*Context*

I wrote this essay a few weeks before I found out I was pregnant and started this blog. I had, of all the ironies, started looking towards acceptance that we would be a one-child family. Coming so close to having a sibling for my daughter has undoubtedly set me back somewhat from where I was, so I’m posting this as a reminder to myself, and anyone else whose experience reflects some of my own, of the good things that can come from being One and Done.  

Just the three of us

As someone with a multitude of siblings I could never relate to people with none. Like many children, I applied stereotypes learned from my parents to the very few one-child families I knew: the child was probably spoiled, bored and lonely; the parents were probably too selfish or lazy to have more than one.  It was much later before I discovered that the number of children you have, or don’t have, isn’t always down to choice. 

Complete but not 

We are part of the fastest growing family unit in most countries. In 2021 it was estimated that 42% of UK families comprise one child.  

As a mother of one daughter, I am invariably asked by people if we plan to have any more. I tell them that my child was much wanted and long awaited. I tend to leave it at that, rarely telling them about the long periods of infertility and two miscarriages before something magical happened. Just at the point my husband accepted a job in New Zealand and my mind was readying itself for a childfree future, I found myself pregnant for a third time. Our move to New Zealand was usurped by what would become my living daughter.   

A fourth pregnancy and third miscarriage unfolded in the weeks before my daughter’s first birthday. In the many intervening years there have been slightly delayed periods that have held the promise of something more, only to deliver a single line on a pregnancy test. As I approach 43, I’m not foolhardy or naïve enough to think we’ll have another child, though something that resembles devilish hope lingers in the outskirts of my consciousness.  

Believing in choice 

Before I found myself living with the ongoing uncertainty of infertility, I believed firmly in choice: you could choose to get pregnant, or not get pregnant; you could choose how many children you wanted to have and destiny would deliver this accordingly. Those of us lucky enough to have access to contraception and domain over our own bodies would choose when and if we procreated.  

When you find out that you are one of an unexpectedly large minority of people for whom that is not a choice, you can’t help but feel conned. The so-called ‘Family Planning Clinic’ seems like something of a joke when no amount of planning will make a difference and your month by month existence becomes characterised by the wax and wane of hope.   

I want to be clear that you cannot conflate infertility and secondary infertility. Having experienced both, I can tell you with certainty that the two experiences are oceans apart. Before having my daughter I found the emptiness of my arms after each miscarriage unbearable. Returning home from hospital after my first miscarriage, my house was completely unchanged and yet the air felt entirely different. The emptiness of it rattled. The pregnancy loss I experienced after having my daughter and every barren month that’s past since occurs against the backdrop of my growing child’s life. She is not a replacement for the babies I have wanted and lost, but her presence drowns out the shattering silence I’ve known before. 

The guilt paradox 

My greatest fear is my daughter feeling like she’s not enough; that my grief at not having a second child distracts me from the miracle of her existence and I spend my life in conversation with what could have been instead of what is. And truly her existence is a miracle, something that perhaps those of us who struggle to conceive know far better than others. Her very being seems so unlikely and has proven so hard to repeat, making her all the more precious and unique.  

My fear of not being enough for her closely follows. As she gets older will she choose to spend time with me and her father? Or will she want to spend time with friends with siblings in family homes that buzz with activity and people? Will her life be poorer without siblings? Often I feel as guilty for her lack of siblings as I do for my desire for them.  

The lonely only?

There is personal irony in my own anxiety; having grown up with 6 siblings I know first-hand the detriment you can suffer being from a large sibling group. Time and money does not multiply by the number of children you have, it divides. My childhood home indeed buzzed with activity and people – and conflict, stress, disorder and dysfunction. A constant deficit of resources was compounded by a dearth of nurture. We were not individuals, we were The Children; a cohort to be managed with little time for personalised nurture or care.   

I escaped my family home as best and as often as I could during my teenage years, spending time with extended family and friends with smaller families. I found the chaos of home draining and unwelcoming. Lonely, of all things.  

Living the unplanned life intentionally 

Over the years of childlessness I looked to my childfree-by-choice family and friends for a glimpse of what could be. In the same way I resented the couple who happily celebrated their swiftly conceived baby, so too I envied people like my sister who flipped the switch and made the choice to live childfree and were doing so with joy, gusto, gratitude and a lot of love for their nieces, nephews and friends’ children. The stereotype that pronatalists would have you believe – that women without children are bitter, selfish, full of regret – is so very far from the reality. Whether a woman finds herself childfree by choice or by circumstances, the life she leads can be rich and fulfilling.  

I now find myself looking at the one-and-done couples through the same lens. I scour the internet for articles and blogs that highlight all the benefits of being a one-child family – and there are so many. I fortify myself with the many accounts of only children who have grown up happy and loved in a household where they can be prioritised because they are the main priority. I know the stereotypes of one-child families are just that, and I strive to become one-and-done, so we can truly complete our family and leave the pain of past hopes behind.  

I may not have choice over my ability to conceive, but I can choose to live my one-child life with intentionality and gratitude. Because whatever has been before and whatever is to come, my daughter is – and always will be –  a gift.