A Second Kid? Are you CRAZY??

(this post was written June 7, 2014)

I heard that after you have your first kid, people started asking you when you were going to have another one. I experienced this a little bit, but really only from people I didn't know (or my mother-in-law). See, I think it was that the people close to me knew what a traumatic experience Avonlea's babyhood was, and so they knew better than to ask me.

As time went on, among other people and among other mommies, the baby question would come up, and people would be surprised at my emphatic "NO!" when asked if we were going to have another kid.

I don't think it is a permanent "no". I just say that I need more time to recover from the trauma of the last kid. It's not the birth that traumatized me. It's the having a BABY thing that traumatized me. I love looking at babies. I love it when friends have babies. I really liked being pregnant and growing a baby. I learned that I do NOT like babies.

I also can't imagine having another kid right now, with Avonlea still so young. I imagine a 3-4 year spread between my kids. I like the 3 or 4 year spread, because they'll have one or two years together in middle and high school, but not too close together. They also won't be too far apart and grow up hating each other, like Ashley and I did with our 6.5 year spread.

I am also seeing what it is like to have a toddler and a baby first-hand. Several of my mom friends are on baby #2 with their first being around 16-20 months old. And while it's exciting in theory, I see what a toll it takes. The energy you needed for one baby is now multiplied, but the energy you're given isn't. My friends are doing an amazing job--but I spent one afternoon with one of them, and I came home saying, "We canNOT have another baby anytime soon." Just watching what it was like terrified me.

I don't do well in situations where I am overwhelmed. I tend to lose my balance mentally, and I constantly feel like I am underwater. I just don't do well. I mean, one of my extended family members told me she was going to fly to California to help me after I had Avonlea because I sounded like I was doing so badly. Did I also mention I'm not good at concealing how I really feel?

I guess you have some things figured out with your second kid that make some aspects of it a little easier. You're not dealing with the first-time Mom thing, which is huge. But on the flip-side, you're dealing with the new thing of raising another kid AND a baby.

And to be honest, I'm kind of content with our little 3-person family. I really would be completely happy if we never had another kid of our own. I did the pregnant thing. I did the baby thing. I'm happy to move on with my life. I would love to consider adoption, but that's not something Nick is interested in right now. Maybe I can work on him in that regard, but it's not something we would pursue even in the next 5 years.

All that being said, I took these pictures today:

Oh, shit.