"Kids are expensive"

Published by Kerry | Filed under Uncategorized

I was just reading a post on the local message board that I frequent that talked about kids not being expensive until they are 3 (it was kind of a joke post, talking about how much kid’s dance classes, hockey lessons, etc. cost).  I had to laugh.  If I had a dollar for every time someone told me that “kids are expensive” after they found out we were doing IVF, we wouldn’t have to worry about taking out loans to pay for in-vitro.  Really?!?!  Kids are expensive?!?!  Oh shoot, Jeff and I didn’t know that!

People can be so dumb sometimes.

Our kid has already been expensive, and he/she isn’t even here yet!!!!!

The above statement reminds me of a time a couple of months ago (before we were talking seriously about doing IVF) when one of my friends was asking me how everything was going.  We were in the middle of our 4th IUI, and I was just convinced that it would work.  Anyway, she had asked me how much Jeff and I had paid (up to that point) in infertility treatments, and the like.  While I was taken aback that she came right out and asked me, I answered her honestly, around $15,000 - Jeff and I have both been pretty vocal about how much this has cost us, so it was really no big deal.  What was a big deal was her response, “oh, that’s not that bad.“  Ummm, WTF?  Since when is $15K just a drop in the bucket?

Then I started thinking – we have spent more trying to just get pregnant than most people will spend on their kid in the first 4-5 years of their life, give or take a few years.  That’s depressing.  After this IVF is all said and done, we will have spent more money trying to have a kid than most people will spend on their kid in the first 8-9 years of their life!  Wowza!  That’s just crazy!  Now if this works (which it WILL), then it will all be worth it, so we can quit dwelling on the fact that we’ve spent “this much money for nothing”.  I so hope this works…

Kerry