how much financial 'stress' did having a baby cause you?

[sarack]

i'm just wondering how much a difference little baby/babies have really made for you in your life? when you had your baby, financially, could you see a difference? do they really cost that much, besides the upfront costs? tell me about your experience.

i put stress in quotations because although it may not make much of a difference for some of us, i want to know if it really made a difference at all. so interpret it how you want.

[jennlin]

i hate to say this...but honestly not that much.

h and i are pretty financially savvy. we have no "bad" debt, and we only have 2 mortgages (1 when we had bjl). we have lots in savings, and we spend a LOT less than we make......we can survive on h's income alone, still save comfortably, but i work, too, and make about 75% what he does...all of our baby gear was purchased slowly, so we really had no impact.

i took 13 unpaid weeks and 6 weeks at 80% pay and we didn't even dig into our savings....we didn't even notice having a baby. if we had to pay for childcare, "my" income would go towards that..but we'd still have plenty left over....so no impact, really...just less saved each month.

[Deleted]

It made a huge impact but we also had a child that was going to need lots of medical help for the first year. Had we not qualified for financial aid through Seattle Children's his surgeries would have bankrupted us. We had $140K in hospital bills that were either covered by insurance or the uncompensated care fund. I think it still would have made a huge dent but I can't really gauge that because it wasn't in the cards we were dealt.

[catbus]

Apr 11, 2013 13:01:46 GMT -5 spunbutterfly said:

Apr 11, 2013 12:21:01 GMT -5 jennlin said:

i hate to say this...but honestly not that much.

h and i are pretty financially savvy. we have no "bad" debt, and we only have 2 mortgages (1 when we had bjl). we have lots in savings, and we spend a LOT less than we make......we can survive on h's income alone, still save comfortably, but i work, too, and make about 75% what he does...all of our baby gear was purchased slowly, so we really had no impact.

i took 13 unpaid weeks and 6 weeks at 80% pay and we didn't even dig into our savings....we didn't even notice having a baby. if we had to pay for childcare, "my" income would go towards that..but we'd still have plenty left over....so no impact, really...just less saved each month.

The less saved a month is what's making my husband twitch.

That's what's been hard for us, too. It's not as though we can't afford the monthly expenses, but we can no longer throw as much into savings as we could before. Our 401(k) contributions are still the same. My paycheck is a bit smaller now because I carry insurance for E, plus am now contributing $208.33 a month ($5k a year) for a flex spending account for daycare expenses and $50/month ($600/year) for healthcare expenses. Then there's the $1600/month for daycare. 

But we're more mindful of our spending in general, and are spending less in categories like entertainment, dining, and travel, simply because it's much more difficult (or impossible) to do those things with an infant. 

[catbus]

Apr 11, 2013 13:07:55 GMT -5 @sounderschick said:

It made a huge impact but we also had a child that was going to need lots of medical help for the first year. Had we not qualified for financial aid through Seattle Children's his surgeries would have bankrupted us. We had $140K in hospital bills that were either covered by insurance or the uncompensated care fund. I think it still would have made a huge dent but I can't really gauge that because it wasn't in the cards we were dealt.

 Ugh, I'm so sorry, but glad you weren't liable for that amount. 

[Deleted]

Apr 11, 2013 13:17:51 GMT -5 catbus said:

Apr 11, 2013 13:07:55 GMT -5 @sounderschick said:

It made a huge impact but we also had a child that was going to need lots of medical help for the first year. Had we not qualified for financial aid through Seattle Children's his surgeries would have bankrupted us. We had $140K in hospital bills that were either covered by insurance or the uncompensated care fund. I think it still would have made a huge dent but I can't really gauge that because it wasn't in the cards we were dealt.

 Ugh, I'm so sorry, but glad you weren't liable for that amount. 

Edmund was born with a cleft lip and palate. He had 2 surgeries before 1 to repair the lip, 5 months, and the palate, 4 days before his first birthday. Not to mention weekly doctors appointments from 6 weeks until he had his surgery at 5 months.

[Deleted]

Apr 11, 2013 13:21:55 GMT -5 spunbutterfly said:

Apr 11, 2013 13:07:55 GMT -5 @sounderschick said:

It made a huge impact but we also had a child that was going to need lots of medical help for the first year. Had we not qualified for financial aid through Seattle Children's his surgeries would have bankrupted us. We had $140K in hospital bills that were either covered by insurance or the uncompensated care fund. I think it still would have made a huge dent but I can't really gauge that because it wasn't in the cards we were dealt.

*hugs*

I am glad to see, however, that the uncompensated care fund seems to really work? (Does it? Can you share your experiences with it?)

We have not had 1 bill children's regarding Edmund's care. You have to apply for it every 6 months, and according to a customer of mine, as long as you make under $68k you are almost guaranteed to qualify for it. We just barely scraped by with his first surgery by making $66k in 2010. It is truly a wonderful program.

[karebear219]

We had saved to cover medial expenses and for me being home the first 18 weeks.

We don't feel it that much, except it is really hard to save now because there is always something coming up that needs $$$. You just find a way to make things work.

[niq]

Between house, mom, and baby, we definitely have to watch our money. We've really scaled back our eating out budget and our buying-stuff-on-Amazon budget. Msniq cut back on makeup/nail polish spending and I cut back on music. The big trip to Japan is probably our last big trip anywhere until we get child(ren) through daycare. Msniq is now 5 days/week at UW instead of 4 days/week and she says that money is a big reason why. We want to move mom out here and put her in senior housing since Washington actually is going to take the Medicaid money. If we did not have a kid to spend/save on we would probably just keep writing checks because I'm not really wild about being in the same city as her (even if the last trip home was really pleasant and she is in a good mood b/c she is looking forward to having grandchildren).

So, I dunno. The idea of moving mom is a big deal. Msniq going 5 days/week is a big deal but I'm sure she would have done that pretty soon anyway. The rest is gentle pressure more than stress.

[sarack]

we have saved for me to be unpaid for 12 weeks from work. i'm not feeling bad about that. i'll be able to go back to work at my same hourly rate, even though i was salary (except for overtime) and work 2-3 days a week, which will be nice. we can survive on h's income now, but i wish we would have saved all that money we vacationed with last year. obviously hindsight in 20/20. we'd have SO much more money now!

h doesn't want to think about when we have kids until when we have kids. he is wayyy too laid back and it drives me nuts. i tell him we need to get down to one income now, and stop eating out/spending/doing extra now so we don't 'feel' it that much later. he isn't listening to me.

[niq]

Apr 11, 2013 16:48:09 GMT -5 sarack said:

we have saved for me to be unpaid for 12 weeks from work. i'm not feeling bad about that. i'll be able to go back to work at my same hourly rate, even though i was salary (except for overtime) and work 2-3 days a week, which will be nice. we can survive on h's income now, but i wish we would have saved all that money we vacationed with last year. obviously hindsight in 20/20. we'd have SO much more money now!

h doesn't want to think about when we have kids until when we have kids. he is wayyy too laid back and it drives me nuts. i tell him we need to get down to one income now, and stop eating out/spending/doing extra now so we don't 'feel' it that much later. he isn't listening to me.

sarack I know that you have become this superperson who's going to school, paying down debt, and lost a ton of weight, and now twins ...

... I am super impressed and I hope people keep saying things like this to you . Second, I know you wrote about meetings w/ your doctor about diet, but what do you think inspired you to get a hold of your finances and go back to school too?

[sarack]

Apr 11, 2013 16:52:52 GMT -5 niq said:

Apr 11, 2013 16:48:09 GMT -5 sarack said:

we have saved for me to be unpaid for 12 weeks from work. i'm not feeling bad about that. i'll be able to go back to work at my same hourly rate, even though i was salary (except for overtime) and work 2-3 days a week, which will be nice. we can survive on h's income now, but i wish we would have saved all that money we vacationed with last year. obviously hindsight in 20/20. we'd have SO much more money now!

h doesn't want to think about when we have kids until when we have kids. he is wayyy too laid back and it drives me nuts. i tell him we need to get down to one income now, and stop eating out/spending/doing extra now so we don't 'feel' it that much later. he isn't listening to me.

sarack I know that you have become this superperson who's going to school, paying down debt, and lost a ton of weight, and now twins ...

... I am super impressed and I hope people keep saying things like this to you . Second, I know you wrote about meetings w/ your doctor about diet, but what do you think inspired you to get a hold of your finances and go back to school too?

niq you are so sweet. thank you for bringing this up. it really does make me feel good. So the meeting with my actual about my diet while pregnant will be on Tuesday, i'll follow up more with that. The reason I decided to call and complain about the other doctor, or really just ask her her thoughts considering what he said was because I don't believe that 1200 calories is good for most people. When i was losing a ton of weight, i was working out hard and eating about 1200 calories a day. It probably wasn't enough, and sometimes i ate more, but being pregnant, i know this isn't sufficient.. and then just all of the other stuff i've been reading.

I've wanted to be smaller my whole life because everyone else was, but was always comfortable with my size. I didn't even realize I weighed 375 until i weighed myself and was like whoa, and then didn't realize how I looked until i lost weight and looked back at pictures. I've been wanting to go back to school for a long time, and kept putting it off because there was always something else that I wanted to do. We wanted to have babies super bad, so that was my real motivation to losing weight, i couldn't imagine getting bigger at my biggest. holy crap. even now, i'm having a hard time. The finances thing was important. H & I do way too much of what we want to do and not enough of what we should do to maintain the life style we'd like to live. We buy what we want, when we want, go where we want, and don't really consider much else. We had 1 cc with debt from wedding, and then H had a few cc that he had built and built and built and i wasn't responsible for them so i never knew what the balance was. when i realized they were all about maxed, i was like, shit! we need to do something. So I got a second job, because it happened that I got one first, and really liked how it helped me stay preoccupied. We paid off our debt, saved a little, and vacationed a lot. Our last vacation was in October and we got pregnant in december/january, so now I'm trying to get H back on track.. we've gotten out of control with buying what we want. He got a new job too and is now making about the same as I do, which was more than double what he used to make, so with all this money, we're finding more and more stuff to buy and forgetting we need to save!

that was probably more than you bargained for. i never wanted to be the poor fat girl i was when i was little, as an adult. i also don't want my children to have to worry about things like i did throughout my childhood. 

so yeah, my future children are pretty much my motivation. even before i had them i wanted them to have everything. i'm hoping that even with h working, i'll be able to figure out a way to go back to school when i'm working pt to get an actual degree finally. this might be too much but i'm hoping.

[niq]

Apr 11, 2013 16:48:09 GMT -5 sarack said:

h doesn't want to think about when we have kids until when we have kids. he is wayyy too laid back and it drives me nuts. i tell him we need to get down to one income now, and stop eating out/spending/doing extra now so we don't 'feel' it that much later. he isn't listening to me.

You're on Mint so you can sort of track your current spending, right? If you want to ballpark child spending, add $1000/month to your current budget, plus whatever you'll spend for regular child care (not babysitters for nights out etc.).