The Only Child Option

I learned a very important lesson last week. I am not proud of how I CAME to my conclusion, but I thought sharing it might help some who haven’t gotten to organized sports with their kids yet (or maybe some who have, but are frustrated by a similar situation).

My son started playing with the local soccer club a few weeks ago. As a general rule, he is nervous in new situations. It is just his personality. I try to keep a positive outlook and nudge him forward. He is usually fine once he gets started, but with soccer, he ended up crying a few times each practice. There were 2 other kids crying intermittently also, so I started to think maybe we had a bad coach. I mean, soccer is supposed to instill a love of the game, not terror and frustration. I got myself all worked up, and was ready to confront him. I decided I would watch one more practice before saying anything.

I had an epiphany. It isn’t that the coach is bad – it is just that he is at the opposite end of the personality spectrum from my son. Joshua is shy and sensitive. The coach is confident and matter-of-fact. He has a lot to teach the kids. He is clearly an expert with plenty of experience. So at the end of practice, instead of confronting him on his “bad” coaching style, I asked him what I could do to help Joshua like soccer more. Joshua’s crying bouts had mostly been when someone would steal the ball away from him. The coach suggested I practice doing that at home so it would become an ok thing at practice. Joshua was fuming mad at me the first time I went out and tried it with him (his frustration on the field was tears, with me, it was anger). The second time it was more like a game (that’s what soccer IS). I will try again tonight and then practice is Tuesday. Here’s hoping and praying we don’t have anymore tears.

Thank goodness I didn’t open my big mouth and “roar” like a momma bear at the coach. His only fault is that is isn’t like my son. LOL

We are in a recession. The President says we are coming out of it slowly. I, for one, don’t buy it. I think it is going to get a lot worse before it gets better. We made our decision to have just 1 child long before the Fed’s economic policy caught up with itself, but the numbers don’t lie. I ran several calculators online to estimate how much it costs to raise a child. Conservative estimates are $220,000 through age 18. Ouch. It is important to note, this number does not include private education or college.

Single-child families do increase during times of economic difficulty. There was a 23% rise in only-child families during the Great Depression. This recession is going to shape whether or not women decide to have children as well. Maybe for you the jury is still out. 44% of women polled recently say they plan to reduce or delay their childbearing because of the economy. You would not be alone.

But, you might ask, isn’t that selfish? Deciding whether or not to have children based on how much they cost – how unfeeling and wrong. I don’t think so. In order to take care of your child(ren) you must first take care of yourself. Everyone was quick to criticize Octomom, Nadya Suleman, because she gave birth to 14 children despite her inability to provide for their basic needs. Why shouldn’t everyone take financial resources into consideration when deciding how many children to have?

Here is another fantastic video by Dr. Sylvia Gearing.  She really has a firm grasp on only child parenting and can give you a balanced view of things to watch out for and things to do that will help you as you parent an only child:

In an effort to provide you with the most comprehensive information about only-child parenting, consider this excellent video with Dr. Sylvia Gearing:

So we spend mucho $$ on a swing set.  My thought was, he’s an only child, he will have hours of fun playing on his wonderful new swing set.  Guess what?  He only plays on it when he has friends over or mom & dad are outside.  He has great fun with his friends.  The playhouse is great for pretending to have a lemonade stand, etc…  Maybe he will spend more time on it by himself as he gets older.  I will tell you one thing – if I had it to do over, I wouldn’t have bought it.  I can take him to the park if he wants to play with friends or with me.  Funny, hindsight is still 20/20. : )