<p>geezermom, people are sharing their family stories on this thread. I don’t think we need to get too harsh or judgmental about other people’s stories, and in any case I daresay that Mudder’s_Mudder knows more about her DIL’s family than any of us do. </p>
<p>Posters are being remarkably open about their experiences and feelings in this thread, and I hope that won’t stop. We can flame away at each other in the “Best way to move the kid’s stuff to college” threads, but for this one, let’s be kind. This is sensitive stuff. :)</p>
<p>'scuuse me. There’s a lot of emotion running through this thread.</p>
<p>I’ve been impressed by the descriptions of onlies. It’s helped me see some of the characteristics DH and my mom share- early maturity, love of reading, helpfulness, etc. It helped me see the same in many of my younger friends or my kids’ friends. I also find the discussion of tending older relatives very interesting, as we did this for MIL and my brother is zero help with my own mom. It even helped give me perspective on my best friend, who is the only one of four kids tending a quite needy mother. So, I have followed this thread.</p>
<p>I really apologize for this. But, what’s surprising is the quick - and sometimes harsh- response to posters who go a little off topic or state something you don’t agree with. I agree we shouldn’t drill unfounded prejudice into our kids (warning them about dating an only, especially when it’s based on limited experience) and that it’s terribly sad to hear someone’s mom thought it took more kids to make a family. But, people are sharing issues and concerns related to onlies. M’sM shared a tale of immense pressure on her DIL, an only.</p>
<p>We all feel the need, at times, to be defensive of our kids, our current families or the family situation we grew up in. But, we should play nice.</p>
<p>If the second child comes 5+ years after the first, that could count as a single child period too. Things just get more complicated and so do the ways of dealing with them.</p>
<p>Geezermom, let me be very clear here: This is how one “only” whom I know well and is a member of my family feels about her experience as an only child. I described the factors she has told me, many times over the years, she feels influenced her upbringing. I could “what if” all day, and so could she, and so could you. It is what it is. This is an only who feels she was adversely affected by being the sole focus of her parents’ attention (and yes, ambition) because what she sees as accomplishment they don’t. That is what the OP asked about that I responded to.</p>
<p>I appreciate your decision not to stereotype my attitudes about daycare and working mothers as I have not expressed them. I thought it was clear that I was describing my DIL’s feelings as I posted it was not my judgment but hers. Thanks for giving me the chance to clarify that.</p>
<p>I posted upthread about my experience as an only child. I didn’t say in that post that my mother was also an only child. Her mother married late and had her when she was around forty. I never heard my mother complain about being an only child. She had a number of aunts she was close to and her generation consisted of only children. When she was young, her father came to America with the intent of getting a job and sending for them. In the intervening time, was broke out in Europe, and it became impossible for them to leave. They spent years separated across the Atlantic and my Jewish family fled Paris on the last train allowed to leave and then went into hiding. I mention all of this because it occurs to me that my grandmother only having one child probably turned out to be a very, very good thing. It’s a lot easier for a woman alone to move about with one child, feed one child under starvation circumstances, live in small quarters, etc. I think it forged a close bond between them as well as between my mother and her aunts, who were nearby for some of that time. I don’t know if my grandmother could have fled as easily had she had a few kids to contend with. </p>
<p>I don’t know if my mother would have ever had another child since she was unable to have kids once I reached the age of five or so. But I have been told by a relative who knew her well, that she didn’t understand why people had several children, as if it is somehow uncivilized. She may not have approved of my choice to have four kids, although I’d like to think she would have fallen in love with them and enjoyed being a grandmother. I think she was happy with one child, and it may well have been her choice in an era when very few women made that choice. It also occurs to me that, while I wish I’d had siblings, our family was in crisis a good deal of the time since my mother was ill and it would have been a lot harder for my parents had there been more children and harder on my father when was left to be a single parent. So all of this is to say that, in some situations, it’s easier for a family to cope when there are fewer children.</p>
<p>It doesn’t take double the time & double the resources. You still live in same house, it is just as easy to cook for 4 as for 3 & if your 2nd is like mine, they might wear the same clothes everyday for a whole year ( when she was in 4th gd) so that is another way to save :)</p>
<p>It also was handy being able to leave my 4yr old home with her 12 year old sister for a few minutes while running to the grocery store. Of course if it was only the 12 year old at home, I might have even taken her with me.</p>
<p>My grandmother always said that, in the period between the wars, many people who had grown up in large, struggling families were grateful to be able to limit their number of children and give them more than they had had. She considered it smart and caring. </p>
<p>My motto has always been, “Family is.” Doesn’t matter if it’s one or many kids, single parent, grandparent, adopted, gay, immigrant, educated…when parents love and raise great young adults, it’s a wonderful thing.</p>
<p>As a baby-boomer, I recall it being considered a little odd that there were only 2 kids in my family. As it happens, my mother has rh negative blood, so even having me–the second child–was taking a chance in those days, before the invention of rhogam. She would have liked to have more kids. I am almost 5 years younger than my sibling, and our relationship was always somewhat distant, even when I was little. I remember that I used to ask my parents why they didn’t adopt someone: I wanted a younger sibling.</p>
<p>My S, on the other hand, has never wanted a sib. I would have happily adopted more children, but the timing of when it became clear that no more bio children were happening coincided with financial collapse, so there is no way we could possibly have afforded to pay the huge fees.</p>
<p>We have explored becoming foster parents, but there are some problems associated with that, too.</p>
<p>You just do. You don’t get a lot of sleep for a lot of years, you try to build a support system of sorts, if you’re lucky you have a partner who helps, and you figure things out. It’s like working out. When you are out of shape, you don’t know how people run for miles, but once you start working out you can build up to it. That’s what i felt it was like. I didn’t start out with four kids. I started with one and started getting my parenting muscles, then when the second one came it was like being thrown in the deep end of the pool, but I got the hang of it and got stronger muscles as I had more. Now that I have only one at home full-time, and he is almost grown, I don’t know how I did it because when I see a woman struggling with a couple of crying kids in a store I know I am no longer “in shape” and couldn’t do it again. When the first two were launched, I had a lot of fun having two kids at home and felt like I could understand how terrific it was for my friends with two kids. Now, in these twilight years of full-time parenting, I feel like I’m getting to experience all the joy and pleasure of having one child and it is very sweet and I can understand that there is something wonderful about having one. I wouldn’t do it differently, of course, but I feel like with the age spread of my kids, I’ve had a chance to see how wonderful it can be to have all kinds of parenting experiences.</p>
<p>*My grandmother always said that, in the period between the wars, many people who had grown up in large, struggling families were grateful to be able to limit their number of children and give them more than they had had. She considered it smart and caring. *</p>
<p>My grandmother had 9 sisters. I found it interesting that the older sisters had small families( none or 1) while the younger sisters had 4 or 5. </p>
<p>For many women, the option to limit their family simply wasn’t there.
And it seems we are coming full circle.</p>
<p>This thread wouldn’t exist if there wasn’t a concern that an “only” gets affected in some way.</p>
<p>I’ve known parents who’ve been concerned about…</p>
<p>The only boy with a few older sisters…living in a sea of pink or getting overly doted on by extra mommies.</p>
<p>The only girl in a family of a few boys…becoming the princess.</p>
<p>The youngest child when all the older siblings are much older.</p>
<p>The larger family with lots of money to spend.</p>
<p>Child/Children in a single parent home.</p>
<p>The child who is the only grandchild…with indulging grandparents, aunts and uncles.</p>
<p>The child with the chronic illness.</p>
<p>The child from a large family who feels that there aren’t enough resources for all.</p>
<p>and so on and so on. </p>
<p>There are all kinds of scenarios that may or may not have affects on a child. It’s how the parents manage each situation that makes the difference. :)</p>
<p>No flaming intended, and I’m sorry if my post came off as harsh. I’m not a mega-poster on CC, but I’m not in the habit of being mean and stay away from threads where that happens. (Though recently someone was snide when I wrote that I have never had any problems with my Mac. Sheesh!) The poster’s DIL did (and does) have a very rough time with her parents, and I’m glad she has had the strength to pursue her own dreams and goals. Setting boundaries in situations like that is really a challenge. Among my current acquaintances is a parent who sounds a lot like the DIL’s parents. It is painful to watch the damaging impact that this parent’s controlling and judgmental behavior has had on the oldest, college-age child in that family. My father was judgmental, too–not as bad as M-M’s DIL’s parents sound, but he could be hurtful. I was probably reacting the way I did because of experiences like these.</p>
<p>My husband’s only regret about being an only child is that there is no one to share the burden of his very very difficult and needy mother. However, it does seem to be true that in most families, one child takes on the burden of the elderly parents while the rest do little or nothing.</p>
<p>This thread reminds me of a time when my oldest son was in second grade. We were watching a class talent show, and my son, who has always had an impressive vocabulary and an ability to charm anyone, was wowing the crowd with his monolouge. A friend of his mother, the mother of an only, leaned over to me and said “You can ALWAYS tell an only child.” The woman sitting behind us, spoke up and said “Oh he’s not an only,” and then she looked at me and said “You have what, five kids?” I have two. </p>
<p>I think people want to see the good in their own situation and see the rest of the world through those lenses. In fact, I think most personality comes from the child himself and not from his siblings or lack there of.</p>
<p>Well, I am an only and I certainly object to the generalizations about onlies that one hears (and I’ve been tempted to advise my children to avoid possible partners from Maryland! :)). </p>
<p>However, I think that generalizations about multiples are suspect as well. In my wife’s family there are 5 kids. In my experience over many years, they have all helped my MIL and late FIL. None of them have done “little or nothing” to help.</p>
<p>So true. There is no ideal situation and everyone has to deal with something and every family situation plays itself out differently. I’ve never really understood the reasoning behind singly out families with one child as being some sort of affliction that adversely affects the child. Honestly, when I was growing up I use to envy my friends who were only children.</p>
As it happens, my mother has rh negative blood, so even having me–the second child–was taking a chance in those days, before the invention of rhogam. She would have liked to have more kids. I am almost 5 years younger than my sibling, and our relationship was always somewhat distant, even when I was little. I remember that I used to ask my parents why they didn’t adopt someone: I wanted a younger sibling.</p>
or getting overly doted on by extra mommies.</p>