This is sort of like an anti-whine.
When I was pregnant with my older daughter, everyone told me how expensive diapers are. From now on, diapers were going to be making up a huge chunk of our budget. I should consider cloth diapering just so we didn't descend into poverty due to the huge cost of diapers. I was going to have make a hard decision between paying for diapers or sending my kids to college. In order to pay for diapers, I was probably going to have to, like, sell my body or something. And so forth.
And then I had the baby, and you know what? Diapers are not expensive.
No, they're not free. But for a middle class family, they're not really a significant expense. We get our diapers now on Amazon through subscribe and save, and they cost 17 cents each. So that's about a dollar a day for diapers. If spending an extra dollar a day is enough to break me, I probably have worse concerns than diapers.
I wish that Amazon service had been around for my kids. My biggest complaint about diapers is hoe much time I had to spend driving to and being in Babies R Us and Target to get them! Grocery store diapers are spendy but if you have the time & means to get to a strip mall, they're way cheaper.
ReplyDeleteBefore the Amazon service, years ago, we used to go to Costco and just get a huge crate of them every other month. Again, it was pretty cheap. (We did have to pay for a Costco membership, but we used that to get a discount on our car, which ended up saving us thousands of dollars.)
DeleteWait, you used your Costco membership to get a discount on your car? Details, please! :)
Deletehttp://www.costcoauto.com/enterzipcode.aspx?gotourl=%2fautomotive_articles%2fprogram_review.aspx
DeleteSaved a ton of money.
Be honest, you really wanted to write this post about how breastfeeding isn't really free, but were afraid you'd get 1,000 hate comments.
ReplyDeleteHey, I would. Breastfeeding isn't free, but I guess it's much cheaper than formula. I mean, it's just the price of a pump, and then storage bags, which are not cheap, but way less than a year's worth of formula.
DeleteI hope you're joking.
DeleteIn case you're not, let me break it down for you: How much do you currently make per hour. That number times the number of hours per day you spend pumping, is the cost of breastfeeding to you every single day. Obviously that does not include all the incidentals you listed above.
Well, if you're going to judge everything by an hourly rate, then I should hire someone to do basically everything in my life, because I'd pay them less than I make on an hourly rate. Cooking dinner, taking my kids to school, even giving my kids a bath would all be prohibitively expensive. But if I actually lived that way, I'd go broke.
DeleteHowever, if I *weren't* pumping, I wouldn't have made any extra money since I wouldn't have gotten paid for that time, so in that sense, the cost to me was zero. It would be different if my boss was deducting my pumping time from my salary.
You probably *should* hire someone to do those things for you unless you derive value beyond what you make in dollars from doing those activities yourself.
DeleteIf your salary is fixed regardless of your # of encounters, I can see why you'd think pumping was "free." Actually, I can see why you'd prefer to see as few patients as possible under that scenario with or without pumping.
Well, I have to see the same number of consults no matter what, so I don't see less or more if I spend 30 minutes pumping. But when I was pumping, I'd usually work faster to get through the consults, so you could argue my hourly rate went up :)
DeleteI 100% agree with you about diapers. Not expensive. The $3000/month in childcare is what kills me. :) And I do think pumping is free. I have a salary, and sort of do whatever during my pumping. I usually work through it. I don't understand the argument that my hourly wage X number of hours I pump is what it costs to me. How come people don't make that argument about eating or watching tv or exercising?
DeleteYou are correct, Anon. Child care IS expensive! And you are paying these so-called professionals to let your children run around with booger on their faces.
DeleteAnon#1 -- People do make that argument about leisure activities. Self care is important to, you know, remain alive, so that's why those activities don't typically get talked about in terms of opportunity cost. If you make a salary, that time you spent pumping could be spent doing other things that could enhance your career, so it's quite possible it costs more than you think.
DeleteAnon#2 -- I've seen plenty of lousy moms too. Maybe you're one of them!
You are right. But it's still worth it to me because I kind of like pumping and I definitely like nursing.
DeleteWhat makes someone a lousy mother, omdg?
DeleteI bought diapers at Target the other day for a friends new baby. Someone else said it was one of the best for absorbancy. I thought the price was less than it was 20 years ago with my boys. At the time, Huggies were the most absorbent for boys and I usually had to add a diaper insert (folded 3x over their pecker)to make it through the night.
ReplyDeleteNow I am dealing with adult diapers for my mom and they ARE NOT FREE or covered under medicare or supplemental insurance, but affordable and a bit expensive at the rate we use them. So now I am having to research the most absorbent. . . etc. Amazon monthly delivery has been the easiest so far!
Who would have ever thunk!?!?!?!
Kev
I have not had the pleasure of having a little person (I hope I do someday), but I thought maybe whoever gave you the advice was also factoring the cost of parking in Downtown Chicago, which seems to require a second mortgage these days!
ReplyDeleteFor babies (we have one on the way) I find a lot of things are as expensive as you make then out to be.
ReplyDeleteYou can get twelve different contraptions - swing, bouncer, excersaucer, tummy mat, vibrating chair, rotating chair, jumper, roller etc etc. Or you can choose one or two and add as needed.
I have heard people complain about the cost of formula and they are paying $100 a month. I was like "um that is NOT a lot" lol These same people take the baby for a walk for coffee everyday....
We are lucky that we live in a country where I actually make more money on mat leave than as a PhD student (no tuition, but get my full funding) so I am not losing any money for 17 weeks...then I get the rest of the year at 85%. So I don't really need to calculate income loss vs breastfeeding time etc. Not to mention, the more I am home the less we pay the nanny.
in my opinion, DEFINITELY get an exersaucer- there are kinds that transition from mat- exersaucer-play table. My daughter has one and we have used it for 4+ months. She absolutely loved it and allowed us to eat our meals at a table without her in our laps!
DeleteI agree with you, Fizzy. Diapers are not expensive. A big box of Huggies (100+ pieces) from Costco costs around $40, and would normally last several weeks. And if your child is older it could even last a month. Formula is expensive, yes. But diapers? No. Not at all. Unless you buy those small packages from Walgreens or those others stores because those stores are total rip-offs. Go to Costco and you can also get a box of wipes (8-10 pack) for less than $20.
ReplyDeleteFizzy you are the biggest internet troll of them all!!!!
ReplyDeleteI hope you're being sarcastic. Otherwise, chill out dude, back away from the computer and switch to decaf. Amanda
DeleteI don't think you can be a troll on your own blog. But you do have to appreciate the irony of someone trolling my blog to call me a troll :) It's like two thousand spoons when all you need is a knife.
DeleteDiapers where we live average 62 cents per diaper at a local big box store - but they have to be shipped in thousands of miles. It's still better than letting babies go commando. Amanda
ReplyDelete