Economies of Scale
It’s not that I didn’t want our fourth. I just wanted to know that my husband and I weren’t alone in thinking that 4 > 3.
Highly mathematical graph by a highly mathematically-minded Brigid Colver
I’ve read the research claiming that four or more kids make the entire exercise of parenting easier. It claims that three children is the hardest, but once you cross the threshold to four, some alchemy makes it all imminently doable.
According to my own research, I can tell you with great confidence: this is nonsense.
Something about four or more – the experts say – triggers an economy of scale.
Something about four or more – I say – triggers death by a thousand cuts. And by cuts I mean howls. And snack requests. And milk droplets. And butt wipes.
Ask me how I know.
Within the first few weeks of baby number four’s arrival, I was googling phrases like “parental burnout” and “fourth child late thirties” and “four kids too many kids.”
In the night hours, while most assuredly not sleeping, I’d gorge on information about other families who had raised this many children.
Of course, the first results were the ones who had chosen this superior life (“For the sake of new brand partnerships,” Liz whispers in my head). These were the lifestyle bloggers with sun-drenched pictures of clean children and long flowing gowns. They acknowledged that their lives were loud and messy, but that didn’t show in their phosphorescent smiles.
These women’s blogs were helpful in the sense that there were, indeed, four children in the pictures and the women were (supposedly) still authoring. Proof of life.
The results I liked better were harder to find, usually tucked into Reddit threads and Mumsnet boards. These were the women responding to a post about four children with snippets like “Was so depressed when I found out I was pregnant with fourth,” and “I wouldn’t, honestly. There’s never enough time or money and we all fight all the time,” and “My fourth child sucked the last bit of soul from my body and now I am a dementor from Harry Potter.” (I might have written that last one. I can’t remember. I was very burnt out.)
It’s not that I didn’t want our fourth. I just wanted to know that my husband and I weren’t alone in thinking that 4 > 3.
I wanted to confirm that we weren’t the only family missing out on these elusive economies of scale.
“By the time you’ve hit three, there’s already noise,” the experts say. “What’s a little more?”
Well.
Consider the math. I’ve never been a whiz at stats, but I know how permutations work. Plugging a new variable into a group adds not one, but many new combination possibilities!
So, for example, let’s say you have three small children who all cry and wail and gnash their teeth at various times of day for various reasons and non-reasons.
Example of din rising and falling throughout the day with a single small child.
Then, let’s say, hypothetically, you add a fourth child who also cries and wails and gnashes his teeth at various times of day for various reasons and non-reasons.
Not only are you adding a small amount of additional volume to the existing din (economy of scale). You are also adding a new reason for the previous three kids to cry at times they were not already crying (we’ll call this the non-economy of bloat). You are adding din to the precious few times of day and locations where the din did not already exist. You are now living in a din-only world with zero din-free times or spaces and your life now belongs to din.
Combined din levels with four kids.
Just as a hypothetical, of course.
“The infrastructure is already in place,” the experts say. “Parents of three already have the things they need to raise children.”
Hahahahahahahahaha
Hahahahahahahahaha
First of all. Are we including “childcare” in our definition of “infrastructure?” Because… [raises eyebrow] I would not suggest that adding one more child to the trash fire that is our depleted, horrifyingly priced childcare system is particularly scalable.
Or maybe, let’s leave childcare out of our definition of infrastructure and assume that at this point families have given up and now have a stay-at-home parent.
Ok. So now we’re adding an additional human being to one side of the equation and removing an income from the other side of the equation. Is that scale?
Ok, no, we’ll just assume that there was always one stay-at-home parent because that’s how it should be anyway, right?
Then yes, sure, fine, economy of scale. (Oh wait, unless you count things like a car that fits four goddamn carseats in your definition of infrastructure.)
“You’re already up at night,” they say.
The way toddlers keep you up at night: They wake you a time or two for water or to crawl into bed when they have a bad dream and they get up too early in the morning.
The way newborns keep you up at night: You are up all night.
I don’t really know how to refute this further because the assumption is so bad to begin with.
I could go on. I mean:
Orthodontia
College expenses
Summer camps
Your vertebrae
These things don’t provide fourth-kid discounts. Maybe Disney World does??
Look. My husband and I come at this from the perspective of parents who were handed a fourth baby out of the blue. A year and a half into it, we’re still a little dazed. This sendup is in no way meant to dissuade anyone from pursuing a family of six or more. But don’t listen to “the experts” and assume it will be easier. Assume it will be much, much harder.
And then remember that hard things are often the ones most worth doing.
And remember that in spite of everything I’ve scoffed at, love does scale.
