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The day the baby ate cheerios off the floor (and other interesting stories)

I am the oldest of two, my brother is 3 years younger than me. Being the oldest is my only frame of reference. I don’t know what it is like being a younger sister or a middle child or one of many. I often wonder what it must be like to be the youngest or the “laat lammetjie” especially for my own kids. What must it be like to be the oldest of four or the fourth of four?

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Sometimes I think Emma got a raw deal being the youngest of four. Everything they say about the fourth child is true. They do sort of have to bring themselves up in many ways. Earlier this week I went to lunch with some friends, both have babies the same age as Emma but it is their first baby. Emma wondered around the play area, unphased by me or the fact that she was not near me, she was happy to explore on her own. Independence survival is probably one of the better things they learn as the youngest.

Now that she is mobile, she is into all the cupboards, she has smashed a purity bottle already, which lead to a quick cupboard rearrange. The other morning I was upstairs and she was downstairs with the kids. I walked into the kitchen and found her sitting on the floor in a pile of cheerios having breakfast.

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Instead of scooping her up, disinfecting her, stressing about the about the amount of sugar in the cereal and the fact she was eating stuff off the floor, as one would do with a first child, I tried to mentally work out how many cheerios she had eaten and would that qualify as enough breakfast. Then I grabbed the camera and had a little chuckle at how different life must be for her compared to when Cameron was a baby.

Even when I was pregnant I referred to her as the “forgotten child” because life was so busy there was very little time to focus on my pregnancy and even less to focus on buying her cute clothes and doing the nursery. As she gets older, she is not so much forgotten as she is sidelined. She gets dragged along to galas, strapped in the car for school runs, left with granny when we need to go places that aren’t baby friendly and she has to eat her breakfast off the floor every now and then. (Ok seriously it only happened the one time…..that I know of…….no really it was just the once.)

The one thing that appeases my guilt somewhat is that she has the best wardrobe out of all of us. We had no clothes for her so everything had to be bought and we have been super lucky to have received prizes and vouchers from the likes of Naartjie, Phoebe and Floyd and Earth Child. So while she may be the forgotten child, she is at least the best dressed forgotten child!

Where you the youngest? Oldest? Middle?

 

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11 Responses

  1. I am the eldest child but don’t give it much (any thought). With regard to the floor Cheerios, I hold the view that our lives today are over sanitised and that children are not exposed to enough dirt/germs/whatever, anyway that’s another story for another day
    Ursula recently posted…MOSU LODGE AT MOKALA NATIONAL PARKMy Profile

  2. I was the youngest for 15 years and then my sister came along. If any of us was a forgotten child, I was it. And it’s just as well, because I flew very much under the radar during the worst of my teenage rebellion… 😉

  3. Im the youngest of 4 and yes it had its advantages and disadvantages. My sister is 2 years older then me then I have my 2 older brothers (basically there was a 2 year age gap between each child.) Growing up myself and my sister were also carted off to support my brothers with their various sports events and then of corse as a teenager my big brothers were very protective with where i was allowed to go and what I should have been allowed to do. Oh and to this day wherever I go there is always someone that recognises me and will say hey u little C arent you x,y,z kid sister

  4. I am an only child – which means that 1. I really did not want one child as I hate being an only child and that 2. I have in general no idea how the steer through the waters of sibling rivalry and all that goes with it. Sometimes I fear our C is a bit forgotten – with A that makes the pathways for all and where we have to help with that first of everything and with L that needs so much more attention than any of the others.
    cat@jugglingact recently posted…A girly horse partyMy Profile

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