Before You Have a Second Child, Consider Your Mental Health.
There are many factors that influence the decision about whether – or when and how – to try to have a second child. The size of your family, your age, fertility, closeness to family, the number of other requirements in your life.
But have you considered the impact on your mental health?
I have always felt that parenting of any kind was difficult (and look, it is ) , including raising one child. When my son was 4 years old, we adopted our first foster child, an energetic 3 year old boy. We went from raising one preschooler one day to raising two the next day. In particular, the first few weeks were, to put it mildly, a daunting task.
But over time, and we have adjusted to living with two children (not to mention the unique stress and time costs associated with navigating the child protection system), I would still probably say that raising two children is not so much. and difficult because of the upbringing of one.
But when a year later our adopted son was reunited with his biological family, and we returned to raising an only child, life began to be DIFFERENTLY different from the previous one. Emotionally, of course, we were shocked (this little guy will always have a special place in our hearts), but the daily anxiety and time constraints that we are used to have eased in a way that I did not expect. I clearly remember how, a few weeks after leaving, I wrote to my friend (mother of two): “I never realized how easy it was with one child until I had two, and then returned to one”.
This can be explained by a new study based on Australian household, income and labor dynamics , which concludes that having a second child increases not only the temporary pressure on both parents in the short term, but also in the long term. And this increased time pressure negatively affects the mental health of parents, especially mothers.
We found that the mental health of mothers improves with their first children immediately after birth and remains stable over the next several years. But, with the second child, the mother’s mental health deteriorates sharply and remains at a low level.
Reason: Second children increase mothers’ sense of time pressure. We have shown that if mothers did not have such severe problems over time after the birth of their second child, their mental health would indeed improve with motherhood. Fathers’ mental health improves with their first child, but mental health deteriorates with their second child. But, unlike mothers, the mental health of fathers over time remains at the same level.
It is logical to think that it is more difficult to go from no children to 1 child than from 1 to 2 (or from 2 to 3); after all, becoming a parent introduces an entirely new role in a person’s life. But this analysis showed that even with increased parenting skills and experience, and with raising children in years when children grow older and more independent, the temporary pressure of extra children does not decrease and can cause long-term stress on the mental health of parents. …
This article , written for an Australian audience, sums up what we have probably all felt from time to time: parents – and, yes, often, mothers in particular – need extra help:
The impact of children on mothers’ lack of time is not short-lived, but chronic stress that slowly degrades their health. Thus, the lack of mother’s time should be a top health priority for medical practitioners and politicians.
Secondly, mothers need specialized institutions so that they can take care of them. Collective childcare — for example, through school buses, lunch programs, and flexible work policies that allow fathers — can help improve maternal mental health. Since poor postpartum mental health can lead to poor outcomes for children , it is in the national interest to reduce stressors so that mothers, children, and families can thrive.