Only Children: Little Things

Walker - 3 Days Old

It’s the little things I enjoy most about having an only. Of course, I don’t know any other way, so I don’t have anything else to compare it to.

But when I see a mother with three clinging to her in the grocery store, fighting with each other and my little guy is riding along in the cart, satisfied just hanging out with me, I’m secretly happy that I’m not her.

When I’m at the store and I can say yes to that toy, I know I can give him things he wants (of course, I don’t give him everything he wants).  

  

I can have a successful career and be a successful mommie. So many women I know have given up their lives to be moms and have lost themselves in the process – their lives are consumed with driving their child to the next practice or play date. I believe women can be mothers and have their own interests and life too. For me, one is the perfect balance and enables me to still be me, and not lose myself in mommie duties.

Yes, siblings have each other when they grow up, but my little guy won’t be alone. Hopefully he’ll have a wife, children, brother and/or sister-in-laws, cousins, best friends, etc. I know that with his personality, he’ll always have people around him. The definition of family continues to change, and I know that being an only, he’ll have to reach out to others and build bonds that serve the same purpose as sibling bonds.

I think some people have more than one child because they don’t want to operate outside of the norms of society. They believe having two or more children is what society expects. Well, society doesn’t help out in my house, doesn’t pay the bills and doesn’t get up in the middle of the night when my kid throws up in the bed. Society isn’t what I’m trying to impress right now. Society shouldn’t and isn’t going to make this decision for me.

When people look at me and ask, “Is he your only?” I smile at them and say, “Yes, and he will always remain my only.”

I know they probably then judge me as selfish, or pre-determine my child to be a brat, but neither of these assumptions are true. So next time you see an only child, think twice about judging or assuming. Maybe, just maybe, they are actually pretty cool people, living outside the norms of society, doing what’s best for them.

 

*Hans-Peter Kohler, a population sociologist at the University of Pennsylvania surveyed 35,000 Danish twins. Women with one child said they were more satisfied with their lives than women with none or more than one. Kohler says, "At face value, you should say that you'll stop at one child to maximize your subjective well being."