One child is just a toy

This week's word: proliferate; pruh-LIF-uh-rayt; (verb)
Meaning: to grow or increase in number rapidly

I was listening to a psychologist on a radio program a few years ago, discussing number of children when a caller phoned in with the comment "One child's a toy!" The host and guest had a good laugh. As the mother of one at the time, I was extremely resentful of such a remark.

Then again, at least with two, you have two hands. One for each child. 

How did he know how hard one could be? Maybe he got an easy one? Unless you considered a toy that screamed all hours of the day and night  something that was amusing and easy, then he was certainly not my idea of a toy. Our 'one' had certainly thrown many challenges and having him had been life-altering.  

I was defensive, to say the least.

Then, I had my second child. All of sudden I realised what the caller had meant by "one's a toy". To unload one child out of a car, take them grocery shopping, get them dinner, put them to bed, wash their clothes, spend quality time and pay undivided attention is much easier when there is no-one else competing for a Guernsey.  Breastfeeding a baby while your toddler climbs up the kitchen bench to get himself an apple and proceeds to the cutlery drawer because he's got plans to chop it up himself, well that's when the games really begin.

Then again, at least with two, you have two hands. One for each child.

Now I have three children but alas, still only two hands. An extra head and an eyeball in the middle of my forehead, but no extra set of hands. It's not a game; it's an obstacle course with sharp edges. I no longer have one hand for each child, as we cross the road, unless the baby is strapped to the front of me. Those days where I clicked one child in their car seat and we were off on our merry way are long gone.

Remember reading the paper? A weekend breakfast followed by a nice, slow peruse of the world news. Little baby lying on the floor gooing and gaaing? Pfft. I couldn't tell you what was happening in the world unless it could be summed up in a three second update between Playschool and Boblins.

The other big factor in the one-child-is-a-toy-arena is no fighting. That's huge. Half my day is spent refereeing arguments and listening to dobbing about who said what to whom and who looked out whose window the wrong way with their finger up their nose.

Don't get me wrong, I am not complaining. We chose to keep breeding and proliferate our family. We only have ourselves to blame for making life more complicated. I am, however, coming round to the concept that having one child is like having a toy. Even if your one child is incredibly difficult and demanding, it is still only one. Whether the choice to have one child was yours or something that was beyond your control, it doesn't change the simple fact that caring for one child is easier than two. I recognise this argument may not apply if your child has special needs or other extenuating circumstances.

We were lucky enough to have a night off from the two older children recently and call us crazy, but we took the baby out shopping.  The very same excursion that would have been hell in a trolley five years before, when we were such new and anxious parents, was actually a blissful treat with the single child. No five- and three-year-olds running ahead and then stopping only to ask if they can have a chocolate milkshake followed by a play at the indoor playground finishing with a new toy.  All of which would be met with a "no" followed by negotiations that would impress the UN peace team. Instead we completed our errands in relative peace and had a leisurely dinner at a quiet cafe all the while our toy baby slept in his pram.  

The amazing uselessness of hindsight is paramount here. Had we known then what we know now, perhaps we would have appreciated our time when we had only one child and could have stressed a lot less.

I guess when I have my sixth, I'll look back to these three and think it was a stroll in the playground. Hope my husband isn't reading this...

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