send me the therapy bills...

i remember many years ago, reading a book that had a chapter in it that pissed me right off. It was a parenting book and they have a tendency to piss me right off in sections, because they spout "the best way" to parent and I just don't think there is a best way. Anyway...this particular chapter was on the the PROPER age spacing between children. I was pregnant at the time with Miss H and Justin was a wee infant. The chapter talked about how unfair it was to have children less than 2 years spaced because the older child misses out on so much one on one time with his/her parents. In my brain at the time I was all "WTF!!" I mean, the 2nd and subsequent kids never experience true one on one time, so does that mean they're never going to be truly happy either? And also...I feared I had destroyed Justin's chance at happiness because "whoops... we got pregnant this time a little earlier than we planned" it took us forever to conceive Justin so when we got pregnant after a mere longing glance at each other from across the room (it may have been a little more than that, but not much) it was a bit of a shock. The accident that is now my one and only girl child, put our 1st two children at a little more than an 18 month apart spacing. So you can understand my WTF response to the notion that I was destroying my son's happiness by giving him a sibling 6 mo earlier than the experts suggest. I was already putting money aside for his therapy later. OK..not really... but I wanted to. Fast forward 6 or so years. Yesterday while the older 2 were at school and I had Ry at home with me, we were snuggling on the couch watching a movie. As I lay there content with him in my arms it occurred to me that I never got to do that with the other 2. I always had a younger child underfoot. There has never been a time until now that I could have spur of the moment, unscheduled, one on one time with one of my kids- well not since Justin was 18 mo old. I don't really think it has caused them to be mentally unbalanced. Well...maybe a little, but no more than the average mentally unbalanced child. It just made me realize that I need to carve out time for each of them on their own. And be thankful for the 30 min or so that I can sometimes get Ry to stop being a whirlwind and just sit under a blanket with me and watch part of a movie.