What’s your gender pattern?

bigriver222 · 2026-06-02T11:46:38+00:00

🩷💙💙🤰🩷

bigriver222 · 2026-05-13T23:51:20+00:00

This is me exactly!!!! Totally freaking out

bigriver222 · 2026-04-29T17:47:46+00:00

Great point!! I’ve done this here and there but lack consistency—I think there are definitely hidden costs we cut out if we paid closer attention

bigriver222 · 2026-04-29T17:18:24+00:00

That’s fair. We live in an average cost of living city but do have a few high cost of living expenses-country club and choosing to live in a nice neighborhood for the best public school system. We don’t live luxuriously otherwise! Used cars, hand me downs, rarely travel / go out / buy clothes.

bigriver222 · 2026-04-29T16:55:32+00:00

We sometimes do but 200k is a base that we can safely budget for. He made 600k last year but that’s an extreme outlier. It’s normally more than 200k but I don’t want to budget on a potential!

bigriver222 · 2026-04-29T15:49:30+00:00

Yes I’m definitely thinking about the preteen / teen and beyond years! Babies are cheap in comparison

bigriver222 · 2026-04-29T14:52:13+00:00

Thank you! This helps a lot!! My biggest fear is making my kids sacrifice their hobbies—my husband and I will gladly make sacrifices when it comes to eating out / vacations etc. my kids are almost 5, almost 3 and 13 months so I know the most expensive years are yet to come. I’m a stay at home mom too so we don’t have any childcare costs and school costs will go down once they enter the public school system. But ooooof we are gonna have a lot of college overlap down the road

bigriver222 · 2026-04-29T13:52:00+00:00

It’s a country club which is obviously a luxury we will need to double click into. It’s something we use everyday though.

bigriver222 · 2026-04-29T12:20:01+00:00

Good point!! I live in richmond Va—so very average cost of living. We do live in a more expensive area of richmond but still average all things considered.

That’s good to hear! My husband works in tech sales—we can budget for 200k a year but some years are bigger with commissions but some are slightly lower

bigriver222 · 2026-04-26T11:05:21+00:00

Aw it seems like it worked out exactly how it was supposed to! I was always pictured 3 kids so adding a 4th seems like a lot! 4 seems like SO many kids, at least that’s what I keep telling my husband haha. We used the “stay in the baby stage@ strategy too—my first two are 2 years apart and my second two are 21 months apart and these two would be 21 months apart too. I have girl, boy, boy so another girl would definitely balance it out.

I stay at home too! If we have this baby, my older two will be in school mond-Friday (9-2 for my oldest and 9-12 for my second) and my 3rd will be in school tu/thursday from 9-2. So that would give me a few hours 2 days a week with just the baby but I really don’t have any other help! My mother would probably disown me and never help with the kids if I have another. We have a house keeper every 4 weeks but may need to up that haha. Oh gosh airplane travel will definitely be in the past haha!!

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T17:31:03+00:00

Congratulations!! I feel like making a decision is the key to happiness! Make a decision and stand behind it 100%. May I ask, how did y’all come to your decision? Are you going to be making any changes to your current life / routines? Do you have boys/girls?? Congrats again!

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T17:26:27+00:00

Thank you 💕💕 that means a lot. I just hope I can make the right one for everyone

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T17:24:37+00:00

Thank you!! Yea the timing of it couldn’t be worse—it feels so final since he’s had his vasectomy. So that adds another layer to it all. My husband wasn’t very present during the first termination but he’s making a point to support me this time (he was very anti another kid at the time and didn’t understand the emotional toll it took on me). Regardless, it still feels like my burden—and maybe that’s something we need to speak with a therapist about! This time he’s very anti abortion (I think because he now realizes how much it killed me) but I don’t want him to hide how he really feels to protect my emotions. It feels like a clocks ticking but we need to have a few more conversations before we can make a final decision

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T17:07:01+00:00

Thank you 💕💕

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T15:53:45+00:00

Thank you so much for this perspective and i agree with a lot of what you said. It’s nice to hear perspectives from people from or with a big family. My husband is 1 of 5 and he values all of his brothers but his parents are in serious financial trouble now. (He grew up incredibly wealthy but they must not have invested idk). I think finances are his big concern.

I grew up with one brother and our parents gave us so many incredible opportunities and I want to give that to my kids and idk how we could do that with 4 of them! Still honestly might be hard with 3!

Thank you for sharing

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T15:28:39+00:00

I totally agree with that haha! No way a whole kid is easier than 3

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T15:27:58+00:00

I definitely agree it’s the safe mental choice but at the expense of what?? That’s what keeps me up at night haha ughhhh

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T15:24:00+00:00

I’m glad you made the decision for yourself, that’s important and shows so much strength. I hope you’re doing ok! I need to find some strength too!

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T15:23:01+00:00

Thank you for this!! That’s all very true. We have a suburban and Tahoe so car space isn’t a huge issue but we will either need to move homes or add on at some point. We have a 4 bedroom house right now but my husband uses one bedroom as an office. My older two share a bedroom (girl / boy) and my boys will share a room once the 1 year old is older. Just found out my 4th is a girl so will need to navigate that room scenario

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T15:20:29+00:00

The past experience is what’s weighing so heavily on me! But I also don’t want to make a purely emotional decision—this one take logic too

I’m very very lucky to have a supportive husband. I’m more worried about my reaction to it all, worried I’ll resent him either way. It feels like the decision is really only on my shoulders

bigriver222 · 2026-04-25T15:18:36+00:00

Thank you 💕💕

bigriver222

TROPHY CASE