On Child-Raising

I just had a minor exchange with my spouse. Though unrelated to personal finance, I felt that the episode and the resulting realizations are worth sharing.

Background

With the arrival of my second child, we moved in to my parents' place as we felt that the maid alone cannot handle both children. We were staying with my in-laws previously, but my mum-in-law didn't want to be at home to help out with the children - she has her own retirement activities. Hence, other than having my wife becoming a stay-home-mum, our only other option is to move in to my parents' place for my mum to help out with the children.

Not-So-Good Relationship Between the Two Dowagers

As with almost all other cases I've heard, my spouse's relationship with my mum leaves much to be desired. The cohabitation started off rather badly, but over time, they learnt to stay out of each other's way and the situation improved - but not quite enough.

The unpleasant exchanges between the two ladies stoked my wife's desire to move back to our own place. We are fortunate to have a trustworthy and capable helper, hence my wife felt that we could leave the kiddos with her at our own home. I don't agree.

Potential Risks of Leaving Our Children with Only the Helper

While I don't proclaim to fully empathize with the unhappiness my wife has to put up with, I feel that the potential downside for moving out is far too great to be worth risking.

First, young children's capacity to learn is beyond the realm of our imagination. By putting them in an environment where there is only one adult (the helper) for most parts of the day, we might be, albeit unintentionally, artificially limiting their learning and growth. There is so much that a growing toddler needs and is able to learn, and nature has helped facilitated this by making them extremely curious and observant. Toddlers are further endowed with the ability to take in information from multiple sources - so many that they themselves might not even be conscious of. Even in the absence of planned, deliberate "teaching", young children are constantly learning, picking up new knowledge and making sense of the world around them. When my wife said she doesn't feel like my mum is teaching the children anything, hence justifying why there is no added value in staying with my parents, I knew she has massively and mistakenly underestimated the amount of learning done by the children through casual interactions with, and observations of the people and happenings around them. The immersive experience of listening in to conversations between adults, observing how adults behave and interact with each other, and sensing emotions under different situations is hard to replicate in a household consisting of only the helper and the two children. a tiny household is more "sterile" and provides less stimulus and learning opportunities for toddlers.

Second, our children will start going to pre-school very soon, and that is when they will start getting exposure to many other things - both good and bad. As toddlers, they will no doubt be excited to talk about their experiences and learning in schools. Staying with my parents means that they will be able to talk to them while my spouse and I are at work. This interaction provides my parents with "teaching moments" to impart correct life values, demystify/clarify misconceptions/misinformation, nudge them in the correct direction if they are going off-course, and finally, discipline them when required. The helper cannot be expected to do the same, and we risk our children becoming self-entitled if their needs and wants are always pandered to by the helper.

Permanent, Irreparable Consequences VS Fleeting, Temporary Unhappiness

The two potential consequences of leaving the children with only the helper are irreversible and permanent. Contrast this with the fleeting and temporary unhappiness that my wife has to put up with for perhaps 2 more years, and the sensible choice to make becomes obvious. Now, I am not saying that our moving out will definitely turn our children into delinquent, self-entitled teenagers - child-raising is never this straightforward - but as parents, we should strive to provide the best environment (not materially) that gives the best chance of nurturing our children into independent, confident, and healthy adults.

8 Money Saving Tips in Raising a Child

Is your budget baby-proof?

 My parents, rather unabashedly, once told me this:

If you don't plan to have children, then don't even get married. Get married for what? Just stay together can already.

My gut feel tells me many others think this way as well. I mean, why else would one wants to get married right? Especially for the men. Matrimonial contracts have "anti-men" written all over it. Nothing in the contract benefits us. I mean, that's the plain truth if I am absolutely objective and clinical about it.

The moment you sign on the contract, what's yours is hers, what's hers remains hers.

But anyhow, despite all the terms that are set up against me, I got married at 24. Going by the logic of my parents', I have to start a family eventually. Both my wife and I weren't sure about it, but we weren't against it either, so we simply not choose and let nature takes its course. About a year later, tadah! My wife got pregnant. To be honest, I didn't know what to feel when I first heard the news. I wasn't over the moon; I wasn't scared; I wasn't feeling anything. It was just that: I am becoming a father soon, and that didn't mean anything to me at that point.

Shortly after though, the financial commitment associated with raising a child began to dawn on me. It was anxiety-inducing to say the least, as I wasn't quite prepared to give up (or at least delay) my dream of achieving financial freedom. But it was no longer an option.

To set the record straight, I wasn't regretting. I was just feeling uncertain and anxious.

16 months on, I am glad my wife and I had chosen not to choose. I mean, sure, we now have to be a little more careful with our money, but it has not yet turn into something that keeps me awake at night. Just like what my parents told me (again), raising a child can be relatively affordable, or extremely expensive, it all depends on your expectations as parents. So to everyone out there who needs this last bit of encouragement to start a family, go ahead and take that leap of faith! It's not half as scary as you imagine.

After being a parent for slightly over a year, I'm proud to say that I've mostly been able to keep to my prudent lifestyle. Sure, expenses will increase, but as with every other situation, there are always ways to limit the scale of it. It all depends on our expectations, right?

So here are some money saving habits that I have to share:

1. Ask for Used Baby Clothing from Friends/Relatives/Colleagues. Before my daughter was born, my wife's colleagues handed over many bags of baby clothing and a few old but functional toys. Another colleague of mine passed me his baby car seat which he got from another colleague of ours. These items are not new, but with a little cleaning, they are good enough. I told my wife that it's better to use old stuff because they are likely to be rid of all the nasty chemicals used in production. She agreed, and so we not only saved tons of money, but also helped conserve the environment a little. The Earth needs all the help it can get.
2. Carousell for the Win! Well, not everything comes free, and there are times when you simply need to spend that hard earned dollar. But why not stretch that dollar? There are many good deals on carousell. I managed to buy a used baby high chair for less than half the retail price, a new booster seat at a great discount, and many others! The seller of the booster seat received the item as a gift, but has no use for it. His loss, my gain =)
3. Explore Free Places. My daughter is 16 months old now. She is able to walk and do random baby things, but I doubt she will be able to appreciate places like Universal Studio. I've always insisted that we bring her to free-to-enter places like Singapore Discovery Centre. There are enough spaces for her to explore, and even if the exhibits are not world-class, they are good enough to keep the baby's senses occupied. We've mainly kept to this practice, but my wife had this nagging urge to bring our baby to the zoo to look at real animals. When I finally relented to her repeated requests though, she was disappointed as my daughter could not yet appreciate what she saw.
4. Borrow Books from the Library. My wife was initially concerned that books from public library, especially children's books, will be rather filthy. That didn't stop me from dragging her to take an actual look before we make any conclusions. She is now appreciative of the variety of books she can borrow for our daughter, and since 1-year-old has an attention span of like 3 minutes, the benefits of being able to constantly refresh the titles we have available at home came up more starkly.
5. Make Your Own Toys. I am repeatedly surprised by the stuffs my daughter finds interesting. I brought home an empty paper cup from Burger King, washed it clean and shouted into it like how one would use a loud hailer, and that got her so excited. When she finally got bored of it, I cut two holes at the side, tied a string across, and "transformed" it into a hat. She was more intrigued by that cup than most of the toys she has.
6. Look into Your Old Stash. I have to thank my mother-in-law for this. She actually kept my wife's doll house for 20 over years! We whipped that out and my daughter had so much fun playing with it. Some figurines have their necks broken, but nothing too catastrophic that super glue can't resolve. 
7. Polyclinics for the Win! Like many first-time parents, we only want the best for the kids, but sometimes we really should pause and consider if the cheaper alternative is indeed inferior. The first few vaccines that my baby had to take was at a GP/Gynae. The charges weren't sky-high, but they weren't cheap either. We decided to take our daughter to the polyclinic for her vaccines on the advice of other parents, and I instantly regretted not going there right from the start. Most of the compulsory vaccines were FOC, and the nurses were all very well-trained and professional. There was once when we had to bring home some paracetamol just in case she develops fever after the injection, and so I made my way to the dispensary. I couldn't believe my ears when I was told to pay like 30c (I really couldn't remember the price because it was ridiculously low) for the bottle of medicine. Being Singaporeans, there are really many things to be grateful for.
8. Have a Few More! Last but not least, have a few more babies, and keep their age close! The cost of raising the second child is likely to be lower than the first, as many things can be handed down. That's economies of scale right there for you to exploit.

That's it! These are 8 practices I keep to to prevent my wallet from emptying out too quickly. And yes, I do practice what I preach: my second child is arriving in Mar =)