I was just curious to hear your opinions on age difference. [name]How[/name] many years would you want in between kids?
Personally, I would like to have my kids as close together as possible. Although I know it’s tough when they’re really little, I think it’s best in the long run because they’ll have close companions. I have a sibling who is ten years younger than me, and while I of course love him, I hate that age difference! I relate to him less, and I am far more like a parent than a sibling to him. I have another sibling who is three years younger than me, and we are closer.
There are 4 and a half years between my DD#1 and DD#1. There will be minimum 2years between DD#2 and a hypothetical 3rd child. Ideally, I think 4 years is a good gap. I had enough time to enjoy DD#1 without my attention being elsewhere. Now that the baby has arrived, DD#1 is independent to do a few things for herself (brush her teeth, get into her pj’s by herself) so that I don’t feel like I’m taking care of two babies, if that makes sense.
So my ideal is 3-4 years for those reasons. I do see the benefits of having kids 1-2 years apart, but it just isn’t for me. I don’t think I’d cope very well!
I think about 4 years is ideal. My brother is 4 and a half years younger than me and we are really good friends and have never fallen out or argued Most of the time I find siblings with about 2 years between them fall out the most because they are at a similar age and stage in life.
I would never have children less than 2 years apart if i can help it. It can cause serious health risks for your children to have them too close together.
That being said, I will probably try to put 2-4 years between my children, if I can help it. My sister is 10 years younger than me, and that’s never been a problem really. I love taking her places and getting to do all the kid stuff with her (she’s 11) that I can’t do yet. I feel like helping to raise her has given me a strong base for my own children. However, I do understand feeling like a parent sometimes.
I am hoping, in an ideal world, to have at least 4/5 years between the first and second, and at least a 3/4 year gap between any after that That way I feel the child gets a lot of individual attention during the early formative years and the older children will be old enough to appreciate, understand and join in the experience of having siblings when they come along.
If I get to have two, then 2-3, but if more than two, maybe more than that. I have two little sisters who are 2 and 8 years younger than me. While I feel like we are bestfriends with my sister who’s 2 yrs younger than me, I feel like there’s a gap between my sister who’s 8 yrs younger than me although I love her so much! But, it was really nice to have a “baby” sister as a child. I loved taking care of her and you know, from my own experience, having a baby who’s a lot younger than your other kids make family really happy and warm.
I always wanted to have 4 years between children so that I wouldn’t (ideally) have two kids in college at once. If our planning works out right, I will have #2 when my son is 4 1/2.
I am 6 and 10 years younger than my two brothers. I am very close to their wives and we all have sons the same age. We are all in the same stage of life and relate very well to each other even though we have the age gap. I also love the idea of letting each child have time to be the “baby” in the house.
But to each his own
There is about 3 years between my two girls, they are good together and I think its a nice gap. It will be a 4 year difference between my youngest and the twins I am expecting, 7 for the eldest. But it shouldn’t matter too much, the girls cannot wait to meet their new siblings.
There is a nine year difference between me and my eldest sister. Yes, there were tones of mentorship but we were and are still great friends.
For me, I think about 4 or 5 years would be good. My one brother and I are 20 months apart, and my other brother and I are 6 years apart. 20 months doesn’t seem like nearly enough… not that I noticed personally, but my two sets of cousins have kids who are 22 months apart, and then 2.5 years apart, and both those gaps seem too small for me, too. But the 6 years between my youngest brother and I is pretty big. We’ve only really been ‘friends’ for the past few years, whereas I’ve been friends with my other brother most of our lives (except for the 2 years where we couldn’t stand each other in middle school, haha).
I like the idea of having a 2nd child when the first one starts school. I’d like to have 3 kids, though, and so even if I had a baby tomorrow, I’d be 35 by the time I had my last one with that time schedule… I kind of feel like if things go okay with having 2 kids, then a 3rd one might come along sooner than the 5 year mark.
My little sister and I were 2.5 years apart and I [name]LOVE[/name] being that close in age. The best year of my life was when I was in 12th grade and she was in 9th and we were finally in the same school. She is my best friend and I think if there were much more of a difference, we wouldn’t be as close.
I definitely want my kids close together like that. It seems like I am in the minority, though!
I think it is best to have them either very close together ie) less than 18 months apart, or more than 4 years apart. I think children adjust best either when they are too young to realize that they are no longer the sole center of attention or when they are old enough to understand what is happening and get to feel special to become a big brother/sister and feel like they can help. Also at 4years or over they also have some interests outside the home. As I don’t want to strech the process of raising children out, my first and second are 14 months apart and the twins I am expecting are due when my second son will be 19months.
Great question! I don’t really like when kids are within a year of eac hother for some reason, but I think 2 years is perfect, 4 or 5 years max. My siblings are 13 years, 10 years and 8 years older than me and I am not close with any of them. I have always wished I had a brother or sister close to me age!
Two to three years apart would be ideal for me, especially since I want at least four kids. Any more than that and I’d feel too rushed to have them before menopause kicks in. Any less and it would probably drive me crazy.
The age separation in my family is:
Me
1 1/2 years
My sister
2 1/2 years
My brother
3 years
My sister
4 years ( they waited longer before my last sister because they thought they werent having any more kids but decided to anyway)
My sister
I love being close in age with my siblings, of course we argued! But we had great times too. And we can share experiences and stories and I am super close with my sister (the one next after me) and we’re very different but we can related because of the experiences we had together! I love it!
Personally, I like every 2 years or so like my parents but I’ve seen all sorts of things and the parents are usually happy with their decision.
I’m due [name]November[/name] and that will give me a little over 3 years between babies. And I’m the weird one. All my friends with children my daughter’s age have gone on to have second kids much sooner that I have. I find lots of people want small age gaps so their kids can “grow up together”.
Me, I always wanted a bigger gap than that. Ideally I’d like my daughter toilet trained before our second is born.
There’s only about a year and a half between me and my brother and we hated each other growing up. I don’t think a close age necessarily guarantees they’ll be friends. I grew up with friends who were 4, 5 even 6 years different, and were much closer than I ever was with my brother.
My opinion is that there’s no ‘right’ amount of time, since for every person/couple the right time is different.
Personally I want three children, with the first two being 3 years apart and the next two either 2 or 3 so that the max difference from oldest to youngest is 6. We’ll see though I guess!
There’s 3 years, 2 months and 1 day between my brother and me. I’ve always liked the gap. I think it worked out well.
Between my two step-siblings there is a 10 month difference, which I always found REALLY WEIRD. They were in the same year at school because of how their birthdays worked out and they’ve always been super close with each other, to the point that they didn’t bother making many friends and stuff because they had each other.
I have a half-sister through my mum who is 5 and i’ve never really felt close to her at all. I don’t know whether it’s the 15 year age gap or because we grew up different houses, but i’ve just never really been close to her at all. I don’t take her out or play with her etc, and I find it weird that my little girl has an aunty whose not that much older than her, although I suppose when their older they’ll get on well.
I think if I had anymore little’uns a 2-3 year gap would be my ideal.
My girls are three years apart, and now I’m expecting a third girl and she’s three years from the youngest (2006,2009,2012). I’d say the negative of a 3 year gap is your baby is just getting out of diapers and becoming independent and then POW you have to do all over again! lol I love it though!
For me, personally, I am thinking three/four years in between each kiddo. I think it’ll be easier on me while they’re small, so I can spend enough attention towards each child that they deserve. At four normally the kid goes to a couple hours of preeschool/K-4 and all, so that’d be time for me to bond with baby. But its not a HUGE age difference, where the kids wouldn’t ever be able to play with each other or relate at all. Though I still do like the idea of a little bit closer, like two years apart.
Most of the time I find siblings with about 2 years between them fall out the most because they are at a similar age and stage in life.