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Dear Parent on the Fence About Having More Children
There’s a way to see how you’d be holding up.
It could always be worse, says an old Yiddish folktale.
But wouldn’t it be nice if we could take a peek at the alternative scenario and get to decide if we really want it before it becomes our reality?
Why on earth aren’t people required to take a peek at what it’s like to have children before they actually have them?
Why do we have reality shows in all possible settings but no reality show that puts regular adults taking care of a newborn, day and night, for like… at least a week?
Nothing prepares you for having a child like having a child. Yet far too many people end up in this situation completely clueless.
I used to fantasize about taking a peek at what it’s like to have one or more children.
This past month, I had an unplanned taste of it.
But first…
The old Yiddish folktale
A poor man living in a small village with his six children, his wife, and his mother in a one-room hut, started to feel that he couldn’t do it anymore.
So he went to seek advice from his Rabbi.
Complaining that they’re too crowded and everything is too noisy, he said:
“Help, me, Rabbi. I’ll do whatever you say.”
What the Rabbi said shocked the poor man. Yet he had no choice but to follow his advice.
The advice was to bring into his one-room hut, on top of his six children, his wife, and his mother, the animals he had in the yard.
Every time he’d come to the Holy Rabbi to complain that it couldn’t be worse, the Rabbi was asking him to bring in another animal.
And so, the man ended up sharing the room with the chickens, the goose, the rooster, the goat, and the cow.
After a couple of weeks of living a nightmare, when the man said to the Rabbi that it was the end of the world for him and his family, the Rabbi allowed him to finally take out all the animals.
