Live the Life You Have Imagined - Thoreau

One of my readers friends read my post about how the to do list will always be around, but your kids won’t and asked me the following question in her comment because she knows we’re planning on having a fourth child:

Do you ever worry that having another baby will just be more to do and less time to do it?

She went on to add:

I would love one more, but think sometimes I can’t even keep up with what needs to be done with the three kids, never mind another one. Please give me your reasoning to this.

Well, the answer to her first question is quick and easy. Yes. Definitely!

Why I’m still going to have another baby when there’s already not enough time in the day, is not such a quick answer. Frankly, had my hubby and I not gone to see The Family Stone, this question would never have come up because we had decided two kids were plenty! But after seeing that movie about a large family we went to lunch and my hubby popped the question:

“Do you want to have another baby?”

My immediate response . . . “Uh, no!”

My labor and delivery had been so traumatic with my second child, I vowed I’d never have any more kids. Period.

“Are you sure?”

“Aren’t you?”

Evidently neither of us were sure.

Since this was a major life decision, I did what I always do. I made a list of pros and cons. Since we were at a restaurant, I wrote it on a napkin. I immediately started with the cons:

• Labor and delivery (at the top of the list!)
• Financial strain
• Life chaotic enough already
• Childcare and employment issues

Then we discussed the pros.

• We always wanted a large family.
• Our children bring us incredible joy.

While there were fewer pros than cons, I thought of the quote hanging in my bathroom that I read every morning before I start my day:

“Live the Life You Have Imagined. - Thoreau”

As an only child, I’d always imagined having a large family.

After a few minutes of silence while I pondered the gravity of the decision we were making, I wrote my answer to his question “Do you want to have another baby?” on the back of the napkin and pushed it across the table to him. Needless to say I saved the napkin from that fateful lunch.

So what’s my reasoning to adding to the chaos?

Yes, having more children will result in:

• More laundry
• More expenses
• More stress
• More exhaustion

But having more children will also result in:

• More joy
• More love
• More fun
• More memories

And at the end of a day that’s been rushed, stressful and chaotic, I remind myself of another one of my favorite quotes:

“The days are long, but the years are short.“