Cost of Children?

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On the very rare occasions we have had to give Harbourboy Junior a drug, it has been what is known as 'Pamol' here, which is some sort of babyified version of paracetomol which comes in a strawberry flavoured gel. Luckily, he has been pretty good and we've only used it a couple of times in his first year.

 

Just my 2 cents worth for those of you considering whether to become parents or not-Go ahead, make your baby. There's never going to be a perfect time in your life, so it might as well be now. Unless of course one of you is two semesters away from earning a Ph.D.

 

@ Scot: I'm 2 years away from a Pharm D.

But what you just said is what my dad keeps telling me. But he just wants us to have the first grandkid soon because all of his kids are grown now, almost.

@Harbourboy: Paracetomol and acetaminophen are the same thing according to one site I just found. Just called different names in different countries apparently.

 

Scot's right - if you're ready enough for kids to think about budgeting, it's probably time to start trying. There will always be something going on in life you can use as an excuse not to, but if you think about it the excuse will be seen for what it is: fear and nervousness. Life stretches to accomodate what we really want, especially babies.

Heh, Arlyn's first birthday party was held the same day as my Master's graduation ceremony...

 

Breastmilk may be free in the sense that you don't buy it at the store, but on the other hand, I have found that my grocery bills are way higher now than they were before I started nursing. When the kid is gaining a pound a week from my milk, how many additional calories do I have to eat to make that milk? I don't know the answer, but I can say for sure that it's a heck of a lot of food, and I'm still losing weight like crazy. So I'm not entirely sure that breastmilk comes out cheaper than formula if formula only costs $15-$30 per week as someone else suggested above. Not that cost is the primary factor in that decision, but the "breast is best" argument can wait for another thread.

If your wife is going back to work when the baby is wee, you probably won't have time to wash your own cloth diapers, and a cloth diaper service (they deliver clean ones and take away the dirty ones) costs about the same as disposable diapers.

We got a lot of second-hand stuff from relatives and a lot of shower gifts too. We bought a baby swing ($130), a manual breast pump ($60) and a baby bathtub ($12) and everything else was given to us, new or used. We spend about $20/week on diapers (these are all Canadian dollars) and then the only other real expense at this stage is the increased grocery bill to feed me, the dairy cow. For us the only real financial cost of parenthood so far is the cost of me being at home instead of in the workforce. Of course, wait until he's school-aged... and if you're not comfortable with giving your kid second-hand stuff, the costs can be very high for everything from clothes to furniture.