I used to always wonder which was the hardest transition for young parents: going from 0 children to 1? From 1-2? From 2-3? I think every parent in each situation will have a different answer, and I find them all fascinating. I used to ask more experienced parents for their take all the time, because I like to know what to expect. I’d be really interested in hearing what your thoughts are! Here are a few thoughts I have now that we’re a few months into our transition into a family of two kids.
1) Preparing for labor is different. On the upside, you don’t have to go to classes to learn how to give birth and how to breastfeed and all that, but the actual going to the hospital part is more complicated. When we had our first child, I just woke Ben up one morning and said, “I think I’m going into labor.” We packed up, then headed out. Simple, right?
This time, the process was a lot more stressful, for many reasons. First of all, we had decided to potty train our daughter, which meant that this 8-month pregnant lady was frequently trying to run around to get this toddler from point A to point B really, really fast. Then this 8-month pregnant lady was stooping, crouching, hoisting, lifting, holding, carrying, bending, etc. etc. to achieve potty training goals which, let me tell you, is NO FUN. None. My body said so too, with false contractions eventually driving me to bed rest.
As if that all was not stressful enough, these false contractions also led me to think I was about to have a baby. All the time. Apparently the more babies you have, the more likely this is to happen. So that was a lot of false contracting. This meant that instead of storing up much needed Zzz’s at 2… 3… 4… 5am, I was busy timing the minutes between contractions, trying to determine whether or not it was time to head to the hospital. And several times, it was… except it wasn’t. As in, the contractions were regularly under 5 minutes apart, hurt, and all that jazz… but we didn’t go to the hospital yet because of…
Stressor #3: Finding childcare. We have a ton of friends and family around who all were willing to help at this time, but we really didn’t want to call them up to come over at 3am only to send them home at 8am with false labor reports. If we really did call for help each time we were 95% sure I was going into labor, that would have been like 5 false alarms. So instead, I lay in bed stressed all the time about whether or not to make the calls and head to the delivery room and all that. GUYS IT WAS SO STRESSFUL. Especially because all of these false labor incidents decided to happen during normal sleeping hours (i.e. 11pm-6am!).
All this to say, you can’t just tap your hubby at 4am and say, “It’s time!” and then calmly head out the door. You have to prep your toddler, prep the people who will care for her, and then be reallyreallyreally sure you’re going to have a baby before troubling all the people to come help. GLAD THAT IS DONE.
(+1 for transition from 0 to 1 being easier)
2) Pregnancy is way more exhausting with a toddler. I had a number of friends that were pregnant at the same time as me this time around, which was great. But I noticed that, as we were trading notes, I found myself feeling jealous. Jealous that she could come home from work and then crash on the couch for a nap for however long she wanted. Jealous that, if she needed to, she could take a sick day and then stay home and just be sick and think about just herself and work on just getting herself better. I could go on, but you get the point. When you’re pregnant with your second, you’ll have all the exhaustion and nausea that you did the first time around… but a lot less of the free time and energy to take care of yourself than you before!
(+1 for transition from 0 to 1 being easier)
3) Know-how and experience really do count for a lot. I thought having a newborn was really, really, really hard the first time around. It was an insane job to me, and I could not believe that so many people had done it before me and lived to tell the story. I think the worst part was breastfeeding. It hurt so much more than I ever thought possible, and looking back, I can hardly believe I stuck through with it. I think I could write a whole essay on how awful breastfeeding was alone.
This time around, it has been CAKE. Preventing breastfeeding problems has made SUCH a huge difference in taking care of this newborn and has been a total game-changer! (Don’t worry, the literature says that most mothers do not have pain and difficulty and all that when breastfeeding, so don’t let my words scare you from breastfeeding your child :)).
Two years ago, on top of nursing woes, we were always worried and anxious and stressed. Every detail required copious amounts of research and thought. When we added our newborn son to the family, though, I found that most of our parenting brainpower has still been devoted to our daughter as we are trying to figure out The Twos. The part of my brain that keeps track of and takes care of our son is pretty much on autopilot. It certainly helps that he is a super chill baby so far (THANK YOU, SON), but it also helps that we can do the whole breastfeeding/diapers/sleep thing in our sleep now (almost literally…).
(+1 for transition from 1 to 2 being easier)
4) It’s easier to accept the reality of this stage of life. For us, the transition from 0 to 1 was way more jarring than the transition from 1 to 2. For Ben, I think it was the anxiety of trying to keep our baby healthy and alive. But see #3 for how we’re a lot more chill about that this time. For me, I think my 0-1 transition had a lot to do with my struggle to hang on to my personal interests for as long as I could. I was still clinging to things like my hobbies and personal “me time” and identity. I clung on to every spare moment I could and tried to bake or play sports or hang out or go to the store or something. Every baby nap time that wasn’t converted into hobby/me time felt like a robbery. I did not nap when the baby napped. I tiredly tried to go do things and be myself, still.
This time around, I’m just grateful to accumulate sleep whenever possible. I have no ambitions of maintaining any social calendar. I am resigned to being “just” a mom. I have accepted the fact that this is my life now, so being chained to a breastfeeding baby is not nearly as hard as it was with my daughter.
(+1 for transition from 1 to 2 being easier)
5) I see the light, and it is not that far away. With our daughter, I remember feeling a lot of despair. I couldn’t believe how little sleep I was getting. I couldn’t believe how constant nursing was. I couldn’t believe how little time I had to tend to myself. I felt like this was motherhood: being constantly sleep-deprived, feeding a baby every 2-3 hours, and never getting to hang out for more than one hour at a time unless I took the baby along. THIS WAS MY NEW LIFE. Cue pity party.
But that’s totally not true. At around 3 months, a lot of magic happens for most babies. They start sleeping longer stretches. You can space out nursing sessions a bit more so it’s every 3-4 hours. Some babies even start to sleep through the night! There is a light at the end of this tunnel. I did not see the light the first time around. This time, I know it is there so I’m a lot more relaxed about the early difficulties of parenting a newborn. I remember that this too, shall pass, and it will just be a matter of months before I am regularly sleeping 6+ hours in a row again.
If your situation is like mine and bottle feeding is just not working out, then you might also feel despair that you will be forever nursing your child and never again being able to go out for a trip to the City or to watch a movie or something without toting the baby along. It is a short chain indeed. But don’t despair! Even most anti-bottle babies someday start eating solid foods. Someday = around 6 months. As they get older, they consume more and more solids and your chain grows longer and longer until one day you realize it’s time to wean your child and you are free to go on a weeklong trip to Quebec in the middle of a freezing winter if you like. So you do. And you realize that this too, ends.
(+1 for transition from 1 to 2 being easier)
6) Having just one kid feels really, really easy. Especially if that one kid is the baby. Because if we’re at home, he’s frequently sleeping which means you can sleep or blog or email or bake. If you take him out, he’s confined to his car seat pretty much the whole time… and plus, you can use the small stroller frame instead of the ridiculous double stroller! Hooray! I don’t really know why I thought it was hard taking a baby out of the house the first time around. JoEllen of 2014, if only you knew how easy those days were. Sigh.
(+1 for nobody. If I could turn back time, how I would make more out of my non-pregnant, 1-child days!)
I’m sure there are many other difficulties of being a new parent I’ve now forgotten, or nuances of adding a second that I’ve overlooked. What are some of your thoughts on adding more to your family? The more the merrier? I’d love to hear your thoughts below!
15 responses to “Transitioning from One Child to Two”
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This is so helpful! I have a just-turned-2-year old and our second coming in June. I’ve been pondering a lot of these things, but generally have to leave off with “well, wait and see!” That’s still true because every baby, toddler, parent, and family is different in some ways, but hearing how it’s been for you is so helpful! Our daughter is definitely showing readiness for potty training so it looks like I’ll be that 8-month pregnant lady too. Here’s hoping it goes smoothly!
Oh man, I wish you so much rest and recovery if you are attempting hardcore potty training as a pregnant lady. (Hardcore = throw out all the diapers!) I still go back and forth on how I feel about the decision we made to do it when we did… but I guess now that we’re good and done and everyone is still healthy and all, it’s easy to say I’m glad I did it. But sometimes I’m not (like when I just want to go on a day trip and not stress over when I should pull over for a potty break or if I remembered to pack an extra set of clothes in case of accidents or if she’s going to get a UTI from holding it in…! THE STRESS IS REAL!). Congratulations on your growing family and I hope you enjoy the rest of your time with just one :).
I totally agree with all of your comments! I’ve had a very similar experience. Ah yes, our good ‘old Quebec trip. That was NICE…we will get to that point again someday. 😉
YES. WE SHALL. AND THEN LET’S GO TO GREECE! =D
Oh JoEllen! I’m so sorry about all the false labor. I had some of that with Elf and it was really challenging. Did anyone tell you about warm/hot-ish baths? If you get into a warm bath, it will stop the contractions if it’s false labor. And if it’s not… well, then the contractions keep going. 😛
There are so many things here that I’m just nodding my head along to. One of the biggest difficulties for me has been bickering children while I’m trying to make dinner, use the bathroom, etc. That’s been really challenging! It’s a little easier now with Munchkin in school and I’m less worried about him pulling the house down around his ears if I leave him alone for a few minutes. (Funny how different these kids can be – I never worried about that with Munchkin as much!) Now that they’re beginning to play together more nicely, it’s gotten easier too.
It’s nice to see you back even though I know you’re still in the thick of it! <3
No, never heard of the baths! Wish I knew about it… I would REALLY really have liked to know whether it was real or not haha =). Man I can’t wait til my kids can play with each other nicely! Right now I’m just glad she is more gentle with her little brother than she is with the baby doll I’d gotten to prep her for the real baby… haha :). Sorry I’ve been awful about keeping up with anything… *hugs*
We feel fortunate that we had enough older parents emphasize point 6 to us (having 1 immobile baby is relatively “easy”) and they were able to (or wish they did) continue doing a lot of things. So we’ve been trying to take advantage of our current situation with just 1; traveling, socializing, etc. The other thing I’ve found helpful to take advantage of others’ experience of 1 vs 2 kids (somewhat related to your post), is when asking older parents for advice on this and that, to ask what they did with their 2nd or 3rd newborn, not their 1st, since the methods tend to be more efficient and less stressful/hassle (and subsequent kids always survive just fine) e.g. if they used washcloths and water for diapering for the firstborn, but ended up using disposable baby wipes for their second kid because it was more convenient (and both kids are still alive), then we’re more likely to follow what they did for their 2nd child and not stress about the potential health downsides of baby wipes on a newborn (and avoid falling into the “must be a first time parent” stereotype). Similar stereotypical situations of a blanket that grazes the floor, and so on. =)
You guys have definitely been taking advantage of your current situation :). You make parenting look like a breeze! Cool idea on taking parents’ advice and doing what they did with #2 with your first, and bypassing all the stress of noob parenting. We definitely did NOT do that. I gotta say, disposable wipes with Son have been SO MUCH EASIER. Would have totally done it with Daughter if her skin were not so sensitive. But generally much more laid back this time around 🙂 Glad you guys are enjoying that mentality with #1! 🙂
Simple version of #1: labour turns serious – call husband – leave him at home with kid #1 – take a taxi to hospital – give birth to kid #2 – text to husband – accept visitors – go home with baby. 🙂
Yes! That was our backup plan haha :). But the idea of going through labor and giving birth w/o him made me sad :P.