One is the Onliest Number
Leslie Price is one and done, baby
Today’s issue comes to you from Leslie Price, a editor, and the co-founder of Gloria, a new weekly newsletter for women who aren't yet old, but aren't still young. If you are also embarking on midlife, or are just curious about what the future may hold, subscribe here.
Last winter, I fell down an unusual internet rabbit hole. It was the YouTube account of an “extreme meal prepper” named Amy Maryon. The video that really did it for me was one where she happily documents the process of making 50 dinners, plus breakfast and lunch for a month, for her family of 10. She wakes up at 1:30am to start, and she works all through the night and into the next day. The sheer quantity of ground beef is astounding. I watched the entire thing!
The economics, structure, and daily functioning of large families are fascinating to me as a parent who feels like I’m barely treading water with one child. I didn’t realize that only having one kid was that big of a deal until I moved from Brooklyn, where our family wasn’t much of an anomaly, to Baltimore, Maryland, where being “one-and-done” was definitely not the norm. Now our daughter’s in a class with 12 other kids, and only one other “only.” She tells me that they’re “sisters” and that “sisters share food” which I’m pretty sure is against the rules right now. Aside from that, I’m fine with this pretense because it ends at pickup and I don’t have to try to navigate their dramatic fake-sibling relationship while also trying to make it through dinner and bedtime every night.
It’s still surprising to me at how much old-fashioned thinking there is surrounding how many kids people have, or the proper spacing of kids. In my Facebook mom groups I’m a part of, I see parents posting about their guilt and shame over not being able to “give” their kid a sibling, whether that’s due to economics or fertility or both.
I know, deep in my bones, that I could not handle having another kid. The baby phase was way too difficult, exhausting and anxiety-inducing; and I still struggle with the noise, mess, and chaos that one child produces. This is also not to mention the money part, which is also a major factor but definitely not the deciding one. The deciding factor is me, and knowing that having another would break me.
As I once told a childless friend of mine, having a kid is committing to a long-term relationship with someone you don’t know yet. You don’t know what your pregnancy is going to be like, or your delivery. Your child may be quiet and artsy or, like mine, they may literally climb the walls and pinball off the furniture if you don’t get them out of the house first thing in the morning.
I had a remarkable naivete about all of this going in. Childbirth would hurt, but my body was “made to do this” and surely it would “bounce back” quickly afterward. Breastfeeding would be easy and parenting would come naturally. Perhaps my entire personality would change? (No.) Words truly fail to describe the reality of the experience, which is why it feels pointless to try to explain/warn about it to those who are considering it...and why I’m always so amazed when people are up for going through all of it again. The first time, you don’t know what you are in for. But now you do, and you’re doing it anyway. That’s bravery.
Sometimes I suspect the two-or-more crew of trying to pull the same shit that parents pull on childless people. “It’s great!,” they say. “Do it!” And then, once you actually join the club, they’ll level with you. Don’t try to trick me with that “it’s not really much more work” song-and-dance. It’s an entire additional human being.
The Coronavirus pandemic made me lean so hard into parenting that I basically fell over. Six months of isolating a then four-year-old was bananas, and trying to get it up for 10 days of outdoor quarantine activities post-school exposure, over and over again, is just exhausting. If I hadn’t already decided that this was it for me, this experience would have probably done the trick.
When I list out my reasons for not having more kids, they seem selfish. I have more time to myself, and now that she’s finally conquered her fears of pooping in a regular toilet after about two years of solid work on our part, there’s a glimmer of hope on the horizon that soon, I won’t have to be intimately involved with her bowel movements. When our friends go on family vacations to places like Hershey Park, we daydream about taking our kid on some sort of glamorous international vacation like the true snobs we are. I get to sleep more, I finally have the time and energy to occasionally work out, and the mental space to write. I’m less stressed and moderately less resentful (it still flares occasionally). As she gains independence, so do I. I guess what I’m trying to say is that, for as much as I care about her happiness, I also care about mine.
If you want to check out Gloria but don’t know where to begin, some highlights cover life as an old mom, work & ambition, and whether it’s possible to change your life after 40.)
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Want more witches? This time 2 years ago we were talking about parenting while sober and also the ways kids go out of their way to disagree with us because they are just the worst.
One witchy thing
I’m also a one-and-done-r for the same reasons as Leslie. I am still shocked that in 2021, having one child is a choice I have to frequently justify or explain to people. I also think there’s something interesting going on with language here; I dislike the term “only child“ as “only“ implies some sort of lack, so I try to avoid using it.
Thank you for this. I love the line that says “having a kid is committing to a long term relationship with someone you don’t know yet” so true!
I also agree that we are still surrounded by people who sing praises to families of more than one child and a close age gap. I waisted so much time worrying about the age gap.