Third Pregnancy

When Lessan and I were expecting our first child, we had come up with the idea of having 4 or 5 kids.  Well, Lessan thought 5, I thought 4 was a nice even number.  But, at the start of this story, in early 2017, we had two children - Thomas aged 3.5 and Ella aged 1- and we felt that two was enough for now.  We had been living in Melbourne for about a year. Lessan had been working in his first real job in an office and I was struggling with managing life as a stay at home mum. We didn't have any family nearby and we struggled to maintain friendships with other parents.  I guess it's complicated with kids and it takes a long time sometimes.  Nevertheless, as Ella got older, I started to feel like maybe it would be easier for me if I could do something outside of the house.  I wanted to study midwifery part-time (a long-held dream). I was accepted into the course and even got the kids enrolled in daycare two days a week, but just as the year was about to start, Lessan and I realized we just couldn't afford the cost of daycare if I wasn't working.  I reluctantly withdrew from the course and turned my attention to finding part-time/casual teaching work (I'm a qualified High School Teacher in ESL and Maths).  As jobs were elusive, I had settled for doing some work as a volunteer teacher at the Red Cross. We figured I could get back to studying when the kids were both at school.

However, the idea of having more children never really left us.  We were struggling with our two and we felt it would make more sense financially for me to work, but we did in a way have a secret yearning for another child.  I do remember thinking, if I start studying now, I likely won't have another baby and I wasn't so sure if I was happy with that.  Also, some friends of ours announced they were expecting a surprise third baby and I can clearly remember Lessan and I looking at each other like, "I wish that was us!" So, we certainly weren't trying to conceive, but we may have not been as careful as we should have been if we were really adamant about avoiding pregnancy.  We took a chance one time thinking it couldn't possibly be my fertile window and lo and behold, a few weeks later, I was late and... pregnant.

When I saw those two lines on the pregnancy test, it came as a shock.  We were both happy and excited, but also scared.  I honestly struggled a sometimes in the first few weeks to accept that I was pregnant, especially when the nausea hit. I hadn't prepared myself to go through this again! But, of course, it was when the baby arrived that we were most concerned about.  We immediately set about finding a way to get more support.

We looked at getting an Au Pair to help, but we would need more space for that so we looked at moving to another part of Melbourne, to a country area or to another state to be closer to our family.  One big concern was how to pay for childcare, now that there was little chance of me getting a job.  If I was not working or studying, we would not get any childcare subsidies from the government and so the cost would become prohibitive, and we couldn’t see how I would manage with three kids at home full-time.  Lessan’s sister-in-law had visited a few months earlier and often talked about the great and rather cheap childcare available in New Zealand, where they had moved to about 2 years prior.  She extolled the 20 hours of free early childhood education available to all 3 year olds and sometimes to 2 year olds. Since the issue with childcare subsidies would be the same anywhere in Australia, we seriously started thinking about New Zealand.

I initially didn't like that idea.  I was settled in Melbourne and starting to make friends.  But, we decided that Lessan should go for a visit to see what life was like in New Zealand to help us decide.  It seemed that his visit convinced him that we would feel more supported there and would most likely be more financially viable. (This last point I think turned out not to be quite true, but thanks to Lessan being able to do his job remotely and getting a pay raise shortly before we left, we are making it work).

At 38 weeks pregnant, with a henna tatoo

Earlier, as soon as I found out I was pregnant, I had applied for a government funded homebirth programme through Sunshine Hospital in Australia.  I attended one antenatal appointment and, though I liked the midwife I saw, I left feeling quite concerned about the care I would receive.  There were a lot of restrictions and I was worried some minor complication could easily ruin my chances of a homebirth and I would be stuck going to the local hospital, which did not seem like a good outcome at all.  I compared this with the options available in New Zealand - great birth centres, many homebirth midwives to choose from, good continuity of care, all funded - and New Zealand became infinitely more appealing.  This was especially so after I talked to Karene - a midwife based in the same village where Martha lived.  She was very experienced in home birth and had a very natural approach.  She determined that I should be eligible for maternity care as an Australian (planning on) living in New Zealand and agreed to take me on. (In hindsight, I know that there are many issues with the New Zealand maternity system, mostly to do with funding midwives, but I feel grateful that I still could access great care).

So, when I was 20 weeks pregnant, we made the big move.  We stayed with Martha (my sister-in-law) and her family for about 6 weeks while we waited for our stuff to arrive and then moved into our own rental home in Cambridge.  We settled into our new home and got the kids settled into kindergarten.  Lessan worked from home with his previous company based in Melbourne, but as a contractor.  This was working out pretty well.  We also tried to get to know our local Baha’i community, attending children’s classes and so forth. We had numerous visits with my midwife and got to know her very well and hash out all the details of how we hoped to approach the birth. By the time my due date approached, we were feeling quite happy and settled.

At the 200th anniversary of the birth of Baha'u'llah
celebration held at Te Awamutu library

Speaking of due dates, a dating scan determined that baby would arrive on approximately the 22 October 2017.  That happened to be the 200th anniversary of the birth of Baha’u’llah, the founder of the Baha’i Faith.  I was torn between wanting our baby to be born on this special day and not wanting to miss the celebrations! I was also worried that everyone we were counting on to be there to babysit would be busy at the celebrations.  To make sure things worked out, I spent several weeks looking for babysitters we could hire, if the need arose.  I also felt like it was very difficult for us to be involved in the planning of events for the bicentenary, which was a major focus of the Baha’i community worldwide, because I didn’t know if I’d be in labour close to that time.

As it turned out, baby came at the perfect time - 4 days after the bicentenary, when all the celebrations were over.

Reflections on having three kids!

So, I recently wrote about how we felt when we first discovered I was pregnant.  We had a lot of worries about how we would cope with three kids under five.  Was all that stress (and an international move!) warranted?

Well, I think the answer is yes and no.

Overall, the transition to a third child has, so far, been easier than the second.  I think we've been coping really well, but it's possibly because we were able to make all those changes and set ourselves up for success.

Lessan's family was really helpful for us around the time of the birth.  They have since left, but we feel like there is a lot we still have here that makes us feel well supported.

For example, the fact that Lessan is working from home is really helping us stay sane.  One reason is that bedtime can be a bloomin' nightmare. Okay, not a nightmare, because that would involve sleeping.  After the move, the kids took a long time to get into a good routine and it got disrupted again after the baby came. Ella stopped sleeping through the night, Thomas refused to stay in his room.  Putting three kids to bed, at our house at least, is like playing "Whac-a-Mole" for hours on end.    You know that game where you have to keep hammering down little moles that come out of holes.  Once Joseph was born, he would be up and down round the clock, anyway, so most of our evenings are a total right-off in terms of Lessan and I doing much.  This is why Lessan working from home has been so wonderful for us at the moment - on the days that Thomas and Ella both go to kindy, Lessan and I have an hour or so to just spend together.  We just wouldn't get much time to be together, otherwise, and I think that would be really tough on our marriage.  Also, the fact that Lesan is at home means that I can occasionaly leave Joseph at home if he is asleep to run an errand.  I feel a lot less trapped at home than I used to, even though there's one more kid!

Another important aspect has been the fact that Thomas and Ella are going to kindergarten - Thomas 5 days a week, 8.30am - 3.30pm, Ella three days.  This gives me time to write a blog post like this once in a while, but mostly just catch up on housework and go grocery shopping! And they really like their kindergartens! They are really good quality care environments and their behaviour at home is better than it was before as a result.

I feel really busy and tired most of the time.  Joseph is still waking through the night MANY times.  Ella is getting into everything (hello "terrible" twos!), Thomas is still having his lovely meltdowns and things are often messy and difficult in our house, but I am coping and generally happy!

I think that is in big part because of us living in a pleasant house, nice town, with Lessan working from home and he is also getting better at helping around the house, plus the extra childcare.  I also feel that the more kids you have, the more skills you develop.  I'm figuring out new ways to get things done with kids around, how to manage the logistics of attending to different needs,  accepting that there will be chaos and just letting go of stuff.  In a way, it's been easier to relax when having a third child because I've lowered my expectations of what I should be doing and that makes me feel less pressured.

We don't at all regret all the changes that have taken place over the last year.  We feel like it was somehow meant to be.  Joseph is such an angelic little boy.  Really very chilled most of the time.  Happy to sit in his pram when we go out, happy to lie on the floor and explore and handles many knocks from his siblings pretty well.  We love him so much and couldn't imagine life without him! And, in a way, it makes us feel like we could have a fourth at some point down the line, but I'd also like to work or study at some point...so we're back where we were two years ago in that regard.