How to raise a child on less than $1000 per year

When the Fraser Institute report on the cost of raising a child came out proclaiming you can raise a child on $4000 a year, the proverbial shit hit the fan.  How can you raise a child on 4k a year when the cost of daycare alone is upwards of 8k, and that's if you are lucky.  Many parents pay 2 to 3 times that much.

The reality is, the Fraser Institute has no interest in analyzing the cost to raise a child.  They just want to push their conservative agenda, and it's astonishingly easy to doctor the numbers.  To prove it, I decided to show you can raise a child on less than one thousand.  Here is how:

Food:  live in the country and grow most of your own food.  Junior better not have any diary restrictions,

Diapers:  you will be using cloth diapers, and washing them by hand since you can't afford a washing machine.  The cloth diapers will be made of your old t-shirts.

Clothing:  you see those curtains above your kitchen sink?  You don't need them since you live in the middle of nowhere.  Cut and sew.

Furniture:  the LCBO gives away free cardboard boxes

Daycare:  that will be performed by your mother and mother-in-law, who live with you

Healthcare:  you only need the bare minimum, so your child will not have what you can suckle from the government

Alcohol: you will be drinking heavily, so half of the $1000 goes here.  See Daycare as to why you will need so much booze

After-School enrichment:  none - your child don't need no school to work at a minimum wage job

Vacations:  the child will be working for his or her keep so, yeah, no vacations

After school programs : see vacations

Books and school supplies:  this is where he other $500 will go, since you can't really get away from it

Toys, gifts, miscellaneous : hand crafted by grandpa from the finest driftwood

Now, throw in another $3000 and you can actually feed your child.  Progress!

The question is not whether you can raise your child on $4000 a year.  You can do a lot of things if you are hard pressed to do so.

The question is, do you want to raise your child that way?  And do we want to build a society that presupposes hat this kind of childhood is a perfectly acceptable norm?

I for one would like to see every member of the Fraser Institute put their money where their mouth is and have their children live on $4000 a year.  I'd bet that amount wouldn't even cover their shoe allowance.

If you can show me how to raise an average Canadian child on $4000 a year, AND you'd be willing to raise yor own child that way, please drop me a line - I would love to hear all about it.

To the Facebook mom lifting weights - Screw public opinion!

When Ms. Ellison posted a photo of herself, wildly pregnant and living weights, she was lambasted left and right as horribly irresponsible, stupid, and downright evil.  For exercising while pregnant.

What is people's problem with this?  This mom has been doing this type of exercise for years.  It's not like she decided to take it up when the pregnancy test came back positive.

During pregnancy is not the right time to start a new exercise regimen, but to continue your old one is perfectly healthy.  Should runners stop running?  Should yogis stop yoga?  Ms Ellison happens to be more hard core in her fitness endeavors and good for her!  I'm sure she will have an easier labour and easier recovery for it.

When I was pregnant, perfect strangers saw fit to comment on my coffee drinking.  When I pointed out that they were morons, and also it was tea, they felt it their duty to warn me that some teas cause premature labour.  And birth defects.  And probably hunger and disease.

My best friend got a lecture for wearing high heel shoes at 7 mints pregnant.  They were 2 inch stacked heels - the horror!
A coworker had a sip of champagne at a wedding at 8 months.  From the uproar you'd think she was main lining crack while kicking puppies.
At the grocery store I saw some total bitch touch a pregnant lady's belly without permission while exclaiming how she really shouldn't be out during flu season.  I wanted to smack her, but you can't beat that level of stupid out of people.

Honestly, we get bombarded with information when we are pregnant.  Believe me, you are not telling us anything we haven't heard already.  So keep your nosy, self-righteous opinions to yourself.

To the mom lifting weights, and the mom taking a sip of alcohol, or eating a deli sandwich, or wearing heels - do what you feel is right to keep yourself and your baby healthy and sane.  And to hell with everyone else!

Are we over-medicating our children? Stop the insanity!

My daughter had reflux as a newborn.  She spat up like the exorcist 10 to 20 times a day, then cried and arched her back.  A couple of times this happened at night, and I was terrified that she would choke herself.

At her 1-month appointment, the paediatrician prescribed Zantac (or Rinitidine, which is the generic baby version).  We started her on it right away, and it seemed to help.

At the same time, I was worried about giving medication on an ongoing basis to such a young baby. I was reassured that Zantac is fairly harmless, but still.  Over the next 2 weeks, I noticed that her digestion seemed much slower.  She was only filling her diaper at times furthest away from the last dose of Zantac.

Now, there is considerable online debate by desperate parents on whether medication is a good idea. Generally, there are two schools of thought.

Medicate Your Way to Relief

Zantac has helped a lot of children control their reflux.  The stronger alternative, Prevacid, has also been a godsend for many parents.

Yes, they have side-effects, but when your three month old baby is screaming hysterically for hours, it seems like a good trade-off.

This is even more apparent when it comes to more severe conditions, and the stronger medicines that accompany them.  Should you give your child cold medication? Ritalin?  Antibiotics?  In many cases, depriving your baby of medicine could risk their life.

However, where do we draw the line?

Alternative Methods

Many conditions can be managed without pharmaceutical intervention.

I did some research which mentioned that keeping my baby  upright after feeding, and eliminating dairy could help.  We followed those suggestions, took her off the Zantac, and followed her very closely to see the effects.  She did just fine without the meds, and her paediatrician was happy with her at the last appointment.

Other moms have found relief through homeopathy, herbal medicine and acupuncture.

Whether this is the right choice for your baby is up to you to decide, but I think we have gotten way to trigger happy with pharmaceuticals.

Doctors don't always follow the latest research

Before my daughter's vaccinations, several people, including our doctor, suggested I give her Tylenol before the shot just in case.  But this can actually interfere with the effectiveness of the shot.  As a parent, it is my responsibility to do my own research, but it's disturbing how pervasive our reliance on drugs really is.

And these are fairly harmless drugs.  What happens when they are powerful, like Ritalin or Prozac?  How likely are we to jump at any convenient diagnosis just because our kid is a little more temperamental and we don't want to spend the time to deal with it?  And how much do we really know about the side-effects.

Don't be stupid about vaccines

All of this is not meant to be some push towards refusing needed medications.  I'm not a Luddite, nor would I encourage anyone to be.  I'm just encouraging some caution and self-directed research.

However, one shot I would actively encourage everyone to get for their babies is the standard vaccination protocol for babies.  Every theory on vaccines being bad for babies has been scientifically debunked.  They are safe and they save lives.

I'll be a lot more careful in the future about medicating my baby, that's for sure.  But I will also make sure that she does get any medical intervention that has shown to improve her chances for a long and happy life.