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For my background - I am the mother of four kids, the oldest of which is a handful and the third of which has some kind of birth defect that currently requires a fake eye and may require a kidney transplant when he's a teen.
When I say the oldest is a handful, I mean that she is seven years old and has been suspended from school twice for running away from school and across a busy street without looking. Let's call her A. I have trouble taking her places - either I take her by herself somewhere or I leave her behind and take the 6, 3, and 2 year old. It is much easier to take the 6, 3, and 2 year old places together than it is to take A by herself. She is a wonderful child 90% of the time, but 10% of the time she gets stuck on a Bad Idea. Literally stuck, she repeats a phrase over and over again, does not listen to anything, only snaps out of it after 20 or so minutes.
A babysitter quit because one of her "stuck ideas" was to get revenge on the sitter for some slight (didn't get the right color dinner plate, if I remember correctly.) Another stuck idea was to get to the check out line first in a busy Home Depot garden center - I had a toddler in a stroller, a 3 year old walking as fast as he could, and couldn't keep up with the lithe unencumbered A. I lost sight of her and wandered around Home Depot until the intercom said she was at the front - she tried to run into the parking lot by herself but an employee stopped her.
She officially has ADHD and I am supposed to take A to a therapist to treat her for this. They don't think she has ODD because she always feels remorse after. I think she might have high-functioning autism because she also has a very black/white way of looking at things. If someone doesn't predict the future she calls it a lie. Ex. "Can we go outside this afternoon?" "Yes, if the weather stays nice." then if it rains and we have to stay inside, "You lied!"
However, when I filled out the PIC-2 questionnaire with full candor and honesty, the Neuropsych wrote in her parent-facing notes: "[OracleOutlook] responded to the measure in such a way that she reported a slightly higher number of symptoms than is typical for A’s age. This is likely due to increased stressors in their life and not true feigning of symptoms; however, results were interpreted with caution." I suspect we are years away from getting a full diagnosis for whatever is going on with A.
I don't write all this to complain or ask for advice. I am trying to get across the experience of having a "bad kid." I don't take the other kids to as many places as I would like. I worry that they are picking up bad adaptations to having a turbulent, violent personality living with them. The next oldest has a fawn response. The younger two like to hit back. It's not great.
I also have a lot of medical costs from the third child with the eye prosthetic. When he was an infant he needed a new conformer every month or so, which is pretty pricey.
This isn't even getting into pregnancy, which is a crap shoot as you noted.
Ultimately life is a risk. The question is, is it worth it? I say yes. Humans throughout history said "yes" through worse difficulties and dangers.
There are many good reasons to be done having kids. Mine is that I want to increase the odds that my husband is alive and well up to the point the youngest turns 18.
One consideration is that having one difficult kid is hard, but I actually think it gets easier when you have more kids who are better behaved. I'm glad I didn't stop at A. If I had, I would assume there was something wrong with my parenting that caused her emotional disturbances. I also get to have "normal kid experiences" with the other kids.
If your complicated kid is the youngest, it's probably easier to manage. I've seen families where they keep going until they have 5-7 kids, hit a kid who needs more attention, and then stop. They seem pretty happy, even when they need to have specialized schooling, medical procedures, etc. It seems easier for an experienced parent to manage, and they also have older kids in middle school/high school who can help out more with chores and babysitting.
While having a really needy or psychotic child can be really bad, the odds of it happening without a clear family history are around the same as getting into a really bad car accident. Going into each pregnancy I worried about it around as much as I worry about getting paralyzed on a road trip, which is to say not overly much - certainly not enough to make me reconsider.
I hope this helps give you more to consider. I'm not trying to persuade you to have another kid, just give a different perspective on the "getting unlucky" phenomenon. I love A. I wish she didn't get "stuck" most days, but I'm glad she's here. I'll do whatever it takes to raise her right.
Also, life is sadder without a 1 year old in the house. It just is. I have a long ways to go before I get a grandkid to play with but I look forward to it already.
What was the punishment for this?
What was the punishment for this?
Usually punishment is confinement to her room for X amount of time, the worst was for two days in a row when she was suspended from school.
We tried spanking for a span when she was four, but it didn't have any effect. Confining her to her room doesn't really have an effect either, except giving her space to calm down.
My mom just recommends taking the next treat away, but the behavior is so continuous, disruptive, and unsafe that we're at the point where we don't do treats. We don't get to go to parties, play dates or movies. We take away the next trip to Costco.
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Thank you for sharing your perspective!
And yes there is a joy that toddlers bring that doesn't really come from anything else. They're just so much more seriously and wholeheartedly enthusiastic about life than anyone else I've ever met.
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