrilled about the gap but I think I am push for another baby in about a year so this one can have some close in age like my others children have. That being said I come from a family of seven kids ages ranging from 34 down to 16. We all love each other very much and once my little brothers passed the teenage stage we became great friends. I am waiting for my little sister, who are 16 to grow up some and I am sure we will bond more then.
Sorry for the ramble.

Emily

Savannah is almost 7, Skyler is 16 months, Bryder is 2 months.  Although the spacing between the last 2 kids is tuff at times I wouldn't change it for anything.  My oldest is a big help at her age she loves babies!

Ash :)

well the spacing of my 1st and 2nd child wasn't intentional, it literally took us 14 months to get pg with my daughter (#2).   We started trying to get pg with our second when my son was about 1 1/2 and I ended up getting pregnant after 9 months of trying (chemical pregnancy and lost it at 5 wks).   My son would've been 2 1/2 or so when I had the baby, we thought that was going to be so cool- but it wasn't meant to be.  I got on Clomid at a year out of trying (inculding the m/c) and got pregnant after the 2nd round at 14 months trying.   I had my daughter when my son was 3 1/2 and it was PERFECT timing I think.  My son had been potty trained by that time for 6 months and he was in preschool 2 days a week.   He was old enough to be a really big helper and do things on his own too.  I loved that he was at preschool twice a week and I had some alone time with the baby too.

With this one, my daughter will be the same age as my son (3 1/2) and I love the spacing.   She'll have been potty trained for 6 months by April and starts preschool in September (the baby will be 5 months old by then) and gone 2 days a week doing that.   I got pregnant right away with this one and I'm glad we have the same age spacing as we did with my son and daughter.  I think my daughter at age 3 has had plenty of time to be the "baby" and I've given her plenty of attention.   I love the 3 yr age spacing and I don't think I could've handled it as well as if we had gotten pg and had a 2 yr spacing.  It all worked out really nicely for us in the end when we had our kids.

I don't feel guilty having another child, my son really needed someone to play with and needed a sibling to grow up with.  I came from a family of just me and my sister and we are 4 yrs apart.   I always wanted another sibling and wished my parents would've had another one, so I'm glad we are having 3 kids.  I'm hoping we are done though, I knew we were supposed to have this baby though and glad we are.   I t hought I could never love another child as much as my son, but you can and it's so fun.  My sister and I are close, but 2-3 yrs is a good age to space kids IMO.

GL to you!

Yes and no.  The time between my first two are 2 years, 2 weeks, and 1day...I love it.  Between my second and third is 4 years, 4 months.  That was a long stretch to get back into the baby thing again.  With this one between my 3rd and 4th it will be 21months  and 5 days..a little 2 close.  But then again I could be wrong and it works out great.  The 2 in diapers never bothered me, if it did I wouldn't be having 3 in diapers that's for sure.  I say give it to April and then see where you want to go from there.

 Okay....I have 22, 19, 18,17,15,13,10, and 8.  My 17 and 15-year old are only 14 months apart and I loved that age spread...I won't lie I was exhausted with them because I would get up and nurse the new baby and in 2  hours and have to wake up and give the older one a bottle, and then an hour later back up to nurse...it went on like that for about 6 months until I took my baby in for her well baby check and started crying when the doc  came in...he was like what is the problem...and I said...I am soooooooooooooo tired...and he asked my schedule...and he said that I needed to stop getting up with the older baby as there was no nutritional need for her to have a bottle in the night...that she was just spoiled...soooooooo we went through a week of hell breaking her from the bottle, but I finally got some rest :)

The reason I love the age spread though is that there has only been 2 times in either of their lives where they were not in the same school...in fact, when the lil one went to kindergarten after 2 months they moved her into my older daughter's classroom (it was a split 1/2 kindergarten and half 1st grade) because they spent all of their time trying to let the girls see one another...I thought it was so sweet, and they were happy as little clams once they were together :)

I hope this helps to hear my story....I didn't mind having them a little farther apart either...but no matter what...it all works out :)


Laura

We have 4 kids and I'll tell ya, I like them close. I don't like the space between the 1st and the 2nd, which is 7 1/2 years. Our 2nd and 3rd are 10 days shy of being a year apart. My 3rd's birthday was the 4th (yesterday) and so him and my 2nd are both 6 right now!! LOL Our 2nd's birthday isn't until the 14th of this month. I think that if I had it to do over, I would've waited until she was 18 months to get pregnant with the 3rd one, but the spacing is better now that they're older. It was HARD at first. Couldn't get a lot of sleep with a newborn and a 1 year old! lol But our 4th baby is 2 1/2 years younger than the 3rd and that spacing is NICE! Between the baby #5 that is on the way and our 4th, there will be 4 years by the time she/he comes and hopefully that age difference will work out ok. But ideally if I could've chosen the perfect timing, I think I would have gotten pregnant when each of them was 18 months. I think a 2 year+ age difference would be ideal. But we're just happy with happy, healthy kids and they seem to do just fine with each other the way it is so I wouldn't change a thing!