Goodnight Mom

A recent study puts the average cost of raising a child at $20,813 annually. The Bay Area (San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley) was listed as the number one most expensive place to raise a child in the USA. Here they calculate the average annual cost of raising a child to be $35,647. That’s more than the starting salary at the first office job I had in the States (in 2012)! Plenty is written about the financial costs of raising children. Some articles are about the overall cost of raising children , others focus more specifically on the cost of childcare . The case of childcare costs is complex. Parents need childcare in order to work, but are they earning enough money to cover the cost of childcare? Can it be justified? I wanted to write more about the emotional rollercoaster of hiring childcare, specifically occasional babysitters. Friends of mine with young kids, and myself, have experienced so many difficulties finding adequate and reliable childcare. Especially for babysitting, when...

If you haven’t read my previous post about the risks of a trial of labor after cesarean compared to having a second cesarean, it might provide greater context to this post . To summarize, I was told by my doctor that if I wanted to try a vaginal birth I would have a 61% chance of it being successful.  Sometimes referred to as TOLAC (trial of labor after cesarean) and VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean). In part one, I laid out the medical risks and my thoughts about them. I think deeply about my decisions, and this is one I have taken very seriously. I have laid out the risks pretty clearly for myself, and some seem more real and more threatening than others (the thought of a uterine rupture is much more graphically scary than the concept of post-surgical infection). But there are other factors that I’m also considering, beyond the medical risks.   For example, how it could impact having more children? Whichever decision I make, the outcome may have repercussions on the a...

On the second visit to my OBGYN, Dr K, she told me that according to a medical calculation I have a 61% chance of having a successful vaginal birth if I wanted to try labor. Sometimes referred to as TOLAC (trial of labor after cesarean) and VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean). I was only 12 weeks pregnant at the time. It felt super early in the pregnancy to even think about birthing plans, but she wanted to bring it up to give me plenty of time to think about it. Her job as my doctor is to share information about the risks. Both options, another c-section and VBAC, come with potential risks. For the past 18 weeks, I’ve been trying to figure out what the risks are and what I feel most comfortable with. I’ve been trying to figure out what is the best decision for me and this baby. The most up-to-date figure I can find is from 2013, when the average success rate for women in the U.S. who attempted a trial of labor after one previous cesarean was 70%.  Most literature encourages TOLAC/...

Needless to say, Steve and I didn’t expect to have a baby at the onset of a global pandemic. I imagined months of Max crawling around circles of my closest friends. Of nights where he slept through the noise while we partied in the basement below. Of day trips and adventures to places and other people’s houses. Playdates with other moms & babies.  The pandemic took away a lot of things that make life really enjoyable. Being around friends, sharing meals, being in crowds of strangers, feeling a sense of community at a local park, farmers’ market, or art museum.  For me, it was very challenging that the beginning of the pandemic - when we knew very little about covid - coincided with the beginning of becoming a Mom - when I knew very little about babies! Note - I took inspiration for the title of this post from collaborative writing project, Born In Lockdown , a collection of experiences from over 200 women who became mothers in 2020. Baby Moon Before Max was born, I had rea...