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One and Only: The Freedom of Having an Only Child, and the Joy of Being One
Debunking the myth that only children are selfish, maladjusted “little emperors,” a prominent journalist makes a funny, tough-minded, and honest case for being and having an only child.
Lauren Sandler is an only child with an only child of her own, who found that discussing the choice to stop at one kid was loaded with anxiety, doubt, misinformation, and judgment. After investigating what only children really are like and whether stopping at one child is an answer to reconciling motherhood and modernity, she learned a lot about herself—and a lot about our culture’s assumptions.
In this heartfelt work, Sandler demystifies the perceived problems of the only child and legitimizes a conversation about the larger societal costs of having more than one. We ask when people are having kids—never a kid, never one child at a time. If parents no longer felt they had to have second children to keep from royally screwing up their first, would the majority of them still do it? And, if the literature tells us—in hundreds of studies—that a child isn’t better off with a sibling, and it’s not something parents truly want for themselves, then whom is this choice serving?
One and Only examines these questions, exploring what the rise of the single-child family means for our economies, our environment, and our freedom. Sandler considers hundreds of studies and interviews, traveling around the world to discover that only children are just fine, their parents often happier, and our planet is better off for them.
Sandler’s controversial revelations will probably draw rebukes from the majority of parents who believe that having several children is the healthiest model for all members of a family. Others will claim that she’s quite possibly cracked the code of happiness, demonstrating that having just one may be the way to resolve our countless issues with adulthood in our overtaxed age.
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First published June 11, 2013
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About the author
Lauren Sandler
9 books97 followersI'm a journalist and author who writes about culture and inequality. My new book is called THIS IS ALL I GOT: A New Mother's Search For home.
When I moved to New York City in 1992, homelessness was already considered a national crisis. The night I unpacked my bags uptown, 23,482 people slept in the city’s public shelters. By the 2015 evening I met Camila, a twenty-two-year old homeless soon-to-be single mother, that number had ballooned to more than 60,000 people.
THIS IS ALL I GOT begins as Camila goes into labor in a shelter in Brooklyn, and follows her to the overcrowded Bronx apartment where she lands after an untimely eviction. The book witnesses her navigate welfare benefits, housing vouchers, child support, and what she must endure to stay in college and stay sane. Throughout, Camila’s intimacies—with people with whom she shares DNA, living space, desire, grudges, heartbreak—help us know this complicated character whose ambitions and passions are nearly as great as the constant crises she has no choice but to confront.
Camila’s caseworkers would tell you that they’ve never seen anyone as knowledgeable about the system in which she was stranded. It quickly became clear to me: If she couldn’t use her wits and persistence to make the system work for her, no one could.
My first book, RIGHTEOUS: Dispatches from the Evangelical Youth Movement, about my journalistic immersion into the young Christian right, was published by Viking in 2006. My second book, ONE AND ONLY: The Freedom of Having an Only Child, and the Joy of Being One, considered how we want women to be mothers more than anything else, despite the US outlier status in supporting parents, and how we demonize what to many is a sane -- and loving choice -- to have just one kid. Thanks to everyone here who has read and reviewed both books.
When I moved to New York City in 1992, homelessness was already considered a national crisis. The night I unpacked my bags uptown, 23,482 people slept in the city’s public shelters. By the 2015 evening I met Camila, a twenty-two-year old homeless soon-to-be single mother, that number had ballooned to more than 60,000 people.
THIS IS ALL I GOT begins as Camila goes into labor in a shelter in Brooklyn, and follows her to the overcrowded Bronx apartment where she lands after an untimely eviction. The book witnesses her navigate welfare benefits, housing vouchers, child support, and what she must endure to stay in college and stay sane. Throughout, Camila’s intimacies—with people with whom she shares DNA, living space, desire, grudges, heartbreak—help us know this complicated character whose ambitions and passions are nearly as great as the constant crises she has no choice but to confront.
Camila’s caseworkers would tell you that they’ve never seen anyone as knowledgeable about the system in which she was stranded. It quickly became clear to me: If she couldn’t use her wits and persistence to make the system work for her, no one could.
My first book, RIGHTEOUS: Dispatches from the Evangelical Youth Movement, about my journalistic immersion into the young Christian right, was published by Viking in 2006. My second book, ONE AND ONLY: The Freedom of Having an Only Child, and the Joy of Being One, considered how we want women to be mothers more than anything else, despite the US outlier status in supporting parents, and how we demonize what to many is a sane -- and loving choice -- to have just one kid. Thanks to everyone here who has read and reviewed both books.
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May 13, 2013
The following quote sums up this book nicely for me:
“Children are a desire, not a calculation. Which is why I believe that if you truly desire more than one child, you’ll make it work. People always have. And if you don’t, well, there’s a big stack of numbers on your side. If we’re going to be rational about it, surely the economic verdict suggests we should stop at one.”
As another reviewer stated (and also in my own experience), this topic can be controversial, and Sandler doesn’t pretend to be objective. Rather she takes a side on the issue, arguing that one child is better for her, better for her child, and better for the environment. Personally, for now, I agree with her. I don’t believe that Sandler is trying to dictate that everyone should have one child (based on the quote above), rather I believe she is making a very direct argument to refute the stereotype of only children as lonely, selfish, and maladjusted.
I also would have preferred Sandler to write the book more along the lines of “only children are just as good as those with siblings", but I can understand why she didn’t. It feels like the stereotype of only children is so entrenched that to prove only children are just as ok as those with siblings, you almost have to prove they are better. Similar to how women in traditional male-dominated careers have often had to be better than men to simply receive the same recognition and advancements.
I have had firsthand experience with the ingrained stereotype of only children, from strangers and friends alike. When a friendly stranger asked if I plan to have another child and I said no, she literally told me 3-4 times I would change my mind, I wouldn’t want to do that to my child. I also have had people I like and respect imply that to raise my only child not to be selfish; I would simply have to be a better parent than 90% of other parents of only children. While it was meant as a compliment to my parenting skills, it’s heartbreaking to have someone I trust suggest that (1) I have put my child at a disadvantage right off the bat and (2) I will have to work harder than everyone else to fix that disadvantage.
And that exact heartbreaking feeling is why I can also understand other reviewers’ vehement criticisms of Sandler’s work, because she directly argues only children are better. None of us like to think that we aren’t giving our children the best in every way. As parents of only children, we cringe when others imply we are supposedly “selfishly” withholding the absolute best thing we can do for our child by not providing them a sibling. I can only assume that parents of multiple children cringe when Sandler points out that quantifiable, documented, research has shown time and time again that only children benefit from their parents undivided time and financial resources by scoring higher (albeit only slightly significantly) in areas of achievement, motivation, and personal adjustment. Thus it is likely that this book will continue to either receive high praise or deep scorn from most reviewers.
My own personal take-away from this book, is that overall being an only child (or a parent of one) is no better or worse than being in a family with siblings. Each has their own set of challenges, and their own benefits. It is really none of my business to judge anyone else’s family size, and I know I have changed my reaction to larger families as my sensitivity has grown. I found this book deeply reassuring as a parent of an only child, and I can only hope my review will raise awareness among those in larger families that only children are just as great as everyone else.
*ARC provided by the author for an honest review.
“Children are a desire, not a calculation. Which is why I believe that if you truly desire more than one child, you’ll make it work. People always have. And if you don’t, well, there’s a big stack of numbers on your side. If we’re going to be rational about it, surely the economic verdict suggests we should stop at one.”
As another reviewer stated (and also in my own experience), this topic can be controversial, and Sandler doesn’t pretend to be objective. Rather she takes a side on the issue, arguing that one child is better for her, better for her child, and better for the environment. Personally, for now, I agree with her. I don’t believe that Sandler is trying to dictate that everyone should have one child (based on the quote above), rather I believe she is making a very direct argument to refute the stereotype of only children as lonely, selfish, and maladjusted.
I also would have preferred Sandler to write the book more along the lines of “only children are just as good as those with siblings", but I can understand why she didn’t. It feels like the stereotype of only children is so entrenched that to prove only children are just as ok as those with siblings, you almost have to prove they are better. Similar to how women in traditional male-dominated careers have often had to be better than men to simply receive the same recognition and advancements.
I have had firsthand experience with the ingrained stereotype of only children, from strangers and friends alike. When a friendly stranger asked if I plan to have another child and I said no, she literally told me 3-4 times I would change my mind, I wouldn’t want to do that to my child. I also have had people I like and respect imply that to raise my only child not to be selfish; I would simply have to be a better parent than 90% of other parents of only children. While it was meant as a compliment to my parenting skills, it’s heartbreaking to have someone I trust suggest that (1) I have put my child at a disadvantage right off the bat and (2) I will have to work harder than everyone else to fix that disadvantage.
And that exact heartbreaking feeling is why I can also understand other reviewers’ vehement criticisms of Sandler’s work, because she directly argues only children are better. None of us like to think that we aren’t giving our children the best in every way. As parents of only children, we cringe when others imply we are supposedly “selfishly” withholding the absolute best thing we can do for our child by not providing them a sibling. I can only assume that parents of multiple children cringe when Sandler points out that quantifiable, documented, research has shown time and time again that only children benefit from their parents undivided time and financial resources by scoring higher (albeit only slightly significantly) in areas of achievement, motivation, and personal adjustment. Thus it is likely that this book will continue to either receive high praise or deep scorn from most reviewers.
My own personal take-away from this book, is that overall being an only child (or a parent of one) is no better or worse than being in a family with siblings. Each has their own set of challenges, and their own benefits. It is really none of my business to judge anyone else’s family size, and I know I have changed my reaction to larger families as my sensitivity has grown. I found this book deeply reassuring as a parent of an only child, and I can only hope my review will raise awareness among those in larger families that only children are just as great as everyone else.
*ARC provided by the author for an honest review.
August 19, 2013
When venturing into the Mommy Wars, it's wise to state your position up front. When it comes to me, Lauren Sandler is preaching to the choir. I am white, affluent, college educated, liberal, urban, green, a writer, and have an only child (a girl!) by preference. The only difference is she lives in the hip neighborhood of NYC (and I live in the hip BOSTON neighborhood) and she worked for NPR while I've only ever listened to NPR.
I am just like her and the book is for people just like her (and me).
I should also state that I'm not an only child. Nor do I have the angst, ambivalence, and existential teeth-gnashing that she seems to have about choosing to have only one child. My husband and I chose one child for many thoughtful reasons, personal and political, and we've never even hesitated over it.
Maybe that's why I haven't had the pushback she's gotten. I've had some very rude people tell me that "only children grow up *odd*" but that's it. My daughter has never asked for a little sibling.
That's out of the way.
The articles covering this were all given inflammatory headlines, because the media long ago learned that any statement about women, sex, and motherhood garners *all the attention*. But her treatment of the subject was so even handed that it was a little tedious sometimes. (Note for non-parents: It is a truism, when discussing parenthood, especially motherhood, that any choice you make is seen as an attack on anyone who doesn't make the exact same choice. And if you dare to list the reasons you made that choice, it's an open invitation to an argument.)
I found the hybrid memoir and scholarly book a little uneven to navigate at times. Her prose is clear and lovely, so you don't stumble on it, but I did have to hop-step sometimes on the swings from intensely personal domestic bliss ("w're in the dining room, drinking coffee and watching Dahlia improvise some ballet move to a Flaming Lips song") to dry academic ("When scientists conducted a meta-analysis of 115 studies comparing....").
All that said, the part of the book that works best is her careful and methodical debunking of the stereotype of the lonelyselfishmaladjusted (all one word) only child. She shows not only that there is a significant body of work that disproves this ridiculous notion, but also the deeply ingrained prejudice that makes researchers doubt their own findings.
Her focus on parental happiness is lovely, too.
When she steps away from the child-centric and into the sociological issues, she fares slightly less well. Each chapter -- on religion and fertility, feminism, the environment -- reads more like an introductory essay to what should be an entire book on the issue. To be fair, she wasn't writing those books, but I would have preferred a little more heft to those chapters, especially the compelling environmental case for only one child.
She makes up for this slight failing by including a nice listing of sources and books and studies at the end. Not the bibliography I wanted, mind you, but more than I was expecting.
Her worst fault, though, is that she's preaching to the choir, to me. She assumes her readers are all NPR-listening, kale-eating, college educated white people who live in cities. She makes little forays out into the other worlds -- most compelling are her visits to China and her discussions with the devout -- but she's there as a visitor. To be fair, she knows it and makes her acknowledged privileged status very clear, chapter after chapter. Hell, it's the *subject* of many chapters, at least in part. However, her complete lack of any black subjects except Condi Rice (that I noticed, I didn't take notes) is kind of an enormous and glaring problem.
Still, it's a nice introduction to some very complex issues which, frankly, all parents ought to consider before they even have ONE child, much less a second one. And it's a handy resource to refer someone to the next time some idiotic asshat tells me that I'm scarring my child because I didn't give her a sibling.
I am just like her and the book is for people just like her (and me).
I should also state that I'm not an only child. Nor do I have the angst, ambivalence, and existential teeth-gnashing that she seems to have about choosing to have only one child. My husband and I chose one child for many thoughtful reasons, personal and political, and we've never even hesitated over it.
Maybe that's why I haven't had the pushback she's gotten. I've had some very rude people tell me that "only children grow up *odd*" but that's it. My daughter has never asked for a little sibling.
That's out of the way.
The articles covering this were all given inflammatory headlines, because the media long ago learned that any statement about women, sex, and motherhood garners *all the attention*. But her treatment of the subject was so even handed that it was a little tedious sometimes. (Note for non-parents: It is a truism, when discussing parenthood, especially motherhood, that any choice you make is seen as an attack on anyone who doesn't make the exact same choice. And if you dare to list the reasons you made that choice, it's an open invitation to an argument.)
I found the hybrid memoir and scholarly book a little uneven to navigate at times. Her prose is clear and lovely, so you don't stumble on it, but I did have to hop-step sometimes on the swings from intensely personal domestic bliss ("w're in the dining room, drinking coffee and watching Dahlia improvise some ballet move to a Flaming Lips song") to dry academic ("When scientists conducted a meta-analysis of 115 studies comparing....").
All that said, the part of the book that works best is her careful and methodical debunking of the stereotype of the lonelyselfishmaladjusted (all one word) only child. She shows not only that there is a significant body of work that disproves this ridiculous notion, but also the deeply ingrained prejudice that makes researchers doubt their own findings.
Her focus on parental happiness is lovely, too.
When she steps away from the child-centric and into the sociological issues, she fares slightly less well. Each chapter -- on religion and fertility, feminism, the environment -- reads more like an introductory essay to what should be an entire book on the issue. To be fair, she wasn't writing those books, but I would have preferred a little more heft to those chapters, especially the compelling environmental case for only one child.
She makes up for this slight failing by including a nice listing of sources and books and studies at the end. Not the bibliography I wanted, mind you, but more than I was expecting.
Her worst fault, though, is that she's preaching to the choir, to me. She assumes her readers are all NPR-listening, kale-eating, college educated white people who live in cities. She makes little forays out into the other worlds -- most compelling are her visits to China and her discussions with the devout -- but she's there as a visitor. To be fair, she knows it and makes her acknowledged privileged status very clear, chapter after chapter. Hell, it's the *subject* of many chapters, at least in part. However, her complete lack of any black subjects except Condi Rice (that I noticed, I didn't take notes) is kind of an enormous and glaring problem.
Still, it's a nice introduction to some very complex issues which, frankly, all parents ought to consider before they even have ONE child, much less a second one. And it's a handy resource to refer someone to the next time some idiotic asshat tells me that I'm scarring my child because I didn't give her a sibling.
April 8, 2013
This is propaganda, pure and simple. Designed by the parent of an only child to make herself feel better about her choice by collecting countless positive (quantitative) studies to dismiss the negative only-child (qualitative) experiences of Sandler's friends and other interviewees, while debunking supposed stereotypes and replacing them with reasons why everyone should do as the Chinese do: have only one child, and in the process, shaming those that have more. In the end, I feel this is a biased, self-congratulatory piece of questionable value, of which I learned nothing new.
Talking about only children right now is highly relevant. Today, there's a continuing trend of having fewer children and there's a rise of only children in developed countries. This is due to high childcare costs, women deciding to have children later, lower fertility rates, the global recession, and economic pressure on families to have two working parents. This topic is in need of discussion so we can figure out how to handle a changing (decreasing) population and work out the advantages or disadvantages of being an only child in the twenty-first century. Sadly, Sandler neglects the disadvantages.
The too briefly described research Sandler refers to is troublesome as she relies upon large scale studies, one of which had 13,000 participants, leading me to question how much time was spent with each person, how accurate the data is when individual circumstances tend to be overlooked, and whether the conclusions drawn could be trusted. Few quantifiable results are quoted by Sandler, yet over and over again we're told only children are more intelligent, but when it's revealed this status only adds one to three IQ points, that assertion no longer seems quite so certain when the difference is so minimal. Are the other positive differences she quoted also as minimal?
As far as I could tell, none of these overwhelmingly positive studies actually asked the participants how they felt about being an only child, and when the author quoted interviews and asked her only-child friends, unhappy negatives start rearing their ugly heads. Some of the stereotypes Sandler has been aggressively attempting to quash are truisms among them, though she quickly whips out another positive study or two to devalue those cases. Belittling these personal negative experiences and dismissing them with positive research is unforgiveable, no matter how positive her own experiences as an only child, it denotes a lack of respect for others in favour of her own agenda. Sandler neglected to criticise the studies in the same way, which I'd expect if she was evaluating all the research fairly. By taking all of the research into consideration, one could conclude that things like intelligence and self-confidence go up (quantitative studies) while happiness goes down (qualitative interviews).
Yes, not all only children are selfish, lonely, spoilt and maladjusted - but some are, there's no point in denying it. And yes, it's more environmentally friendly to have one, and it's glaringly obvious one child will receive more resources like more money, time, space and attention from their parents than having to share with siblings. And they will benefit from those things, although how and how much they benefit will differ according to individual circumstances. However, other factors such as socialising with and being able to relate to their peers is important because spending too much time with adults can alienate them from their peer group. I'd argue attending school isn't enough, as Sandler suggests it is, proximity and access to other children outside school hours is necessary, too. Activities outside the home and exercise are other factors to consider as I'd postulate that those who do these socialise more with a variety of people, rather than with just their parents.
On and on, Sandler repeatedly preaches her 'only children are more intelligent and prosperous' mantra, and cherry picks famous onlies and cites the 1979 Chinese One-Child policy for their recent economic improvement to back up her claims, which is more than a little reductive, if you ask me. Really, Sandler's subtitle should be, 'Why You Must Have an Only Child, and Why Being One Can Make You Smart and Successful' . However, upon closer inspection those famous people and Chinese case studies all had pushy parents who provided strict educational schedules for their children lasting from the minute they woke up to bedtime, thereby surpassing the norm for the average child whether they had siblings or not. Most Chinese can't afford more than one child anyway, but rather than just a wish for their child to have it better than themselves, I started to wonder if there was an air of competition between parents to make their child successful, or whether it was to improve their retirement as it's tradition to move in with their child and care for their grandchildren when they reach that age. There's also the enormous pressure on that single child to perform and succeed so they're able to provide for both their parents when the time comes. In any case, you could argue privilege gives these children opportunities to prosper because their parents have clearly invested a substantial amount of time and effort, regardless of finances, and are able to reap the rewards.
Full disclosure here, I'm an only child, and one with negative experiences. Sandler would hate me because I don't conform to her views. As one stereotype goes, I was late to walk and talk, but my reading level was years ahead of my peers. Early schooling taught me that being an only set me apart as teachers frequently asked us to talk or write about our siblings and pets - I had neither, and that made me feel like I had and experienced less than everyone else. Despite many children living on my street, they were all a year or more younger though I made the best of it, still experiencing loneliness on the dark, cold, rainy winter days, of which there are many in the UK. Unfortunately, when I was seven we moved 100 miles away to where no children lived near me. Cue more loneliness and a growing preference for the company of older children (usually by several years) and adults. I've never been comfortable with those of a similar age to myself; school was hell - I frequently truanted in my teens, and age 18 onwards my friends have been more than 10 years older than me. I'll also confess that I'm selfish, but only children can hardly claim the monopoly on that trait. And hey, I was spoilt as far as toys, clothes and my mother's attention were concerned. I was lucky.
When I think of others I've known who are onlies, most them also had negative experiences for a variety of reasons, but one thing was very clear: they fit into two types. Some were able to cope or be happy in their own company, and others weren't and would do anything to avoid it. Before reading, I had wondered if being an only child meant there was an increased likelihood of becoming an introvert, which would feed into Susan Cain's Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking, and because of this I've been comparing the two books. They don't compare. Cain, despite being an introvert, manages to confer balance when discussing her subject matter by acknowledging both positives and negatives of being such, and Sandler as an only child fails in this. Her bias is so pronounced it's impossible to draw parallels when I can't trust her interpretations of her much vaunted sociological studies.
A monumentally bad first impression was made after reading the opening chapter. I should've gone with my instincts and discontinued reading then. That chapter was the most biased, one-sided diatribe against negative stereotypes associated with being an only child, never stopping to consider that there may be some truth to them for some or allow for other aspects that, in tandem with being an only child, could produce those stereotypes. Challenging myself to read on was a mistake, and I've struggled to finish. Currently stuck @ 41%.
Only children may find they know about most of what is discussed but could find parts of it insulting. Everyone else on the other hand, may find One and Only informative and helpful, or offensive and upsetting if they've chosen to have more than one child themselves.
*eARC provided by the publisher in return for an honest review.
Talking about only children right now is highly relevant. Today, there's a continuing trend of having fewer children and there's a rise of only children in developed countries. This is due to high childcare costs, women deciding to have children later, lower fertility rates, the global recession, and economic pressure on families to have two working parents. This topic is in need of discussion so we can figure out how to handle a changing (decreasing) population and work out the advantages or disadvantages of being an only child in the twenty-first century. Sadly, Sandler neglects the disadvantages.
The too briefly described research Sandler refers to is troublesome as she relies upon large scale studies, one of which had 13,000 participants, leading me to question how much time was spent with each person, how accurate the data is when individual circumstances tend to be overlooked, and whether the conclusions drawn could be trusted. Few quantifiable results are quoted by Sandler, yet over and over again we're told only children are more intelligent, but when it's revealed this status only adds one to three IQ points, that assertion no longer seems quite so certain when the difference is so minimal. Are the other positive differences she quoted also as minimal?
As far as I could tell, none of these overwhelmingly positive studies actually asked the participants how they felt about being an only child, and when the author quoted interviews and asked her only-child friends, unhappy negatives start rearing their ugly heads. Some of the stereotypes Sandler has been aggressively attempting to quash are truisms among them, though she quickly whips out another positive study or two to devalue those cases. Belittling these personal negative experiences and dismissing them with positive research is unforgiveable, no matter how positive her own experiences as an only child, it denotes a lack of respect for others in favour of her own agenda. Sandler neglected to criticise the studies in the same way, which I'd expect if she was evaluating all the research fairly. By taking all of the research into consideration, one could conclude that things like intelligence and self-confidence go up (quantitative studies) while happiness goes down (qualitative interviews).
Yes, not all only children are selfish, lonely, spoilt and maladjusted - but some are, there's no point in denying it. And yes, it's more environmentally friendly to have one, and it's glaringly obvious one child will receive more resources like more money, time, space and attention from their parents than having to share with siblings. And they will benefit from those things, although how and how much they benefit will differ according to individual circumstances. However, other factors such as socialising with and being able to relate to their peers is important because spending too much time with adults can alienate them from their peer group. I'd argue attending school isn't enough, as Sandler suggests it is, proximity and access to other children outside school hours is necessary, too. Activities outside the home and exercise are other factors to consider as I'd postulate that those who do these socialise more with a variety of people, rather than with just their parents.
On and on, Sandler repeatedly preaches her 'only children are more intelligent and prosperous' mantra, and cherry picks famous onlies and cites the 1979 Chinese One-Child policy for their recent economic improvement to back up her claims, which is more than a little reductive, if you ask me. Really, Sandler's subtitle should be, 'Why You Must Have an Only Child, and Why Being One Can Make You Smart and Successful' . However, upon closer inspection those famous people and Chinese case studies all had pushy parents who provided strict educational schedules for their children lasting from the minute they woke up to bedtime, thereby surpassing the norm for the average child whether they had siblings or not. Most Chinese can't afford more than one child anyway, but rather than just a wish for their child to have it better than themselves, I started to wonder if there was an air of competition between parents to make their child successful, or whether it was to improve their retirement as it's tradition to move in with their child and care for their grandchildren when they reach that age. There's also the enormous pressure on that single child to perform and succeed so they're able to provide for both their parents when the time comes. In any case, you could argue privilege gives these children opportunities to prosper because their parents have clearly invested a substantial amount of time and effort, regardless of finances, and are able to reap the rewards.
Full disclosure here, I'm an only child, and one with negative experiences. Sandler would hate me because I don't conform to her views. As one stereotype goes, I was late to walk and talk, but my reading level was years ahead of my peers. Early schooling taught me that being an only set me apart as teachers frequently asked us to talk or write about our siblings and pets - I had neither, and that made me feel like I had and experienced less than everyone else. Despite many children living on my street, they were all a year or more younger though I made the best of it, still experiencing loneliness on the dark, cold, rainy winter days, of which there are many in the UK. Unfortunately, when I was seven we moved 100 miles away to where no children lived near me. Cue more loneliness and a growing preference for the company of older children (usually by several years) and adults. I've never been comfortable with those of a similar age to myself; school was hell - I frequently truanted in my teens, and age 18 onwards my friends have been more than 10 years older than me. I'll also confess that I'm selfish, but only children can hardly claim the monopoly on that trait. And hey, I was spoilt as far as toys, clothes and my mother's attention were concerned. I was lucky.
When I think of others I've known who are onlies, most them also had negative experiences for a variety of reasons, but one thing was very clear: they fit into two types. Some were able to cope or be happy in their own company, and others weren't and would do anything to avoid it. Before reading, I had wondered if being an only child meant there was an increased likelihood of becoming an introvert, which would feed into Susan Cain's Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking, and because of this I've been comparing the two books. They don't compare. Cain, despite being an introvert, manages to confer balance when discussing her subject matter by acknowledging both positives and negatives of being such, and Sandler as an only child fails in this. Her bias is so pronounced it's impossible to draw parallels when I can't trust her interpretations of her much vaunted sociological studies.
A monumentally bad first impression was made after reading the opening chapter. I should've gone with my instincts and discontinued reading then. That chapter was the most biased, one-sided diatribe against negative stereotypes associated with being an only child, never stopping to consider that there may be some truth to them for some or allow for other aspects that, in tandem with being an only child, could produce those stereotypes. Challenging myself to read on was a mistake, and I've struggled to finish. Currently stuck @ 41%.
Only children may find they know about most of what is discussed but could find parts of it insulting. Everyone else on the other hand, may find One and Only informative and helpful, or offensive and upsetting if they've chosen to have more than one child themselves.
*eARC provided by the publisher in return for an honest review.
March 27, 2014
When I was younger, I thought I would have a brood of eight children. Maybe I picked eight because it is my lucky number or maybe it was completely arbitrary, but I was then so enamored with the state of papahood that I knew, simply, I wanted to have several children. By the time I got married at 25, I was more realistic, looking forward to only 3 or 4. When my wife and I experienced infertility and the chance of being a father in any capacity seemed to diminish slowly but steadily, I think my wiring was altered.
When Jude miraculously materialized in 2012, I was not only elated beyond belief, but even at that very time, a part of me wondered if it took so long to make this one, what were the chances of a second? Almost two years later, I am deeply in love with my son and our family of three, but also so utterly exhausted most of the time, that I wonder if he should be our only one. It feels wrong to say it, but I sometimes wonder if I'm only going to continue to lose bits of myself as parenting continues. And what does this say about me and my love for my son that I can admit this?
So when I stumbled across this book at a local bookstore, I was hoping to find my feelings and experiences echoed in its pages--and hopefully, too, some validation for feeling overwhelmed, guilty, conflicted, and sometimes just not good enough. It turns out Lauren Sandler's book was exactly what I needed. One and Only is not a memoir nor diatribe, but a cultural critique and sharp reflection. And as such, it has several outside sources that she boxes with and builds upon. Although she flat out says her book is not an argument for why couples should stop at one child, she sure makes a compelling case all the same. It felt great to see arguments I have personally made (about overpopulation, about community vs. cocoonism, etc.) spun together so well into one modern volume and then see others extended upon to only make my own argument stronger. Around Chapter Five, the book spoke to me most. From then on, I couldn't stop reading the book.
Her audience is a certain type of parent or would-be parent. For this reader, I was pleasantly pleased to see an honest and clear portrayal of modern feminist thought in action. (Go feminist moms and dads!) Others, though, will bristle at some of her perspectives. Yet this is exactly her point: Can we just stop with the generalizing? Only children aren't all the same and neither are all parents, so why expect everyone to fit into little boxes? And can we value our children and ourselves enough to think as hard about having a second child as we do about parenting them? That there are oodles of literature about the raising of children and very little about the actual decision of having multiples speaks volumes in and of itself. Sandler points out so many of the gender, cultural, economic and even environmental factors that come into play with each new bundle of joy that enters a home, that I find her very thorough and her book very valuable.
Just days before I began One and Only, I was speaking with a friend and she said that her friends she knew who never had children just have a sort of immaturity about them. She said, "It is like they are their own children." After raising an eyebrow and waiting a second, I realized what she said was actually really lovely--and I think Sandler would agree. We hardworking parents have to remember that just because we have a kid or kids to take care of and love deeply, we are still our own children, too, and we have a responsibility to ourselves and our brood to continue to demonstrate self-actualization and love of our community, our jobs, our partners, and our lives.
When Jude miraculously materialized in 2012, I was not only elated beyond belief, but even at that very time, a part of me wondered if it took so long to make this one, what were the chances of a second? Almost two years later, I am deeply in love with my son and our family of three, but also so utterly exhausted most of the time, that I wonder if he should be our only one. It feels wrong to say it, but I sometimes wonder if I'm only going to continue to lose bits of myself as parenting continues. And what does this say about me and my love for my son that I can admit this?
So when I stumbled across this book at a local bookstore, I was hoping to find my feelings and experiences echoed in its pages--and hopefully, too, some validation for feeling overwhelmed, guilty, conflicted, and sometimes just not good enough. It turns out Lauren Sandler's book was exactly what I needed. One and Only is not a memoir nor diatribe, but a cultural critique and sharp reflection. And as such, it has several outside sources that she boxes with and builds upon. Although she flat out says her book is not an argument for why couples should stop at one child, she sure makes a compelling case all the same. It felt great to see arguments I have personally made (about overpopulation, about community vs. cocoonism, etc.) spun together so well into one modern volume and then see others extended upon to only make my own argument stronger. Around Chapter Five, the book spoke to me most. From then on, I couldn't stop reading the book.
Her audience is a certain type of parent or would-be parent. For this reader, I was pleasantly pleased to see an honest and clear portrayal of modern feminist thought in action. (Go feminist moms and dads!) Others, though, will bristle at some of her perspectives. Yet this is exactly her point: Can we just stop with the generalizing? Only children aren't all the same and neither are all parents, so why expect everyone to fit into little boxes? And can we value our children and ourselves enough to think as hard about having a second child as we do about parenting them? That there are oodles of literature about the raising of children and very little about the actual decision of having multiples speaks volumes in and of itself. Sandler points out so many of the gender, cultural, economic and even environmental factors that come into play with each new bundle of joy that enters a home, that I find her very thorough and her book very valuable.
Just days before I began One and Only, I was speaking with a friend and she said that her friends she knew who never had children just have a sort of immaturity about them. She said, "It is like they are their own children." After raising an eyebrow and waiting a second, I realized what she said was actually really lovely--and I think Sandler would agree. We hardworking parents have to remember that just because we have a kid or kids to take care of and love deeply, we are still our own children, too, and we have a responsibility to ourselves and our brood to continue to demonstrate self-actualization and love of our community, our jobs, our partners, and our lives.
February 2, 2015
My experience of this book can be best summed up by the author's own words in the last chapter:
This is book most of us will only pick up if we're already 90% there on having an only child, whether by choice or by circumstance. If that's you, you're understandably concerned about whether you can raise an only child into a good person. In the culture of the United States, there's a social understanding of the only child: a spoiled, selfish, maladjusted "mama's boy" or "daddy's girl" type of kid. If you're there, go ahead and pick up this book. I think it will help.
There's enough research and numbers to reassure me that not only is it possible to raise an only child into a good person, it might actually be better for the child. That's what I wanted to know, so I'm glad I read it. However, as the author stated in the quote above, there's an emotional struggle that goes beyond the numbers, and I just have to hope that as the research settles into my brain it will seep down to emotions.
Speaking of that research, here's Sandler's excuse for a bibliography, which is nothing short of baffling to me. If I had consulted as many sources as she did, conducted as many interviews, I'd want to compile it all in one place! I'd want you to bow to the might of my research prowess! Instead, she offers this:
That's just sloppy and lazy and calls into question the credibility of the entire book for me.
Finally, there's one issue that Sandler brought up in the beginning but never came back to, and it happens to be one of my biggest concerns of having an only child so I really wish she'd put some effort into it: the only child as an adult with aging parents or no parents. I've watched my mother deal with end-of-life care and decisions for 4 elderly family members over the last few years, and even with clear instructions and documentation from the people concerned, there's nothing easy about being the one to make the call. I don't know what it would have been like for her without her sister to talk to and cry with and gut-check with, and I don't want to sentence my son to that. I wish that Sandler had dug into that, especially since she mentioned it in the beginning of the book.
All that said, I'm glad I read it because I emotionally needed someone to pat me on the shoulder and say this was going to be ok. But I'm disappointed that what could have been a five star book didn't do better.
Despite all the rational information that supports my reluctance to have another kid, all the research demonstrating that only children are fine, all the data suggesting the additional sacrifices another kid would require, making the choice not to have another child is still fraught with conflict. It's an emotional struggle that, it turns out, no set of numbers and analysis can erase.
This is book most of us will only pick up if we're already 90% there on having an only child, whether by choice or by circumstance. If that's you, you're understandably concerned about whether you can raise an only child into a good person. In the culture of the United States, there's a social understanding of the only child: a spoiled, selfish, maladjusted "mama's boy" or "daddy's girl" type of kid. If you're there, go ahead and pick up this book. I think it will help.
There's enough research and numbers to reassure me that not only is it possible to raise an only child into a good person, it might actually be better for the child. That's what I wanted to know, so I'm glad I read it. However, as the author stated in the quote above, there's an emotional struggle that goes beyond the numbers, and I just have to hope that as the research settles into my brain it will seep down to emotions.
Speaking of that research, here's Sandler's excuse for a bibliography, which is nothing short of baffling to me. If I had consulted as many sources as she did, conducted as many interviews, I'd want to compile it all in one place! I'd want you to bow to the might of my research prowess! Instead, she offers this:
Throughout this book, I cited specific sources for data, so you would know in context where I was getting my information. That said, I wanted to offer a sketch of some important works I consulted, a brief tour through my binders and bookshelves.
That's just sloppy and lazy and calls into question the credibility of the entire book for me.
Finally, there's one issue that Sandler brought up in the beginning but never came back to, and it happens to be one of my biggest concerns of having an only child so I really wish she'd put some effort into it: the only child as an adult with aging parents or no parents. I've watched my mother deal with end-of-life care and decisions for 4 elderly family members over the last few years, and even with clear instructions and documentation from the people concerned, there's nothing easy about being the one to make the call. I don't know what it would have been like for her without her sister to talk to and cry with and gut-check with, and I don't want to sentence my son to that. I wish that Sandler had dug into that, especially since she mentioned it in the beginning of the book.
All that said, I'm glad I read it because I emotionally needed someone to pat me on the shoulder and say this was going to be ok. But I'm disappointed that what could have been a five star book didn't do better.
March 2, 2014
Really enjoyed reading the quotes from various researchers on the "only child" issue. I knew I'd have just one child while I was pregnant for my son. Loved it, but follow the "one and done" motto. Having him fulfilled my desire to be a mother. Having a goal and then achieving it doesn't have to lead to more of the same goal. I ran a marathon in my 20s and had no desire to run another one. It's just that simple! I would love to have my son as a baby again, but no way would I want a different baby. My mother often told me she gave up her life to have kids. I made the decision to have a life AND to also be a mother. It was a joint decision w/ my husband and it was right for us. Having none, one, or multiple kids is a personal choice and no one has any right to dictate that choice. There is no "right way" regarding having or not having children. I'm extremely proud of the young man my son has turned out to be, the amazing career I enjoy, and the wonderful 17 year marriage I have. Having one child has enabled all of this b/c of the type of person I am and knowing one's limitations is a good thing! Me with multiple children just wouldn't work nor would it be pretty...just ask my husband or son. I'd be a basket case for sure!!! I say it proudly to whomever asks: ONE & DONE!
November 30, 2013
I picked this book up out of curiosity -- in full disclosure, I'm not the book's intended audience, as I have nine children, not one. But I was curious about the research the author might have done into the subject, and as a graduate in Family Sciences, I'm always up for delving into social sciences and research.
Unfortunately, this book was very soft on science and Sandler was quite biased in her interpretation of what research she did bring out, making a huge deal of very slight differences in some studies that showed that only children do slightly better in certain areas than singletons while dismissing other studies out of hand. Some of the studies cited also had some very limiting parameters. In one place, I found it ironic that right after discussing how only children tend to internalize the pain of their parents' divorce or other trauma, feeling responsible for sparing the parent's feelings without a sibling to share the burden, Sandler then relied on a study that showed that only children supposedly do better after divorce than those with siblings, citing a study that relied on what parents reported of how their children were doing. Hmmmm.
She brings up population science and the fact that most of the developing world is below population replacement in almost an "aside" matter, then quickly dismisses its implications, while then spending an entire chapter talking about carbon footprints and declaring authoritatively, "The more children we have, the more we speed up the earth's destruction" as if that's established science. Later on, she gleefully notes that if everyone had just one child, our world's population would be just a third of what it is today in just one hundred years, as if that would be a good thing for our economies and our societies. Her willful ignorance and refusal to consider scholar's opinions when they disagree with her is disappointing in one who calls herself a journalist.
Her reliance on anecdotes and reports from her friends is hardly good scholarship, though it does advance interesting issues. One thing that was quite unappealing was her elaberations on the lists of famous and/or accomplished people who were only children and how that must have made them successful. Sure, but how easy would it be for anyone to come up with a list of famous people with a sibling or famous people with lots of siblings to counter her list?
Another flaw in the book was its constant navel-gazing. Sandler writes over and over about her own experiences as a mother to a singleton, her own angst and worry and concern, the comments of others, etc, etc, etc. Frankly, by the end of the book it got repetitive and boring. An engaging memoir, this was not. Basically, some of it sounded simply like the whining of a deeply conflicted woman, trying to explain how she isn't being selfish to have just one, she's actually saving the planet! She's allowing herself the freedom to self-actualize, to pursue causes and to change the world. We also get a really wonderful segway into her thoughts about how much she supports her own right to have an abortion yet feels conflicted because after her daughter's birth, she realizes what an unaborted fetus might become, but still she is fighting the cause of a woman's right to freedom and right to choose . . . yeah, trying to wrap my head around her reasoning was inconceivable, but then, I'm just one of those people she constantly sneers at in the book.
Which brings me to the book's fatal flaw: Lauren Sandler is supposedly a champion of liberal enlightenment, of self-actualization and choice, of freedom to pursue whatever lifestyle you desire, up to and until she starts talking about people who choose something different than her -- oh sure, she seems a little less judgmental of those who have two or three children, but anything more than that is cause for sneering comments. The Duggars, people of faith who have children for religious reasons, even Al Gore and his "four-child family's aggregate carbon footprint" are a cause for sneers. She writes with an "us-vs-them" mentality towards those who are more fertile. She's enlightened and free, while those with faith are derided. She writes of a bi-polar America, one free and enlightened and not pro-creating, and another backward, conservative, and having faith. She is singularly shallow when she writes of talking with those who have faith, dismissing whatever happiness they derive from their children (and it is quantifiable according to research) to the fact that they have a support system who bring them casseroles when they have new babies and not to any inherent happiness that having children or faith might bring. But her attitude is hardly surprising, given the prejudice she shows in this declaration: "And so we have one America with the values and birthrates of the developed world, and another with the values and birthrates of a society we evolved beyond generations ago." It's easy to see who is "evolved" and who is not in her view. It's too bad that such a liberal-minded thinker couldn't manage to treat with a little bit of tolerance and open-mindedness those who have more children than she deems appropriate.
Also subject to her judgments are women who choose to stay home with their kids, especially those with advanced degrees who waste their educations and become dependent on a man in the process of taking care of their children.
Still, the book did bring up a lot of issues that deserve more in-depth understanding and that I've read quite a bit about. I was surprised at the information about China and how in one generation, it has become the preference to have one child because it is too expensive to have more and it is considered selfish to do so.
I did find some things very interesting about the book. One is this quote on page 179, right after she discusses how people like herself (liberal, enlightened, evolved, remember?) are breeding themselves out of existence. She asks a scholar, "'Should my desire to defend Enlightment values and a secular future for my kid lead me to have another one?' . . . He grins at me and laughs. 'That's adorable,' he says. Of course, none of us secularists breed to change the world. We'd need faith to do that."
I also thought it was interesting that a paper in 1981 found that "only 4 percent of singletons fall into the category of people who say that religion has a very important role in their lives. 'It is the unique quality of being an only,' she writes, 'which contributes to smaller family size goals, and greater secularism.'"
I also found it interesting that the author quoted Alice Walker's advice several times, making me wonder if she'd never happened to read this: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/art...
Unfortunately, this book was very soft on science and Sandler was quite biased in her interpretation of what research she did bring out, making a huge deal of very slight differences in some studies that showed that only children do slightly better in certain areas than singletons while dismissing other studies out of hand. Some of the studies cited also had some very limiting parameters. In one place, I found it ironic that right after discussing how only children tend to internalize the pain of their parents' divorce or other trauma, feeling responsible for sparing the parent's feelings without a sibling to share the burden, Sandler then relied on a study that showed that only children supposedly do better after divorce than those with siblings, citing a study that relied on what parents reported of how their children were doing. Hmmmm.
She brings up population science and the fact that most of the developing world is below population replacement in almost an "aside" matter, then quickly dismisses its implications, while then spending an entire chapter talking about carbon footprints and declaring authoritatively, "The more children we have, the more we speed up the earth's destruction" as if that's established science. Later on, she gleefully notes that if everyone had just one child, our world's population would be just a third of what it is today in just one hundred years, as if that would be a good thing for our economies and our societies. Her willful ignorance and refusal to consider scholar's opinions when they disagree with her is disappointing in one who calls herself a journalist.
Her reliance on anecdotes and reports from her friends is hardly good scholarship, though it does advance interesting issues. One thing that was quite unappealing was her elaberations on the lists of famous and/or accomplished people who were only children and how that must have made them successful. Sure, but how easy would it be for anyone to come up with a list of famous people with a sibling or famous people with lots of siblings to counter her list?
Another flaw in the book was its constant navel-gazing. Sandler writes over and over about her own experiences as a mother to a singleton, her own angst and worry and concern, the comments of others, etc, etc, etc. Frankly, by the end of the book it got repetitive and boring. An engaging memoir, this was not. Basically, some of it sounded simply like the whining of a deeply conflicted woman, trying to explain how she isn't being selfish to have just one, she's actually saving the planet! She's allowing herself the freedom to self-actualize, to pursue causes and to change the world. We also get a really wonderful segway into her thoughts about how much she supports her own right to have an abortion yet feels conflicted because after her daughter's birth, she realizes what an unaborted fetus might become, but still she is fighting the cause of a woman's right to freedom and right to choose . . . yeah, trying to wrap my head around her reasoning was inconceivable, but then, I'm just one of those people she constantly sneers at in the book.
Which brings me to the book's fatal flaw: Lauren Sandler is supposedly a champion of liberal enlightenment, of self-actualization and choice, of freedom to pursue whatever lifestyle you desire, up to and until she starts talking about people who choose something different than her -- oh sure, she seems a little less judgmental of those who have two or three children, but anything more than that is cause for sneering comments. The Duggars, people of faith who have children for religious reasons, even Al Gore and his "four-child family's aggregate carbon footprint" are a cause for sneers. She writes with an "us-vs-them" mentality towards those who are more fertile. She's enlightened and free, while those with faith are derided. She writes of a bi-polar America, one free and enlightened and not pro-creating, and another backward, conservative, and having faith. She is singularly shallow when she writes of talking with those who have faith, dismissing whatever happiness they derive from their children (and it is quantifiable according to research) to the fact that they have a support system who bring them casseroles when they have new babies and not to any inherent happiness that having children or faith might bring. But her attitude is hardly surprising, given the prejudice she shows in this declaration: "And so we have one America with the values and birthrates of the developed world, and another with the values and birthrates of a society we evolved beyond generations ago." It's easy to see who is "evolved" and who is not in her view. It's too bad that such a liberal-minded thinker couldn't manage to treat with a little bit of tolerance and open-mindedness those who have more children than she deems appropriate.
Also subject to her judgments are women who choose to stay home with their kids, especially those with advanced degrees who waste their educations and become dependent on a man in the process of taking care of their children.
Still, the book did bring up a lot of issues that deserve more in-depth understanding and that I've read quite a bit about. I was surprised at the information about China and how in one generation, it has become the preference to have one child because it is too expensive to have more and it is considered selfish to do so.
I did find some things very interesting about the book. One is this quote on page 179, right after she discusses how people like herself (liberal, enlightened, evolved, remember?) are breeding themselves out of existence. She asks a scholar, "'Should my desire to defend Enlightment values and a secular future for my kid lead me to have another one?' . . . He grins at me and laughs. 'That's adorable,' he says. Of course, none of us secularists breed to change the world. We'd need faith to do that."
I also thought it was interesting that a paper in 1981 found that "only 4 percent of singletons fall into the category of people who say that religion has a very important role in their lives. 'It is the unique quality of being an only,' she writes, 'which contributes to smaller family size goals, and greater secularism.'"
I also found it interesting that the author quoted Alice Walker's advice several times, making me wonder if she'd never happened to read this: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/art...
October 7, 2024
While I've never sought any kind of validation for being an only and, so far, thinking that I'd want an only--Lauren Sandler confirms what I've always been thinking: It's awesome being an only child. I can admit that some of the chapters were inundated with information to the point of tedium, yet it didn't stop me from going through the pages eager to hear the next story about how yet another only "turned out ok." Sandler also put me on to a lot of great articles in her book. I'd say it's worth reading and even more worth thinking about.
September 30, 2022
After many decades of only child stereotypes dominating, research in recent years has shown that not only are the only children alright, they're thriving. This rounds up a lot of that positivity one space and is an interesting read. I agreed with the author's POV that having a second child should be about the parents desiring another, not to be "for" the existing child. Because the existing child doesn't need a sibling (and the benefits to said child are variable).
August 8, 2013
I was a little disappointed in this one. I'm in the process of coming to terms with the fact that my son will likely be an only child, so I've been reading through a variety of books on the subject of parenting only children. I enjoyed Lauren Sandler's previous book, so I was excited when this one came out this spring.
The material was interesting (after all, I'm seeking out justification to soothe my own irrational guilt), but it felt like a book that just couldn't decide what it wanted to be. It wasn't a memoir, and it wasn't totally nonfiction. The author's personal experiences were scattered in with interviews and reviews of research, making things feel a bit disjointed. I think the book would have been stronger as a "pure" memoir, or more research-focused with some sort of framing device for the personal anecdotes.
The material was interesting (after all, I'm seeking out justification to soothe my own irrational guilt), but it felt like a book that just couldn't decide what it wanted to be. It wasn't a memoir, and it wasn't totally nonfiction. The author's personal experiences were scattered in with interviews and reviews of research, making things feel a bit disjointed. I think the book would have been stronger as a "pure" memoir, or more research-focused with some sort of framing device for the personal anecdotes.
August 7, 2015
Apparently I've never had a problem being an only child.....sure, I got the whole, "Oh you're so lucky, you get anything you want/you don't have to share...". Firstly, I did NOT get everything I wanted - but I MOSTLY got what I wanted and no, I didn't have to share and I must be honest - I liked it. Something that most people don't include....I also received ALL of the blame (yes, I did try to divert attention from myself to pets but sadly, that never seemed to work).....and I did feel that ALL of the hopes & efforts were pile on me and there was a HUGE air of expectation that I felt during a lot of childhood. I learned to be totally ok with being alone and I've found there are some people out there who can't STAND to be by themselves.....I don't understand that and I feel badly for them. Undiluted Resources.....huh, never realized that's what my husband was all about when he championed the idea of having an only child. While it wasn't completely planned, I'm pretty delighted with my only child - I hope she's as happy with BEING a singleton.
Good book - I would imagine it would be quite insightful for most readers.
Good book - I would imagine it would be quite insightful for most readers.
April 27, 2015
As an only child who has lost a sibling, I really wanted this book. I thought that the facts she brought up were ones I have always known existed but hadn't done the research Sandler has done to back it all up. Reading it felt more like a memoir then a book of facts about only children even though the end she says it isn't a memoir. So much of her personal experience and baggage is woven into the book that it is hard to distinguish her experiences. The biggest downside to this is that she expresses the same bias which she seems to have experienced. Although I agree with her about that there should be more tolerance and support for families of onlies (especially people who only want one), she is extraordinarily nasty about families with many children. I am glad I was able to read her and I hope that more people research this topic more in depth
November 4, 2018
One and Only: The Freedom of Having an Only Child, and the Joy of Being One is an excellent book. Lauren Sandler interviewed a wide range of people and professionals from all over the world, looked at studies, and shared some personal experiences of having and being an only child.
January 2, 2022
This is going to be an opus, be prepared ha! So I saw this book recommended in a Facebook group I'm in for parents of "onlies" (or singletons, as they're referred to in this book). It's part memoir, part research based, part humorous. Now, a little background on myself. When I was 18 I thought I would be married and have my first baby by 22, with at least 3 more on the way. I was going to marry my boyfriend at the time and we would live happily ever after. Fast forward to getting married at 33 (NOT to my boyfriend from 15 years prior) and having our daughter 2 months shy of my 36th birthday, which made me out to be a "woman of a certain age" commonly referred to as "advanced maternal age" or better yet - I had a geriatric pregnancy. Neither term actually bothered me, as I was healthy and at least "looked" younger than my 35 years. I was still in the frame of mind that I wanted childREN. Plural. But then something crazy happened. Looking back on my (extremely) easy pregnancy and childbirth, and the fact that I truly had a really good baby......the thought of tempting fate with another pregnancy/childbirth/possible demon child made me rethink my drink. I don't remember when exactly I had decided that we were "one and done" but it was within the first year of S's life. While obviously not a perfect first year (and you truly remember mostly the good stuff otherwise you'd never have more than one kid), it was such a wonderful time for us all and the love I felt for her was sooooooooooo frigging tremendous, I couldn't even imagine loving another child as much as I loved her. When I told my husband that I didn't want any more kids, his response was pretty much "Cool. The Bear's pretty great." (That's her nickname for those who don't know) And the decision was made. BUT I continually doubt myself and our decision. Will she be spoiled? What happens when we get old and there's no one to help her with US? Will she be able to make friends and share and know what it's like to cooperate? To this day, at times I wonder if our decision was "wrong" in some way. Now, while I'm not an only child myself, I took to heart the research and interviews Lauren did while writing this book. Below are (A LOT) of excerpts that stood out to me.
"As parents who stop at one, we have to get used to the nagging feeling that we are choosing for our own children something they can never undo."
along the same lines - "First children tend to be a choice parents make to fulfill their own lives and a second child tends to be a choice parents make to fulfill the life of their existing child."
"We ask when people are having KIDS. never A KID, never one at a time, which is how it usually happens."
"If I choose not to give my daughter the sibling the world believes she is owed - whether or not she wants one - that means I am asking her to live as I wish her to live."
From an interview with a professor of family studies - "I still think only children may have a disadvantage, and it explains why they tend to squabble with their parents *instead of a sibling."
"One of the most special things about having an only child is you can eat her up every day without having to think that much about expressing these things fairly to each child." - this speaks to me on so many levels
Coming from a parent of three - "I had three sons and I'm glad they're brothers. One of the most enjoyable things I did as a parent was to watch my kids interact with one another, hanging out, seeing them interact as adults." - she gets many different perspectives throughout the book, it's not entirely one sided.
"Each child is an additional source of pride, sure, but also an additional infringement on freedom, privacy, and patience."
University of Pennsylvania professor Samuel Preston discovered in his research that parents fell so madly in love with their first child that they WANTED a second. - this is oddly enough one of the reasons why I DIDN'T want a second.
"Why am I in traffic on Rockville Pike going to a Chuck E. Cheese birthday party for my whole Saturday? Because if everyone else's kid is doing it, your kid has to too." There's an entire paragraph about what parents need to do/try to do to give their kids as many advantages as possible.
Along the same lines as the excerpt above - She references Mad Men and how Betty Draper barks "Sally, go watch TV!" more than any other line in the show, and how in current times you can hardly find a mother who is comfortable putting her kid in front of the tv instead of "embarking upon a craft project using post-consumer waste materials or heading out to a sustainable farm-to-table class with her kid."
According to the USDA, a child born in 2010 (mine was born in 2013) will cost an average of $226,920 to raise until the age of 18 (not counting college) and that the price of raising children is rising at a higher rate than inflation.
"Two parent households with 2 children devote over 1/3 of their income to kids. The average family living in poverty pays 40% of their income to cover childcare, meanwhile parents over the poverty line shell out 7% of their wages.
"In one person's lifetime, they are responsible for 3.1 millions pounds of CO2, 23 million pounds of water waste and more than 7 thousand pounds of food waste. Each day the world expands by the population of Toronto. Each baby born in the US will add about 300x more carbon dioxide to the earth's atmosphere than every baby born in Ethiopia." - There's a whole lot more regarding the overpopulation of the planet and how it's destroying our environment, but she also discusses how devastating it would be to our future if the population was significantly lowered as well. Kind of a lose/lose situation. This was a real feel good chapter lol
The most poignant part of the book for me actually comes from Tina Fey - "Do I want another baby? Or do I just want to turn back time and have my daughter be a baby again?" THIS. LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, THIS IS WHAT I WANT. Every second of every video that comes up in my time hop, or photo of a teeny tiny Bear, I wish wish wish wish I could go back to that time with her. Do I want another child? No, honestly and truly no. Not even a little bit. But do I want to relive all her moments that are just memories now? Every single one of them. There are a lot of factors that were involved in our decision to have just one - our ages, our finances, our living space (or lack there of). I could go into more detail regarding each of them, but I've gone on long enough. Do I still worry about who will be there for her when we're gone? More often than I'd like, yes. But being able to give all we can to her, and only her was a driving force in our decision.
I think the most important line in the entire book is the following - "If I can choose to stop at one, that's not a referendum on anyone's choice not to. The whole point is to live the life you want."
And I will end my Stephen King sized post with that.
"As parents who stop at one, we have to get used to the nagging feeling that we are choosing for our own children something they can never undo."
along the same lines - "First children tend to be a choice parents make to fulfill their own lives and a second child tends to be a choice parents make to fulfill the life of their existing child."
"We ask when people are having KIDS. never A KID, never one at a time, which is how it usually happens."
"If I choose not to give my daughter the sibling the world believes she is owed - whether or not she wants one - that means I am asking her to live as I wish her to live."
From an interview with a professor of family studies - "I still think only children may have a disadvantage, and it explains why they tend to squabble with their parents *instead of a sibling."
"One of the most special things about having an only child is you can eat her up every day without having to think that much about expressing these things fairly to each child." - this speaks to me on so many levels
Coming from a parent of three - "I had three sons and I'm glad they're brothers. One of the most enjoyable things I did as a parent was to watch my kids interact with one another, hanging out, seeing them interact as adults." - she gets many different perspectives throughout the book, it's not entirely one sided.
"Each child is an additional source of pride, sure, but also an additional infringement on freedom, privacy, and patience."
University of Pennsylvania professor Samuel Preston discovered in his research that parents fell so madly in love with their first child that they WANTED a second. - this is oddly enough one of the reasons why I DIDN'T want a second.
"Why am I in traffic on Rockville Pike going to a Chuck E. Cheese birthday party for my whole Saturday? Because if everyone else's kid is doing it, your kid has to too." There's an entire paragraph about what parents need to do/try to do to give their kids as many advantages as possible.
Along the same lines as the excerpt above - She references Mad Men and how Betty Draper barks "Sally, go watch TV!" more than any other line in the show, and how in current times you can hardly find a mother who is comfortable putting her kid in front of the tv instead of "embarking upon a craft project using post-consumer waste materials or heading out to a sustainable farm-to-table class with her kid."
According to the USDA, a child born in 2010 (mine was born in 2013) will cost an average of $226,920 to raise until the age of 18 (not counting college) and that the price of raising children is rising at a higher rate than inflation.
"Two parent households with 2 children devote over 1/3 of their income to kids. The average family living in poverty pays 40% of their income to cover childcare, meanwhile parents over the poverty line shell out 7% of their wages.
"In one person's lifetime, they are responsible for 3.1 millions pounds of CO2, 23 million pounds of water waste and more than 7 thousand pounds of food waste. Each day the world expands by the population of Toronto. Each baby born in the US will add about 300x more carbon dioxide to the earth's atmosphere than every baby born in Ethiopia." - There's a whole lot more regarding the overpopulation of the planet and how it's destroying our environment, but she also discusses how devastating it would be to our future if the population was significantly lowered as well. Kind of a lose/lose situation. This was a real feel good chapter lol
The most poignant part of the book for me actually comes from Tina Fey - "Do I want another baby? Or do I just want to turn back time and have my daughter be a baby again?" THIS. LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, THIS IS WHAT I WANT. Every second of every video that comes up in my time hop, or photo of a teeny tiny Bear, I wish wish wish wish I could go back to that time with her. Do I want another child? No, honestly and truly no. Not even a little bit. But do I want to relive all her moments that are just memories now? Every single one of them. There are a lot of factors that were involved in our decision to have just one - our ages, our finances, our living space (or lack there of). I could go into more detail regarding each of them, but I've gone on long enough. Do I still worry about who will be there for her when we're gone? More often than I'd like, yes. But being able to give all we can to her, and only her was a driving force in our decision.
I think the most important line in the entire book is the following - "If I can choose to stop at one, that's not a referendum on anyone's choice not to. The whole point is to live the life you want."
And I will end my Stephen King sized post with that.
December 27, 2018
As the only child of an only child of an only child, you know what? I turned out pretty fine. That is not to say I turned out perfect, far from it, but then again, to quote Bladerunner, who does?
In all likelihood, my child will also be an only child and you know what? She has been turning out more than fine so far. Nevertheless, as I watch her grow into a happy, open, communicative, darling little human (quite the opposite of the singleton stereotype), I do carry in the back of my mind the irrational burden of “what if” and “wouldn’t it be” and “but what about”.
Sandler’s book has helped me see that all of us in this situation carry around the same gray cloud of uncertainty and fear. What’s more, it has shown clearly that this cloud is irrational, and that I can stop worrying (to the extent it is possible to squash down what is an irrational fear) and enjoy being the parent of a beautiful, clever, creative and outgoing fourth-generation only child.
In all likelihood, my child will also be an only child and you know what? She has been turning out more than fine so far. Nevertheless, as I watch her grow into a happy, open, communicative, darling little human (quite the opposite of the singleton stereotype), I do carry in the back of my mind the irrational burden of “what if” and “wouldn’t it be” and “but what about”.
Sandler’s book has helped me see that all of us in this situation carry around the same gray cloud of uncertainty and fear. What’s more, it has shown clearly that this cloud is irrational, and that I can stop worrying (to the extent it is possible to squash down what is an irrational fear) and enjoy being the parent of a beautiful, clever, creative and outgoing fourth-generation only child.
August 8, 2021
As the parent of an only, not by choice by but biology, I thought this book would bring me comfort and validation of our reality. Instead, it basically a long winded ego driven journal entry about one woman’s life, and her choice to ‘so far’ not have another child. The research is deep, but sloppily presented and not tied to specific conclusions. This reads like the first draft of an undergrad thesis.
March 5, 2020
This book assuaged a lot of my fears about having an only child, even though the author and I don’t share all the same premises. Takeaways: only kids are as happy as siblings, if you have an only please make sure they have people around them, whether you have one or more there’s no way to do it wrong or right, there are trade-offs for everything.
January 26, 2025
While this book prompted some reflection for me regarding family planning, I wouldn’t say that I enjoyed it. I don’t know if it was the author’s defensiveness in the opening chapters, her interweaving of popular culture and politics into her research, or the eye-roll inducing praise of urban living over the suburban life, but I found the mixing of journalism/memoir/research to be distracting and ill-effective. I would have liked either pure memoir or pure research.
Besides the personal thoughts Sandler’s work prompted, I’m not sure much of what she wrote will stick with me, beyond the basics: only children get more of their parents’ attention; parents of only children have more time to themselves; you can have a chosen, rather than blood family; and having more children will accelerate the planet’s death.
Besides the personal thoughts Sandler’s work prompted, I’m not sure much of what she wrote will stick with me, beyond the basics: only children get more of their parents’ attention; parents of only children have more time to themselves; you can have a chosen, rather than blood family; and having more children will accelerate the planet’s death.
June 28, 2022
This is a good exploration of some of the data and myths around having and being an only child. At times it felt disorganized and rambling, but I enjoyed how it touched on various aspects of child rearing nonetheless.
December 2, 2018
I stumbled across this book quite by accident while looking for children’s books that portrayed only children in a positive or at least neutral way. Sandler takes a thorough look at both qualitative and quantitative data on the topic and details the many financial, ecological, emotional and social reasons that if it’s what you want, having an only child is a very rational decision. Of course, the majority of people aren’t using a spreadsheet when deciding to ditch the contraception, but there are many myths she debunks. For example, people will tell you that a second kid is cheaper than the first, but research shows that the direct financial cost is roughly the same, while the cost in terms of earning capacity is vastly higher (as it is the second child that tends to drive the primary caregiver out of the workforce for longer, and to return in a reduced capacity, if ever). More indirect costs such as housing (the dreaded move to the suburbs), commuting (a second car and longer commutes all round) and well as time and arguably sanity (my worst nightmare, the double drop-off at two different locations!).
This all made total sense to me but as I said, it isn’t the way most people make decisions about family size. What was more surprising, and validating for the parents of onlies, is that families with only one child are overall happier. Sandler shows through her discussion of many studies that parents of one child are markedly happier that their multi-child peers. They are more satisfied with almost all aspects of their life (housing, leisure time, finances, career) but the thing that stood out to me is that they actually like their children more and enjoy spending time with them, whereas children with siblings are expected to entertain each other much more, and are rated neutrally to negatively on scales of likeability by their parents.
Of course, books like this aren’t much use if you’ve already got multiple kids and are guaranteed to grate on the nerves. Similarly, if you really want to have multiple kids, you’re going to have them anyway. On the other hand, if this book presented a strong case for siblings, I’d probably still have just one. So it was what I wanted to hear, but I think that’s fair enough since I’ve spent four years listening to a medley of the following:
“You’ll change your mind.”
“You can’t just have one.”
“You’re not a real family with just one.”
“An only child? That must be easy!”
Not to mention that some fairly severe lady issues caused by the birth of my daughter weren’t resolved since the doctor thought it would be a shame to go to the effort of fixing everything up then have her work wrecked by my presumed second baby!
Sandler is also at pains to explain, and I concur, that having an only child is not a judgment on the majority who choose to have more. Having friends with larger families is great because they give our kids experiences ours won’t have at home, and of course, their kids are great. Naturally, we hope these friends won’t judge us either! Ultimately, people do not make decisions about family size rationally. They do what they want. That applies whether they have one child or zero or two or six. (Now that I think about it, the people with six probably encounter massive judgement too. Anything different to two raises eyebrows.) But not many of us live under rocks. We know where babies come from. So maybe let’s not worry about other people’s family planning and read this interesting book instead. If you want.
This all made total sense to me but as I said, it isn’t the way most people make decisions about family size. What was more surprising, and validating for the parents of onlies, is that families with only one child are overall happier. Sandler shows through her discussion of many studies that parents of one child are markedly happier that their multi-child peers. They are more satisfied with almost all aspects of their life (housing, leisure time, finances, career) but the thing that stood out to me is that they actually like their children more and enjoy spending time with them, whereas children with siblings are expected to entertain each other much more, and are rated neutrally to negatively on scales of likeability by their parents.
Of course, books like this aren’t much use if you’ve already got multiple kids and are guaranteed to grate on the nerves. Similarly, if you really want to have multiple kids, you’re going to have them anyway. On the other hand, if this book presented a strong case for siblings, I’d probably still have just one. So it was what I wanted to hear, but I think that’s fair enough since I’ve spent four years listening to a medley of the following:
“You’ll change your mind.”
“You can’t just have one.”
“You’re not a real family with just one.”
“An only child? That must be easy!”
Not to mention that some fairly severe lady issues caused by the birth of my daughter weren’t resolved since the doctor thought it would be a shame to go to the effort of fixing everything up then have her work wrecked by my presumed second baby!
Sandler is also at pains to explain, and I concur, that having an only child is not a judgment on the majority who choose to have more. Having friends with larger families is great because they give our kids experiences ours won’t have at home, and of course, their kids are great. Naturally, we hope these friends won’t judge us either! Ultimately, people do not make decisions about family size rationally. They do what they want. That applies whether they have one child or zero or two or six. (Now that I think about it, the people with six probably encounter massive judgement too. Anything different to two raises eyebrows.) But not many of us live under rocks. We know where babies come from. So maybe let’s not worry about other people’s family planning and read this interesting book instead. If you want.
July 29, 2013
I can identify with this book in so many ways; my mother was an only; and I'm the mother of an only. While I can certainly identify with the authors plight in making her own decision, this book did not really illuminate for me how to help raise an only; which is what I was really looking for.
For myself I really didn't choose to have an only. I wanted more children but my husband really didn't, we couldn't really afford it, and my health kept getting in the way of my own lobbying efforts to change my husbands mind. My reasons for wanting another child are wrapped up in family. My son's next closest relative, age-wise, was my younger brother who was 35 years his senior. He unfortunately died in a car accident a few years ago; he never had children. In fact no siblings on either side of our family have procreated. My son will truly be alone as an adult.
It's taken me a long time to come to terms with stopping at one. Unlike the author, the only person to criticize this decision was my mother, an only herself. I have to say some of the family dynamics that are described are things that I have experienced in my own upbringing and I don't feel are exclusively an only issue.
I would concur that the level of scrutiny an only child receives does make for more intense parenting; my husband and I catch ourselves sometimes being too concerned over something that in a larger family would likely not have been raised to the level of scrutiny we apply.
And in our own experience, our child bucks the assertion that onlys are somehow smarter or more mature. Academically, our son is right where he should be for his age and if anything he's a little immature.
Bottom line, I found the demographic and sociological studies interesting, but over all the book did little to illuminate the world of onlys for me. In addition I felt the book was a tad disorganized and the sometimes chatty style rather annoying. I can see why one reviewer felt that this work was nothing more than the authors justification for her own decision but I feel that there is a lot more substance and thought provoking information in it.
For myself I really didn't choose to have an only. I wanted more children but my husband really didn't, we couldn't really afford it, and my health kept getting in the way of my own lobbying efforts to change my husbands mind. My reasons for wanting another child are wrapped up in family. My son's next closest relative, age-wise, was my younger brother who was 35 years his senior. He unfortunately died in a car accident a few years ago; he never had children. In fact no siblings on either side of our family have procreated. My son will truly be alone as an adult.
It's taken me a long time to come to terms with stopping at one. Unlike the author, the only person to criticize this decision was my mother, an only herself. I have to say some of the family dynamics that are described are things that I have experienced in my own upbringing and I don't feel are exclusively an only issue.
I would concur that the level of scrutiny an only child receives does make for more intense parenting; my husband and I catch ourselves sometimes being too concerned over something that in a larger family would likely not have been raised to the level of scrutiny we apply.
And in our own experience, our child bucks the assertion that onlys are somehow smarter or more mature. Academically, our son is right where he should be for his age and if anything he's a little immature.
Bottom line, I found the demographic and sociological studies interesting, but over all the book did little to illuminate the world of onlys for me. In addition I felt the book was a tad disorganized and the sometimes chatty style rather annoying. I can see why one reviewer felt that this work was nothing more than the authors justification for her own decision but I feel that there is a lot more substance and thought provoking information in it.
January 8, 2019
Okay, gotta admit: she's preaching to the choir here. Sandler is an engaging and smart writer, and she details the personal, marital, logistical, economic, and even ecological reasons that choosing to have only one child can be awesome. As the title suggests, Sandler is also a singleton, and she writes evocatively of her close relationship with her parents, which make me choke up a little in recognition. I value my friendship with my parents so much, and I do think that that intimacy was very much shaped by the tininess of our family unit. Sandler debunks a lot of the literature and pop culture--both historical and contemporary--that suggests that only children are necessarily weird, alienated, and unhappy. (I'm certainly weird, but I'm not sure one can attribute that to family size.) She writes about motherhood and marriage with real gusto. Like Perfect Madness: Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety, Sandler ultimately turns to a political position--namely, that the absence of universal child care and state-sponsored parental support makes the choice to have only one (or none!) an eminently logical one. Rather than shrug her shoulders, she expresses frustration that this platform is a political non-starter in America where this would make such a huge difference for women's well-being and families' finances. She gets into the culture wars and the divide between secularists who tend to have small families and religious conservatives who tend to have large ones. A really interesting and breezy yet well-informed read overall.
May 7, 2015
Summary: I am the best, my son will be the best. The end. (It needs to go back to the library and I'm tired of renewing it. I don't recommend trying to read it while a three year-old is screaming in your face.)
December 4, 2018
It's not an amazing book but successfully reassuring to the fears I, a woman fundamentally like the author, have in the back of my mind about choosing a small family.
January 17, 2018
7th book for 2018.
Around the time of your child's second birthday, pressure – from grandparents, friends, even your own child – starts building up about possibility (inevitability?) of next one. If not for yourself, then at least for your child. Do you really want them to grow-up emotionally impoverished, alone, to face the horrors of the World? Of their parents eventual disability and death, alone? At this time too, many of the horrors of birth and those first few sleepless months fade, and you start thinking, if I only could do it again it would be so much easier. I could get it right this time. And all the time you are increasingly surrounded by parents you know who have taken the plunge a little earlier, and despite a certain look of tired-craziness, swear that the second child has completed them as people and as a family. And you feel yourself weakening...
Sandler's book – a mix of psychological studies, interviewers only children and their parents, as long with Sandler's own experiences as single child and mother – offers a useful counterbalance. In it she debunks many myths about single children: there is no indication that they are more selfish or poorly adjusted (just the opposite actually). They even have slightly higher IQ s. On the parental-side happiness is maximized with one child – with one you get the joys of being a parent, but less negatives that come with each child (time loss; ,more money spent). Of course, that's only the average parent – some people need more and some none, but if people were rational about having children (which no one is) this would be an important point to make. Certainly women's careers are affected disproportionately negatively by the birth of each additional child – especially in the US context (one study shows that the birth of a 2nd child adds at least 120 hours of extra housework, most of that down by the mother). Sandler even considers the environmental impact of each additional child (but again no one has children for rational reasons).
Sandler is in no way preaching or propagandizing here. My impression is that she's actually struggling with the idea of a second child herself, and this book is her way of working through some of the issues. No one's ideas of what they want to do are going to be changed here. For those who don't know what they want, the book will either resonant or not. Those who don't want, but don't know how to express this desire either to themselves or others, will find this book helpful.
4-stars.
Around the time of your child's second birthday, pressure – from grandparents, friends, even your own child – starts building up about possibility (inevitability?) of next one. If not for yourself, then at least for your child. Do you really want them to grow-up emotionally impoverished, alone, to face the horrors of the World? Of their parents eventual disability and death, alone? At this time too, many of the horrors of birth and those first few sleepless months fade, and you start thinking, if I only could do it again it would be so much easier. I could get it right this time. And all the time you are increasingly surrounded by parents you know who have taken the plunge a little earlier, and despite a certain look of tired-craziness, swear that the second child has completed them as people and as a family. And you feel yourself weakening...
Sandler's book – a mix of psychological studies, interviewers only children and their parents, as long with Sandler's own experiences as single child and mother – offers a useful counterbalance. In it she debunks many myths about single children: there is no indication that they are more selfish or poorly adjusted (just the opposite actually). They even have slightly higher IQ s. On the parental-side happiness is maximized with one child – with one you get the joys of being a parent, but less negatives that come with each child (time loss; ,more money spent). Of course, that's only the average parent – some people need more and some none, but if people were rational about having children (which no one is) this would be an important point to make. Certainly women's careers are affected disproportionately negatively by the birth of each additional child – especially in the US context (one study shows that the birth of a 2nd child adds at least 120 hours of extra housework, most of that down by the mother). Sandler even considers the environmental impact of each additional child (but again no one has children for rational reasons).
Sandler is in no way preaching or propagandizing here. My impression is that she's actually struggling with the idea of a second child herself, and this book is her way of working through some of the issues. No one's ideas of what they want to do are going to be changed here. For those who don't know what they want, the book will either resonant or not. Those who don't want, but don't know how to express this desire either to themselves or others, will find this book helpful.
4-stars.
July 31, 2018
I've been reading this off and on for over the last 6 months or so and finally decided to finish it (although I cheated by skipping the last few chapters - more on that below...).
I commend Ms. Sandler on her painstaking research and all the data supporting the fact that singletons can be just as happy as children with siblings, and parents are all that much happier for having one child. While I enjoyed the first half of this, I found myself skimming the last few chapters because she kept reiterating the same facts, over and over. Yes, some kids fare well as singletons, and some hate it. Some singletons grow up to become Lauren Bacall and FDR, while some just barely manage to survive their clingy, needy parents and are still bitter and resentful about it. Oy.
I also found Sandler to be somewhat less of a reliable authority on this subject because her daughter was only four at the time she wrote this. Despite her declarations that singletons are awesome, Sandler herself was still very much on the fence as to whether or not have another child. I would have found her testimony much more comforting? substantial? had she been the parent of a singleton 14-year-old who was doing just great, thank you very much. Instead of chapters and chapters of research and anecdotes, particularly all the 'Little Emperor' stuff, I think it would have been more interesting and beneficial to get some advice from these adult singletons she talked to. What do they wish their parents would have known then that they know now? What do they wish their parents would have done differently? (aside from giving them a sibling) What hands-on advice would they give to parents who have singletons either by choice or by circumstance as to how to raise their child to be happy/well adjusted/not lonely? etc. Sandler touched on some of this toward the end, but not nearly enough, I think.
Another thing is, a lot of people *with* siblings grew up absolutely hating each other due to jealousy, sibling rivalry or simple personality conflicts (many of my childhood friends experienced this and were happy to escape their siblings every chance they could get). Also, adult siblings often move so far away from each other that they lose all connection over the years. Having siblings is not key to childhood happiness or familial bonding throughout your life - something to keep in mind when fretting over the number of children to have.
Anyway, three stars for great research and an interesting read, but I knocked two off for too much repetition and not enough constructive and helpful advice on actually raising singletons.
I commend Ms. Sandler on her painstaking research and all the data supporting the fact that singletons can be just as happy as children with siblings, and parents are all that much happier for having one child. While I enjoyed the first half of this, I found myself skimming the last few chapters because she kept reiterating the same facts, over and over. Yes, some kids fare well as singletons, and some hate it. Some singletons grow up to become Lauren Bacall and FDR, while some just barely manage to survive their clingy, needy parents and are still bitter and resentful about it. Oy.
I also found Sandler to be somewhat less of a reliable authority on this subject because her daughter was only four at the time she wrote this. Despite her declarations that singletons are awesome, Sandler herself was still very much on the fence as to whether or not have another child. I would have found her testimony much more comforting? substantial? had she been the parent of a singleton 14-year-old who was doing just great, thank you very much. Instead of chapters and chapters of research and anecdotes, particularly all the 'Little Emperor' stuff, I think it would have been more interesting and beneficial to get some advice from these adult singletons she talked to. What do they wish their parents would have known then that they know now? What do they wish their parents would have done differently? (aside from giving them a sibling) What hands-on advice would they give to parents who have singletons either by choice or by circumstance as to how to raise their child to be happy/well adjusted/not lonely? etc. Sandler touched on some of this toward the end, but not nearly enough, I think.
Another thing is, a lot of people *with* siblings grew up absolutely hating each other due to jealousy, sibling rivalry or simple personality conflicts (many of my childhood friends experienced this and were happy to escape their siblings every chance they could get). Also, adult siblings often move so far away from each other that they lose all connection over the years. Having siblings is not key to childhood happiness or familial bonding throughout your life - something to keep in mind when fretting over the number of children to have.
Anyway, three stars for great research and an interesting read, but I knocked two off for too much repetition and not enough constructive and helpful advice on actually raising singletons.
June 26, 2022
I started reading this book to make me feel better about a non-choice, or a semi-choice, once we exhausted our mental and financial resources trying to adopt a second child. And it worked. Sandler combines sociology, demographics, history, and a touch of memoir to make the case that the only-kids are all right.
Importantly, this is not a manifesto. Sandler is interested in dispelling myths and observing trends, not in advocating for one particular family structure; if anything, she underscores how poorly the nuclear family construct has served families and embraces a looser, more expansive definition of family.
Only children do get a more intense dose of their parents than kids from multi-child families, so I should work on my marriage and on personal fulfillment—two things that having just one child will free me up to do, especially in a country that provides almost nothing in the way of meaningful material support for parents. Sandler notes that the U.S. response to this lack of support is a bifurcation: urban liberal families skew smaller to cope, and Red State families of faith are fruitful, multiply, and create churchy networks of support. The future may belong to the religious, but some of those kids will be queer and intellectually curious, so I'll try not to worry too much. Since I don't have the option of raising a gaggle of liberal children, I'll focus on my small and big worlds.
Importantly, this is not a manifesto. Sandler is interested in dispelling myths and observing trends, not in advocating for one particular family structure; if anything, she underscores how poorly the nuclear family construct has served families and embraces a looser, more expansive definition of family.
Only children do get a more intense dose of their parents than kids from multi-child families, so I should work on my marriage and on personal fulfillment—two things that having just one child will free me up to do, especially in a country that provides almost nothing in the way of meaningful material support for parents. Sandler notes that the U.S. response to this lack of support is a bifurcation: urban liberal families skew smaller to cope, and Red State families of faith are fruitful, multiply, and create churchy networks of support. The future may belong to the religious, but some of those kids will be queer and intellectually curious, so I'll try not to worry too much. Since I don't have the option of raising a gaggle of liberal children, I'll focus on my small and big worlds.
January 6, 2023
This book does a good job combating the stereotypes around raising and being an only child — all backed by research. At times the insertion of stats and studies caused the reading to be a bit slow I still appreciated it. It definitely helped to confirm (though the confirmation wasn’t necessary) that raising an only child is what’s most desired for our family, our lifestyle, our interests, and that the happiness of parents shouldn’t be ignored.
I grew up as an only child for 13 years and had very limited resources. Now, as a parent of any only I am happy that we can provide our child with resources — from time spent together to financial — that won’t be depleted.
At the end of the day, and the author makes this clear, families should be able to do whatever the hell they want. No child? Awesome! 1 child? Awesome! Enough children for a soccer team? Awesome!
The action that I took away from this book is to be an activist and advocate for better social systems and services in the US to support families with children. From paid family leave to universal childcare. We stretch ourselves too thin in order to accomplish everything that being a parent requires, especially in families with 2+ children, and we need to push for systems that make it easier.
I grew up as an only child for 13 years and had very limited resources. Now, as a parent of any only I am happy that we can provide our child with resources — from time spent together to financial — that won’t be depleted.
At the end of the day, and the author makes this clear, families should be able to do whatever the hell they want. No child? Awesome! 1 child? Awesome! Enough children for a soccer team? Awesome!
The action that I took away from this book is to be an activist and advocate for better social systems and services in the US to support families with children. From paid family leave to universal childcare. We stretch ourselves too thin in order to accomplish everything that being a parent requires, especially in families with 2+ children, and we need to push for systems that make it easier.
September 5, 2014
I was in the parenting section at the library looking for another book when I saw this one on the shelf. The topic is, of course, timely (we’ve been talking a lot about this) and I knew the book would be thought-provoking. What I wasn’t expecting was that it was also emotional and vulnerable, sometimes in subtle ways, sometimes through Sandler’s anecdotes about being an only child raising an only child. Sandler does not use the book to try and make the argument that only children are the same as children with siblings. Instead, she shows the ways they differ and how that can be positive (only children tend to be more successful) and intense (only children tend to internalize parental relationships and emotions) or even negative (only children often bear the sole burden of emotionally supporting their mother after parents divorce or separate).
She explores other topics of interest, including the perceived loneliness of only children, the economics of raising an only child, the intersection of religion and having multiple children, and the environmental impact of having children at all. It is fascinating and well-written. If you don’t have kids, have one child, have more than one—this is a book well worth your time. It’s about more than parenting, more than just logistics and research. It is razor-sharp cultural insight and analysis and I found it incredibly well-done. Here are some passages I loved:
"I want to snuggle with my daughter for as long as she’ll let me, being as present in her life as I can while giving her all the space she needs to discover life on her own terms. I want full participation: in the world, in my family, in my friendships, and in my own actualization. In other words, to have a happy kid, I figure I need to be a happy mother, and to be a happy mother, I need to be a happy person. Like my mother, I feel that I need to make choices within the limits of reality—which means considering work, finances, pleasure—and at the moment I can’t imagine how I could possibly do that with another kid."
"The University of Chicago’s Linda Waite, whose research focuses on how to make marriages last, tells me, ‘You’re better off to ignore your kids and focus on your relationship than to focus on your kids and ignore your relationship,’ which she says few people have the courage to do. Instead, she says, we do the opposite. ‘Kids, kids, kids. That’s how we forget about our own needs—it’s all about them. And no one is happy like that.’"
"What my mother needed to be a happy person is not what all mothers need. She needed to feel she was making a significant contribution through her work, and not just her family, working for more than the necessary paycheck. She needed to live somewhere she could walk a few blocks to buy a really good cookie when she got the craving after diner. She needed to travel, to make her marriage as significant as her motherhood, to be able to go supermarketing and pick up the dry cleaning without being outnumbered by her kids, plural, who were performing the theater of rivalry in the produce section."
"I find that parenting offers an untold bounty of happiness, joy, excitement, contentment, satisfaction, and pride—just not all the time. Each child is an additional source of pride, sure, but also an additional infringement on freedom, privacy, and patience. I can understand why Jean Twenge, in a study on parenthood and marital satisfaction, found that happiness in a marriage tumbles with each additional child. This finding bears out worldwide and not just in the United States."
"A survey tracking families from the late 1980s through the early 1990s showed that while a single child decreases a mother’s employment by about eight hours a week, the second kid leads to a further reduction of about twelve hours. A father’s work hours don’t change at all when a first child is born, but an additional child actually increases his time on the job by about three hours per week."
"Actually, real change [in terms of a societal shift in the way Americans viewed the work/life balance and social policy for mothers] began in the seventies and ground to a halt by the mideighties. That’s when Ellen Willis wrote in her essay ‘Looking for Mr. Good Dad’: ‘the problem is not that women’s demands for freedom are rocking the boat,’ which they surely no longer are, ‘it’s that men have the power to set the terms of their participation in child rearing and women don’t. So long as mothers must depend on the ‘voluntary commitment’ of men who can withdraw it without negotiation at any time, we’re in trouble no matter what we do.’ […] As you’ve read, thirty years after this essay was published, thirty years that could have seen great progress, the US Census considers child care to be parenting when a mother does it, and an ‘arrangement’ when a father does."
"Whether parents are single or coupled, many of us enjoy a quieter side to this intensity [of the relationship between an only child and parent] too; an unspoken intimacy. I remember as a child gingerly opening the door to my parents’ bedroom, slashes of early morning light from the shutters setting the room softly aglow. I would tiptoe to the far side of the bed where my mother slept, and crawl under the paisley flannel duvet. Silently, I’d lay my head beside hers, and try to sync our breathing. Now I lay awake many mornings, awaiting Dahlia’s cry of ‘Mama’ before I creep into her room and lay my head on her pillow. She wriggles in close and takes hold of my elbow. And in the dark cocoon of her tiny room, I feel her try to sync her breathing with my own."
She explores other topics of interest, including the perceived loneliness of only children, the economics of raising an only child, the intersection of religion and having multiple children, and the environmental impact of having children at all. It is fascinating and well-written. If you don’t have kids, have one child, have more than one—this is a book well worth your time. It’s about more than parenting, more than just logistics and research. It is razor-sharp cultural insight and analysis and I found it incredibly well-done. Here are some passages I loved:
"I want to snuggle with my daughter for as long as she’ll let me, being as present in her life as I can while giving her all the space she needs to discover life on her own terms. I want full participation: in the world, in my family, in my friendships, and in my own actualization. In other words, to have a happy kid, I figure I need to be a happy mother, and to be a happy mother, I need to be a happy person. Like my mother, I feel that I need to make choices within the limits of reality—which means considering work, finances, pleasure—and at the moment I can’t imagine how I could possibly do that with another kid."
"The University of Chicago’s Linda Waite, whose research focuses on how to make marriages last, tells me, ‘You’re better off to ignore your kids and focus on your relationship than to focus on your kids and ignore your relationship,’ which she says few people have the courage to do. Instead, she says, we do the opposite. ‘Kids, kids, kids. That’s how we forget about our own needs—it’s all about them. And no one is happy like that.’"
"What my mother needed to be a happy person is not what all mothers need. She needed to feel she was making a significant contribution through her work, and not just her family, working for more than the necessary paycheck. She needed to live somewhere she could walk a few blocks to buy a really good cookie when she got the craving after diner. She needed to travel, to make her marriage as significant as her motherhood, to be able to go supermarketing and pick up the dry cleaning without being outnumbered by her kids, plural, who were performing the theater of rivalry in the produce section."
"I find that parenting offers an untold bounty of happiness, joy, excitement, contentment, satisfaction, and pride—just not all the time. Each child is an additional source of pride, sure, but also an additional infringement on freedom, privacy, and patience. I can understand why Jean Twenge, in a study on parenthood and marital satisfaction, found that happiness in a marriage tumbles with each additional child. This finding bears out worldwide and not just in the United States."
"A survey tracking families from the late 1980s through the early 1990s showed that while a single child decreases a mother’s employment by about eight hours a week, the second kid leads to a further reduction of about twelve hours. A father’s work hours don’t change at all when a first child is born, but an additional child actually increases his time on the job by about three hours per week."
"Actually, real change [in terms of a societal shift in the way Americans viewed the work/life balance and social policy for mothers] began in the seventies and ground to a halt by the mideighties. That’s when Ellen Willis wrote in her essay ‘Looking for Mr. Good Dad’: ‘the problem is not that women’s demands for freedom are rocking the boat,’ which they surely no longer are, ‘it’s that men have the power to set the terms of their participation in child rearing and women don’t. So long as mothers must depend on the ‘voluntary commitment’ of men who can withdraw it without negotiation at any time, we’re in trouble no matter what we do.’ […] As you’ve read, thirty years after this essay was published, thirty years that could have seen great progress, the US Census considers child care to be parenting when a mother does it, and an ‘arrangement’ when a father does."
"Whether parents are single or coupled, many of us enjoy a quieter side to this intensity [of the relationship between an only child and parent] too; an unspoken intimacy. I remember as a child gingerly opening the door to my parents’ bedroom, slashes of early morning light from the shutters setting the room softly aglow. I would tiptoe to the far side of the bed where my mother slept, and crawl under the paisley flannel duvet. Silently, I’d lay my head beside hers, and try to sync our breathing. Now I lay awake many mornings, awaiting Dahlia’s cry of ‘Mama’ before I creep into her room and lay my head on her pillow. She wriggles in close and takes hold of my elbow. And in the dark cocoon of her tiny room, I feel her try to sync her breathing with my own."
January 8, 2019
Bardzo ciekawa publikacja, która zwraca uwagę na takie aspekty jedynactwa, na jakie nawet bym nie wpadła.
Dowiadujemy się z niej dużo o stereotypach na temat bycia jedynakiem i na temat bycia rodzicem jedynaka. Znajdujemy wyniki wielu ankiet i badań, które pokazują prawdę o dzieciach, które nie posiadają rodzeństwa. Poznajemy aspekt moralny, ekonomiczny i ekologiczny zjawiska. Zapoznajemy się z historiami ludzi, którzy świadomie zdecydowali się na posiadanie jednego dziecka lub - wręcz przeciwnie - nigdy na jednym by nie poprzestali.
Nie czyta się tego lekko i łatwo, ale publikacja jest ciekawa i oparta na wielu źródłach. Warto przeczytać.
Dowiadujemy się z niej dużo o stereotypach na temat bycia jedynakiem i na temat bycia rodzicem jedynaka. Znajdujemy wyniki wielu ankiet i badań, które pokazują prawdę o dzieciach, które nie posiadają rodzeństwa. Poznajemy aspekt moralny, ekonomiczny i ekologiczny zjawiska. Zapoznajemy się z historiami ludzi, którzy świadomie zdecydowali się na posiadanie jednego dziecka lub - wręcz przeciwnie - nigdy na jednym by nie poprzestali.
Nie czyta się tego lekko i łatwo, ale publikacja jest ciekawa i oparta na wielu źródłach. Warto przeczytać.
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