If this is your first, are you "planning" (as if we can plan these things, right?) to have another one right away? If so, why? If not, why not?
If you're a 2nd (or 3rd, 4th, etc) time mom please share your experiences with this and what you did and why and whether you'd recommend it...
I know a few people who said when they were pregnant with their first that they definitely wanted to have a 2nd baby right away. Then after the first was born they changed their minds as it was too much to handle and they just wanted to spend time with the one LO for a while. please share your thoughts!
Re: how close together do you want your LOs?
Married 08/18/07
BFP 02/15/11 EDD 10/27/11 Born at 35w3d on 09/25/11
BFP 10/13/12 EDD 06/25/13 Born at 37w0d on 06/04/13
BFP 12/11/15 EDD 08/23/16 Early miscarriage
BFP 02/02/16 EDD 10/16/16

We've always said we wanted our kids spaced about 2 years apart. My brother is 2 years older than me and my sister is 14 months younger (God bless my Mom - 3 under 3!). My husband has a sister that is 5 years older and one that is 5 years younger... and that is too much of a difference. They really are in 3 separate generations.
So, 2 years sounded perfect to us... until we found out how much daycare costs. So we'll see what happens!
Married my best friend 05.27.06
BFP!!! 2/6/11 Super Bowl Sunday!
Expecting our first, a little boy, somewhere around 10/18/11!
2/7/11 beta #1 212.73
2/11/11 beta #2 1,633
2/15/11 beta #3 7,308 progesterone 12.69
My sentiments exactly!
Married my best friend 05.27.06
BFP!!! 2/6/11 Super Bowl Sunday!
Expecting our first, a little boy, somewhere around 10/18/11!
2/7/11 beta #1 212.73
2/11/11 beta #2 1,633
2/15/11 beta #3 7,308 progesterone 12.69
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October 11, 2008
Trusty Gal blog|Trusty Tales
I just turned 36 and would like to have *all* of my children before the big 4-0. BUT, I'd like this one to be older than two before I attempt another one. I suppose I've got a little window of opportunity to play with. It should be interesting. Looks like a lot of temping in my future.
~~on bit of a different note, but in regard to planning another; when is a good time to start temping after LO is born? Do the residual hormones and/or BF affect temping for a while? Just curious, if someone has experience with it.
This is me too! I would like at least a year off from being pregnant (although I will be BF), so hopefully I can get pregnant soon after the one year mark, but with our history, that may be wishful thinking!
DH and i aren't getting any younger so we pulled the goalie when DD was 5months but i breastfed until she was 12 1/2 months and i didn't start ovulating again until i stopped. i would like to try for a 3rd but we will see how it goes with #2.
DD and this lil guy will be 22 months apart.
This is #1 but I would like to have the second one as close as possible. Twins would have been nice, but obviously that didn't happen. Irish twins perhaps? We'll see what my body allows (pregnancy wise and taking care of LO-wise!). Also, there is the cost of daycare and all that to consider.
I'm not really considering the relationship between the 2 kids, though, because I think it depends way more on the kids than the age difference. My brother and I are 20 months apart and we aren't close at all (not like we have any problems, we're just not close). My sister and I are almost 5 years apart and we were at each other's throats growing up, and then when I moved out for college we never lived together again and we are good friends now.
Obviously my kids will be close in age and we planned it that way. DH and I both have siblings 3.5 years apart and we never got along and thought it was an age issue so hopefully they will be close.
Flammable part of it: I am also not an overall fan of the baby stage and kind of want to get it over with ASAP. I love my DD and think the age she is at is great but I am looking forward to the years when both of them are a little older and we can take them to do fun things that they will remember and enjoy. I don't want to be taking DD to Disney/SeaWorld etc and lugging around a baby at the same time, I want us all to enjoy it.
We would like to have two or three children. My brother and I are a little over two years apart and I like our age range. I guess it all depends on when I can get pregnant again! I have a friend whose sister wanted to have her kids two years apart- she got pregnant quickly with her first and assumed the same would happen with her second. It didn't- her boys are three years apart.
So, ideally I would say two years apart, but it really isn't up to me
no flames here!!!!! i kind of feel the same way!! i am not looking forward to the newborn stage again.
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maternity leave is one year and then I would feel guilty not going back to work for at least a year before being off again. So I might start to try at 18months? This would also require some financial planning to see what we can afford. I think we want a house more than a second child in our apartment so that would be an important factor.
If more than 3 yrs went by, I think we would say forget it. I would be almost 38 and that is too old for this body.
My sons are 19 months apart (planned)...I'm in the not getting any younger club. It was hard for sure, but I feel like we're already reaping the rewards. They are 4 and 2.5 now and are starting to play together really well. I feel like things have gotten a lot easier as of late.
We were hoping to have #3 two years after DS#2 but it did not work out that way...they will be 3 years apart. I can see how a 3 year gap would be easier in the beginning for sure. We'll see how things change as they get older!
This is different for everyone. My OB told me most women don't ovulate for at least three months if they are EBFing. So you probably don't need protection but if you go that route you can always find out you're the exception. I BF for a little over a year both times and it took me 10 months to start ovulating again. My temps were different (higher) than pre-preg until I weaned so I didn't find it to be very effective while BFing.
We always wanted our kids close together. We started trying when DD was 5 months old and it happened the 1st month! Our LO's will be 13-14 months apart and we couldn't be more excited! I think it's easier being pregnant now than when DD is a toddler because she still gets 2 naps a day and I can rest/nap if I need to. Originally we wanted 3 but now that this one is a boy we may be done. If we go for a 3rd we will start trying around DS's 1st birthday. 3u3 sounds fun, but we will see how we do with 2 1st!!
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This. Ideally I'd like about 18 months in between. But as it is, no matter what I'll be in the over 35 category for the next one so the closer together the better.
In an ideal world, we want three kids with about 2-3 years between each, but we'll take what we can get.
ETA: Sorry, hit post before I included our reasons. DH has 2 siblings, with 2.5 years between each. It worked out really well for their family dynamic and made for some awesome stories (like how DH was talking when his sister came around, but still also seemed to understand "baby talk" so he would translate for her!). My brother is 4 years older than me and we didn't get along well until he went off for university. We'd also like to be done having kids by the time I'm about 33 or 34, since the risks just keep increasing.
BFP #1: July 12, 2010 Natural M/C: July 26, 2010
BFP #2: January 30 ,2011 Born: September 29, 2011
BFP #3: January 5, 2013 Born: August 25, 2013
I wanted kids two years or so apart. They'll be over three due to IF issues. It may end up working out a little better with DD being older anyway.
Our LOs will be just over 27 months apart in age. Everyone tells me that this will be the perfect spacing, even though we didn't plan to have #2 so soon (not that we were exactly preventing another pregnancy, either). So I'm pretty happy with the way it worked out. We only plan to have 2 children, so this is it!
(fwiw, if we hadn't conceived DS#2, we would have likely waited until DS was 4 our so to TTC again)
Originally we wanted around 2/2.5 years between the two. DD was born in October of '08 and we had no trouble conceiving and a super easy pregnancy, we didn't think we'd have issues the next time. I got pregnant again in April of '10 and ended up losing the baby at about 6 weeks. I got pregnant again in June of '10 (yeah super quick) and ended up losing that one at 12 weeks. After that we had several months of trying with no success.
Now it turns out ours will be nearly 3 years apart exactly (DD is 10/12 and I'm due 10/30). I think it worked out best like this, I mean I wish we never went through that (it was the hardest year of our marriage and lives), but our DD is super involved and so excited about her baby brother! And now she'll be old enough to really help out. This morning she told me that, "As soon as he comes out of your belly I'm going to give him a BIG hug and kiss!" I just love it!
BFP#2 2.5.11 (EDD 10.15.11) DS born 9.28.11
BFP#4 8.27.13 (EDD 5.6.14) DD born 4.23.14
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We wanted our children about 20ish months apart. We started trying in Oct. 09 when DS turned 1. It took us 1.5 years almost to conceive this LO. We had no trouble conceiving DS1. DH had testicular cancer and is on hormone therapy and turns out I have PCOS with IR. So his count although not spectacular, was good enough to get pg, I just wasn't ovulating, or ovulating too late.
So our boys will be almost exactly 3 yrs apart. (DS1's bday is Oct 28, this one is due Oct 29). And honestly I love this gap. DS will be pottied trained and can play independently very well.
We want 1 more for sure, maybe 2. That just depends on how long #3 takes to conceive and what help we end up needing for #3. We will probably start trying for #3 when #2 is about 15 months.
I'm already starting to stress about the lack of sleep in the newborn stage.
My DD and DS are almost 2 years 11 months apart in age to the date he was born in July and her birthday is August. I thought that this was a great age. She's still young enough to play with him but old enough to help me out with him.
This time there will be a little more than 2 years apart between DS1 and DS2. I still think it will be a good age gap. Only problem is DS1 is a big mamas boy so idk how he is going to take to DS2