So... over time, and with the benefit of hindsight, I've come to realize something about myself: moms of only children take a lot of crap.
Is that you, too? Your friends with the brood of three just don't take you seriously when you talk about how intense and hard to handle your one is. You find yourself accommodating the high-strung, brilliant creature God gifted you with... with all the care and focus of a bomb squad tech.
My son, the Boy Wonder, is ten now. I am infertile, so it would've taken some work (and possibly divine help) for him to have a younger sibling anyway. But I sometimes think I probably would have tried more seriously to have more if he hadn't been the way he is. Not that he's not still a Miracle Baby in every sense of the word. Not that I don't love him to pieces. Not that I don't thank God for him all the time. I do. But he's also precocious, and intense, and high-strung, and strong-willed... and a lot of other things that make him the Boy Wonder, but also make him enough for one family. Would we have tried more seriously for another baby if the Boy Wonder had been an easy baby? I don't know... but if I'm honest, I think the answer is probably yes.
Now that he's more mature, I have been thinking about this a lot. Now that he's older, I probably could go through the babyhood and toddlerdom thing again, but my body's older too, so it's much less likely to happen even without the infertility thing on top of it. So I'm good with that. I'm OK with the idea that he will always be not just my firstborn but my only-born. But I do worry that I have done him a disservice somehow by not requiring him to endure sibling rivalry.
That's what brought me here. Is this you? Are you a mom with an only kid saying, "Amen, sister" right now? I think it's high time we band together.
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