A friend of mine is pregnant again. She shared this news with an admission that this child was a surprise and now brings their total number of children to one more than the number she previously felt was acceptable for their family. The part of me that has struggled for years with infertility (or more accurately, Unpredictable Intermittent Fertility) can be irritated when people aren’t thankful enough for the gift of healthy pregnancies, but in this situation I felt a sense of understanding. I know what it feels like to realize you’re going to have more kids than you originally planned.
I think many of us have an idea in our mind about the appropriate number of children for our family. I hear some couples are even able to just decide how many kids they want, how far apart they think those children should be spaced and then they make it happen. Fertility issues, miscarriages, adoption and foster care have a way of taking your plans, ripping them into tiny shreds and then taping them back together in some new, unrecognizable (but amazing) formation, so I knew pretty early on in our parenting journey that that wasn’t the way it was going to be for us. For other parents it may just be the unexpected “whoopsies” baby that comes long after you sold the bassinet and gave away the baby clothes. Either way, there comes a moment when you realize your original plan is now out the window and you’ve got to adjust.
Maybe you think you can’t handle more children than you have. You feel really stretched as it is and the idea of ONE MORE feels totally overwhelming. Maybe it’s that you think one more child will push you out of society’s perception of “normal” and into some other category of Weirdos Who Don’t Know When Enough is Enough. Maybe you’re worried that you don’t have the financial resources to add to your family again or you’re worried about the toll another child will take on your body. All of these reasons can feel like a weight and can make it difficult to be as excited about this child as you were about your first.
I want to tell you that it’s okay to be sad, frustrated or confused for a minute. Pushing back those emotions will not necessarily make them disappear. If you can give yourself the space to work through it, then you can free yourself from it and it won’t be a burden you place on that child. You don’t have to tell the whole world what a struggle this is, but find a friend or two you think might understand and share with them that this is hard. It can be helpful to give voice to those feelings and then allow your friends to help you see the joy and embrace the beauty of this new parenting experience.
Once you’ve grieved that life is not going according to your plan, think about practical ways make this experience fun– new maternity clothes instead of just pulling out the old ones, a fresh coat of paint in the nursery, a last family vacation with your current crew, getting maternity pictures taken, or taking a “babymoon” with your spouse can be wise to do embrace this big change. Start to see this experience as God’s way of moving you out of thinking you can handle life in your own strength and into more dependance on him. If this new family member pushes you into “large family” territory, learn to see the beauty in a family that fights stereotypes about big families. Don’t assume that just because you have a bunch of kids you are now expected to wear denim jumpers and buy off brand toilet paper in bulk at Sam’s Club. Of course you CAN do those things if you want to (with my full blessing), but sometimes we need to remind ourselves that the biggest stereotypes we’re fighting are not “society’s” but the ones in our own head.
So here’s my story:
I grew up in a family of five kids. I loved that number. I saw my parents handle five kids with grace and I had such fun being part of a large family that was still small enough to fit in your average station wagon. In my mind, 5 was the appropriate number of children to have.
When it became clear that our foster daughter was likely to become a permanent member of our family, I mentally closed the door on adding more children to our home. She was the fifth– three sons, two daughters. Just what I wanted. But (as has become the pattern of my life) that wasn’t God’s plan and the miraculous pregnancy that of course couldn’t happen, DID.
Because we’ve had years of infertility and pregnancy loss, I won’t say that there was ever a moment that this child wasn’t wanted. We had enough perspective to know what a gift this pregnancy was and we intended to treasure every minute, however long or short. But there was a process of letting go of my plan. Six kids seemed like too many. We had crossed over from (in my mind) being an adorably large family to being a suspiciously large family. I was self-conscious about having five kids and being pregnant. I was afraid someone would decide our foster daughter needed a different family. I worried my friends would judge me and I’d have less support at a time when I needed it more. I continued to harbor some of these concerns until our son was born.
It wasn’t until after I saw his face, heard his cry, came to know his personality that I realized a number is just a number. My perfect family size was based not on knowing these children, but on my own ideas about what number of theoretical children is best. Now that I know all six of children, I know God’s plan was better than the one I was holding so tightly to.
I like to call my littlest boy our “dessert baby.” This is partly because he is so sweet. And it is partly because of the dessert cart experience you may be familiar with. Have you had that moment when you ate a big meal at a restaurant and you feel totally, wonderfully, blessedly full and the waitress asks you if you saved any room for dessert? No. Of course you didn’t. You couldn’t possibly eat another bite. And then somebody rolls the dessert cart by or you watch a waiter take a slice of cheesecake to the table next to you. Okay, so I didn’t have room for random dessert, but now that I’ve seen that cheesecake, I realize I do have room for THAT. This is how it feels to be a mother to this little guy. I didn’t have room or capacity for a sixth child. That was too much. But then we saw THIS sixth child and obviously we had room for him. He wasn’t just a positive pregnancy test, he was a person that we love. It’s hard to know all that when you’re wrestling through the emotions of realizing you’re going to have one more child than you thought you’d have.
For the mother out there struggling with the idea that her family may be larger (or smaller!) than she planned, I understand. It can be a scary place to be. But that doesn’t mean it’s wrong. Having to be in the position to let go of your plan can come to be a freeing place. Having thrown my “ideal family size” out the window, I’m learning to let go of control in other areas where I thought I was in charge. I think that may have been what God was asking of me all along.
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