Why People Are Afraid Of Having Babies...

[marielapin]

I really couldn't believe this article. People must be morons to drop this kind of money on a baby! The key phrase to this article is "upscale baby". Who needs an "upscale baby"? Babies are happy playing in a box! All they need is love, shelter and food. This just makes me sick. These people have major issues. And you can find lactation advise on the internet for free, and you can also get some live advice for free. Why are they spending so much money on them? $400 dollar Lamaze class? When most women get an epidural? This is outrageous! I think I spent $40 on ours.

This is one of the reasons more people aren't having kids. They think they have to buy them everything, when in effect, all a baby needs is the love of their parents.

GRRRRR this really angers me!

[url="http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/CollegeandFamily/Raisekids/P90259.asp?Printer"]http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/Colleg...259.asp?Printer[/url]

Uncommon Sense
A bouncing baby can bust your budget


It takes wayyyy more than a garage full of Costco diapers and a crib to take care of a new baby, and the big spending isn't even for baby equipment. Here's why new parents tend to plunge from baby bliss to bank-account blues.

By MP Dunleavey

Editor's note: Columnist M.P. Dunleavey and six other women have come together online to strip away the myths surrounding money, lay bare their assets and liberate themselves from debt. Follow the quest for financial fabulousness of these "Women in Red" every second Monday in Dunleavey's column on MSN Money.

Why does the birth of a tiny, helpless newborn suddenly cause otherwise sane adults to go crazy with money? Is it sleep deprivation? Is it the abrupt end to sex as we know it?

We may never know for sure, but it can't help that we live in a culture that encourages new parents to buy baby gear by the carload (wipe warmers, anyone?), with the subtle message that there's a direct correlation between the amount spent and their baby's future prospects at Hahvard.

Hidden costs of procreation
Anna, the expectant mom among the Women in Red, is just as wary as I am. “I read somewhere that you spend about $6,000 just the first year of your child’s life!” she says.

That’s nuthin’! According to the Department of Agriculture, the total cost of raising a child until the age of 18 is about $250,000, which doesn’t include (gulp) college tuition.

But that quarter of a million is just the cost for your basic upscale baby. When you add in all the obscure, yet seductive, baby expenses, the numbers will take your breath away. Hang on to your teddy bear.

Learning how to breathe
Sure, delivery is covered by your insurance -- mostly. But what about that little ol’ Lamaze class? Technically, giving birth is free, but learning the right way to do it might set you back as much as $400, as Anna learned.

Breastfeeding, anyone?
Mother Nature’s readymade milk supply seems like a no-brainer. It’s plentiful and cheap, right? Not quite, says Rebecca, a new mom and lawyer in San Francisco. “The big expense I wasn’t expecting was the need to see a lactation consultant two or three times, at about $80 an hour.” Even more pricey: A $300 breast pump and the constant expense of bottles and pacifiers.

And don’t think formula is any better. “Once you stop breastfeeding, they go through it like crazy -- and it’s wildly expensive,” Rebecca says.

Make way for baby Mozart
Back in the Paleolithic era of childrearing, circa 1968, having a kid came with a tuition-free grace period of at least five years. “Now you don’t want to take any chances that your child isn’t getting every possible advantage,” says Mark Ozer, father of a 20-month-old girl, who has been “taking” music classes since the tender age of 8 weeks. “She’d just lie there,” he admits. But that hasn’t stopped Ozer and his wife (and countless other couples) from spending $200 to $400 a class for swimming, gymnastics and “mommy and me” yoga.


Spreading your spending far and wide
Baby's first blockbuster
Forget the idea of taking a few Polaroids of your drooling wonder and sending them off to Gram and Gramps. Have you no conscience? Entire nanoseconds of your child’s life will be lost if you don’t invest immediately in a digital camera, DVD camcorder and small production studio. I’m not kidding. Beth, who has a 17-month-old, says that she and her husband spent about $2,700 on new and used computer equipment, digital recording devices, software and high speed Internet access.

The high cost of sleep deprivation
A little-known aspect of parenting is how much lack of sleep will cost. Partly, it’s the increased latte bill. But mainly it’s the slew of dumb mistakes you make when your brain operates at the speed of sludge. A friend of mine says never in her life has she lost so many credit cards or pairs of sunglasses. Rebecca admits spending $300 on birth announcements while in a hormonal, sleep-deprived fog.

Green eggs and prosciutto
Big pictures, few words -- how much can it cost to stock your little one’s library with a few dozen classics? Answer: At $20 or more for a hardcover, you’ll drop $500 before you can say “Curious George.” (“I don’t like to scrimp on this stuff, but I balk at spending $12 on a six-page book!” says Rebecca.) Get that baby a library card already.

New baby, new car syndrome
You plan to keep driving around in your old Honda, until you realize . . . the baby’s car seat won’t fit, the car doesn’t have airbags and it has a knack for breaking down in the rain. See if junior can say, “Cha-ching!” with mommy. Beth and her husband took out a $13,000 car loan to buy a new Mazda, incurring the first car payments of their lives.

Babysitter or bandit?
Child care is a hefty burden on most parents, but few are prepared for the sticker shock of what that babysitter costs. Bryan Nadeau, a video producer in San Francisco and the father of a two-year-old, says that when he and a friend decided to splurge on theater tickets at $70 a pop, the babysitting costs were almost as high -- about $10 an hour (remember, this is San Francisco we're talking about), for six hours. “Including dinner, you’re talking about $250 for a night out,” he says.

Junior's first fete
Jimmy Buffet played, there were ice sculptures and waitresses garbed in togas. Was it a bash thrown by a Tyco exec? Or a child’s first birthday party? These days it’s hard to know, as many new parents will attest.

“There is so much pressure on you at birthday time,” says Nadeau, who started out with a few Teletubbies balloons for his son’s second birthday and ended up creating an artificial grass tablecloth, a la the Teletubbies set, and paying $60 for a Teletubbies cake. A word to the wise: Pookie won’t remember how much you splurged, but Mr. Visa Spongepants will.

[marielapin]

after reading this article I have decided that a lot of women must see their babies as designer accessories. nothing else can explain such wastefulness.

[homeschoolmom]

these people are rediculous... it's all part of our sick society...

[marielapin]

a $300 dollar breastpump? Where are these people shopping?!?!?! What's sad is that it is these people who can actually afford to have lots of kids, but they think they can't have but two because they have to buy their kids new H2s when they turn 16.


Sick, Sick, Sick. :irate:

[Sojourner]

Yeah, I saw that article too ... I think my parents managed to raise all five of us at a cost of not much more than $250,000. Ha ha.

[homeschoolmom]

*runs to go look for something*


It only gets worse... in a recent FAO Schwartz catalog, they featured a "mini caravan" with water tank, sink, bed, table, working lights etc (a camper that a kid could live in!) and a "junior off roader" that runs on gas, has a three gear drive. (ages EIGHT and up)... $20,000 for the camper, $30,000 for the off roader...

[Madonna]

Gosh, I can't wait to have kids. I'll probably be dirt poor, with the simple food, clothing and shelter. Maybe they'lll be all the better for it.

Kids raised like the ones you mentioned are probably those who have big therapy bills when they hit their teens and up.

[marielapin]

[quote name='Sojourner' date='Jul 28 2004, 11:38 AM'] Yeah, I saw that article too ... I think my parents managed to raise all five of us at a cost of not much more than $250,000. Ha ha. [/quote]
I know we got more than we should have, and my parents didn't spend anywhere near 250,000 on both of us. Of course we didn't get a car, and my parents didn't send me through college either.

By the way, nice signature sojourner. Seems we think alike.

[Aloysius]

soo... every child raised b4 the 20th century needed therapy?

or maybe some of those expenses are unnecesary

[1337 k4th0l1x0r]

This is sad, but I'm going to satire this article below.

And being involved in church is also expensive!

Car: Think that 1989 Honda Accord is good enough for going to church? Think again. You'll want to be seen driving something nice around your fellow parishoners. After all, if you don't look like you've been blessed by God with money, everyone will think that you're living in a persistive sinful state, and you don't want that. At the low end, you should be driving a base model Infinity. You should try to get a BMW or a Mercedes. Expect to spend from $25,000 - $60,000.

Clothes: Forget wearing anything that you purchased on sale at the Gap. You're in the presence of God, and he wants you to be in nothing less than a new Armani suit. These things run about $800-$1200 per suit. Don't forget Italian silk ties and shirts imported from France.

Jewelry: You probably really like that crucifix made out of no-name metal you picked up in Mexico is good. Sentimental value is so overrated. Your image of Jesus you parade around your neck should be of highest quality. You should get an 18k gold filled crucifix with a platinum corpus. These base models run around $350. If you wish to splurge, get 1/8 carat diamonds from Zimbabwe (they're pretty!!!) for the nails on the crucifix. Don't forget a gold chain.

Getting everything blessed: You probably are thinking you can just go to the pastor at your church to get all this stuff blessed. You can, but everyone else in your parish is also. Whenever you have something you want blessed, you should plan a trip to Rome and get a private Papal audience. After all, it makes you so much holier to pray a rosary blessed by the Pope. And fly first class and stay in 5-star hotels. You're carrying around blessed matter now, so act like it! Expect to spend $4000/person for a 4 day trip. Throw in an extra $1000 if you want your baby baptized by the Pope.

It's so expensive to be a Catholic.

Edited July 28, 2004 by 1337 k4th0l1x0r

[SevenSorrows]

oh man I saw that article this morning too. Oh man us Catholics are in trouble, we are going to spend 2.5 million on our 10 kids..hehehhee

But yep, this is the contraception mentality. they think to be good parents they have to buy the most expensive stuff, but on the other hand, they don't want to change their lifestyle, so they need a breastpump, cause God forbid, the wife stops working, and they need to get a baby sitter, cause why would you want to take your kids with you anywhere!!!

[immaculata]

I missed you, marielapin! :wub:

[daugher-of-Mary]

Wow. That is utterly absurd. For just 250,000 dollars, YOU can raise a spoiled brat! What a deal!

[Norseman82]

I just wonder how my non-millionaire blue collar immigrant grandparents raised 7 kids during the Depression......

[CreepyCrawler]

that's so dumb. my kids are going to play with sticks and they'll like it!! :laugh:

[Carrie]

This really is sick. It's wasteful and completely ridiculous! I don't know anyone who spends that much on one child. Teens don't need cars, kids can put themselves through college, you can get a great breast pump for $40, many hospitals offer lamaze for less than $50, and the nurses at the hospital can help you with advice the first few days of nursing for FREE. I guess the author of this article has never heard of hand-me-downs. My family loves them. They pass around baby equipment, clothes, and advice around all the time.

[Ash Wednesday]

Very silly people thinking in that article!
It all goes down to people not understanding the difference between a "need" and a "want". Both my brothers are working class and their wives stay at home. They get along fine!

I'm 27, very independant, and all that. Probably won't get married until I'm around 30 if circumstances allow it. I've always been afraid about having kids (I basically put marriage and children together), not because of money, but because I didn't grow up around them a lot, and I worry that I will be too self-absorbed vagabond artist-type to be a good mother. I want to change as a person and I want to be more generous in heart. I don't know if this is because my mom died in November and I've just been in a mode of trying to heal and I've had to re-evaluate things, or what.

A couple weeks ago I babysat my neice and nephew (not until THEN have I learned to change diapers, I'm glad I learned) and while I really love those kids, at times I felt drained and just wanted to go home. Maybe it's different when they are your own?

Has anyone here ever worried about kids being "foreign" to them if you didn't grow up around them much? And is it really different when they're your own?

I talked to a photographer I worked with and he was a lot like me. He's an artist, waited until later to marry (around 30) He and his wife got pregnant accidentally (they didn't know if they wanted kids) but they have two now and are loving family life. So that's encouraging to me.

[1337 k4th0l1x0r]

The worst part about the article is that it makes it seem like not spending the money is not loving the child. Most grandma's would love just having still pictures of their grandkids. If a coworker of mine showed me a picture of a child, I'd congratulate him and tell him how cute the kid is. If a coworker came up to me and handed me a DVD with 60 minutes of film and 500 pictures of his child, I'd probably just start busting out laughing. I've never once thought that the best way my Mom and Dad could have loved me would be to take more pictures or home videos.

As for cars, I drove around a pickup truck that had 257,000 miles on it that my Mom had won at a car dealership before I inherited her car (I dubbed it the Jaywagon and drove it for 4.5 years). They finally bought me a new car when I graduated from college at the age of 22 last year.

Some of the diction in the article sounds slightly sarcastic, but if sarcasm was the intended effect, the writer could have done a much better job.

[Ash Wednesday]

I got this from babycenter.com *phew*
I guess I'm not the only one who ever asked this question!!!!

[b]I was never a "baby person" before. Does that mean I'll be a bad mother?[/b]

[i]No, how you feel about babies before you have one isn't an accurate predictor of the kind of mother you'll become. "You don't have to be the type who fawns over babies," says Rubenstein. Once you give birth, it's a whole new ballgame, and feelings you never expected to have will surface as part of the process of becoming a parent.

Before San Jose resident Heidi Oliveri had her son, Brandon, she was a typical 22-year-old — fun-loving, outgoing, career-minded, and definitely not the kind of person you'd describe as maternal. "I was not a baby person," she says. "I never pictured myself having three kids, which I now do." But she's completely comfortable in her role as a mother. "Until you have your own, you really don't know what you'll be like," she says. "But once you have a baby, the maternal instinct just kicks in." [/i]

But for people to bellyache about MONEY... I mean getting financially situated and things reasonably prepared is fine. But like l337 said, you don't "buy" love for your kids. Reminds me of parents that buy their kids nice toys because they feel guilty for not spending time with them and more time in the office or away on business.

[IcePrincessKRS]

[quote name='marielapin' date='Jul 28 2004, 11:23 AM'] I really couldn't believe this article. People must be morons to drop this kind of money on a baby! The key phrase to this article is "upscale baby". Who needs an "upscale baby"? Babies are happy playing in a box! All they need is love, shelter and food. [/quote]
I LOVE you Lauren! lol

No matter how often we say this stuff people are still going to be morons and treat their babies like accessories. Its sad people with "upscale baby syndrome" all the time.