Life with Two Children under Three Years\' of Age

To have a baby is to fall in love like never before. Many parents plan a second baby soon after the first.  After all, having two babies has to be better than just one, right? There will be twice the joy. Well, that's certainly how I felt until reality intruded. One baby will leave you deliriously happy despite the demands, whereas a baby and a toddler, now that's a different story altogether.

I used to think having a baby and toddler couldn't be too difficult. After all I was an 'old hand' now that I'd already been through the pregnancy, the delivery, the breast feeding, buying mattress sale gold coast and the nappy changing once before. However, while I felt far more confident the second time around, I was not prepared for the degree of exhaustion, the fact that a baby's schedule is radically different from that of a two-year-old and the challenge of managing my toddler’s reaction to his new sibling.

There's no down time.With a baby and toddler you will always be 'on call'. Babies and two-year-olds don't have compatible schedules. They will not be sleeping at the same time. When one is up, the other will be down and this means you will be needed all day long. Picture this – while breast feeding the baby, you are called upon to respond enthusiastically to your two-year-old proudly reporting his or her potty training progress. Now you get the picture.

Love to get out and about?Think you'll just pop down to the local coffee shop and catch up with a girlfriend? Think again. It’s a major challenge to find a time when everyone is awake (including you) and there is a window of opportunity for this walk down memory lane. If you happen to live near a coffee shop, lucky you! You might be able to walk, as long as it's only 10 meters from you house. A two year old will just about manage that. Then again, perhaps you need to use the car. Oh dear, you'll lose at least twenty minutes packing all the paraphernalia you need to take and securing your offspring in their respective harnesses.

How about a trip to the supermarket to stock the pantry and enjoy a little adult conversation with the checkout attendant? It's all the same - a major expedition. Forget it. Just order online and get whatever you need delivered. It's truly heartening to learn that more and more services can be purchased online. This will go a long way to ensuring the sanity of all mums.

The green-eyed monster makes an appearance. One of my motivations for having a second child soon after the first was a belief that my children would become best buddies and grow up to be lifelong friends. This cozy belief was seriously challenged when my toddler decided to go 'all out' to reclaim his fair share of attention. If you're lucky, the strategies employed by your two-year-old will be fairly benign such as thumb sucking and baby talk. However, if you're not so lucky, you may have to cope with tantrums, misbehaviour and refusals to eat, as I did. After the initial panic, I consulted 'Doctor Google' for some advice and began involving my first born in caring for the baby, scheduled some special time with him and introduced the 'big boy chair'. I wish I could say it worked like a charm – it didn't but, these challenging behaviours gradually lessened.

This madness is likely to go on for quite a few months but there is a 'silver lining'. Although having a baby and toddler is a very intense period of your life, it may make a lot of sense to have your babies close together. That way you get used to the general mayhem, tend to hang out with others in the same boat, get support and gradually adapt. Both you and your children will learn to roll with the punches and develop resilience. The beginning of the adaption process is often facilitated by a crisis of some sort. Mine occurred at around 9.00 in the morning after a sleepless night. I opened the door to the infant welfare nurse, fully dressed, and perfectly made up, holding the hand of my equally well-dressed toddler and with the baby at my hip. The nurse, wearing a look of alarm asked “Are you alright dear?” At this, I collapsed into a blubbering mess and howled for a full 10 minutes. This was the point at which I accepted the realities of my situation and began to adapt. No more pretense of being in control.

Parents who choose to have longer gaps between babies need to re-adapt every time they have another child because, in between babies, they forget all the madness and return to a 'normal life'. All in all, I think short gaps between children and a prolonged period of mayhem may be preferable to having to undergo the adaptation process again and again.

Auther: Flower Delivery Melbourne