How hard is to take care of a small child in Krsna consciousness?

Frequently we have the impression that having children demands a lot of money. I also had this perception, but gradually I started understanding that actually, it is not so.

Frequently we have the impression that having children demands a lot of money. I also had this perception, but gradually I started understanding that actually, it is not so.

The main point about raising children is to be able to dedicate enough time to them. Raising a small child is a full-time job for one of the parents, and at least part-time for the other. This goes on for several years, at least until the time they start going to school. Frequently we are not able to or are not willing to dedicate so much time and we try to compensate with material facilities. We then end up spending lots of money, and still the result is not great.

The first point about children is that in reality, children don't have many material needs. This may sound shocking, but actually what children need is love and attention from their parents. Because often one or two of these things are not given in enough quantity or quality, the need for different material objects from the part of the child is felt more strongly. One example of this is when we don't have time to spend with the child and try to compensate for it by giving him more toys. When we are able to spend time with the child, he or she will be happy with much less.

This is an important point to consider, because often when we plan to have a child we often plan how to increase our income, which leads to less time spent with the child. If we start from the opposite idea, making having more time to spend with the child a priority instead of making more money, we can have a much better experience and better results.

By the arrangement of nature, a child doesn't even need to eat. For the first six months or so, a child can live exclusively on the milk of the mother, which (apart from the food the mother eats) doesn't cost any money. After that, a child can start gradually eating the same food as the parents, like small portions of grains, boiled vegetables, fruits, cow's milk, and so on. If the parents have a relative health diet, the same food can gradually be given to the child, and because children eat little, this will also not cost much. If the parents give the baby proper natural food and a lot of love and attention, this child will grow happily as a devotee of Krsna and will not need much to live happily.

If the parents have diets based on processed foods and other unhealthy things that can't be given to a baby, however, there will be the need of cooking separately for the child, which will take more time. One may then be tempted to start giving baby food. The problem with baby food, however, is that the quality is not great (in many cases it's not even vegetarian!) and it can be quite expensive. We can see that this is another instance when we try to exchange money for convenience, and again the results are not great. Baby food is just another type of processed food that is actually not healthy in the long term.

In modern society, quite a few shortcuts are offered. One that doesn't want to feel the pain of delivery can do a c-section. One who doesn't want to breastfeed can give formula. One who doesn't want to spend time with the baby can buy numerous toys and games and so on. All these options allow us to trade money for convenience, but the results are not good. Another problem is that a lot of times parents are pressed or manipulated to make the wrong choices, and this is also something we should be well aware of.

There are several traps on the way, and frequently one thing leads to the next. Everything starts when the baby is still inside the womb of the mother. In most places, there is great pressure for parents to opt for c-sections instead of natural birth. Many ladies are afraid of the pain of delivering a baby by natural means, and doctors often add to the pressure. One may hear that the baby is too big and that there will be a risk in a natural delivery (it seems that nowadays this is told to most women) and so on.

The truth is that a c-section is more convenient and much more lucrative to doctors and hospitals than a natural delivery. In a natural delivery, the doctor and a nurse have to stay with the woman for several hours, while a c-section takes just a few minutes and results in much higher honorariums. A woman who gives natural birth can leave the hospital the next day, while on a c-section she has to stay several days in the hospital. After a c-section, a baby has usually to stay under care for a few days, while on a natural delivery it can go to the mother almost immediately. All of this makes a c-section much more lucrative both to the doctors and to the hospital.

A c-section may be necessary in some circumstances when there is a real risk for the baby or the mother. However indiscriminate use has many negative consequences and actually causes much more pain to the mother than a natural delivery. Caring for a small baby right after giving birth is already a challenge by itself, and it becomes exponentially harder when you are simultaneously recovering from a cut on your abdomen.

The first problem is that when a baby is delivered by natural means, a series of signals are produced, which induce the body of the mother to immediately start producing milk. When it's a c-section, the production of milk may take several days to start, which will lead the baby to start losing weight. In most countries, the regulation is that a baby must be given formula if it loses more than 10% of the initial weight (which can take just a few days if the mother is not producing enough milk). Once the baby starts with formula, the chances of bringing him back to breastfeeding are greatly reduced.

Baby formula can be quite expensive, but this is not the only problem. A newborn baby has a very weak immune system, the baby depends in large part on antibodies received from the mother through breast milk. Formula can't reproduce it, and therefore a baby that is raised on formula will have a weaker immune system and will become sick more often, which can represent successive visits to the doctor. Babies born from a c-section are also usually born a few weeks before time, and this has an impact on the development of different organs (the lungs, for example, stop developing at the moment the baby starts breathing), and as a result, the baby can be weaker for life.

There are a number of techniques that can help to reduce the pain of a natural birth. There are numerous videos and courses on this subject that one can easily find online. Most of the pain during delivery happens because the mother becomes tense or scared, which makes the muscles contract, greatly complicating the process. When the mother understands what is happening and is able to remain relaxed, everything happens much easily and with much less pain. We can see that most animals give birth in quite an uneventful way, they just lay down and soon the cub comes. This happens because animals don't become tense or scared when giving birth.

Natural delivery and breastfeeding for at least the first full year guarantees that the baby has the best conditions for properly developing his body and mind, which he or she will need to understand the world and practice Krsna Consciousness later on. One should not deprive one's child of this just out of fear of discomfort or for aesthetic considerations or convenience.

Another factor is love and care. It's quite natural to love one's child, and this actually can help a lot in spiritual life, because once one is capable of loving a child, this helps one to understand what love for Krsna is. We tend to call sexual love between men and women "love", but this is a very different type of feeling that has a lot of egoism embedded in it. Love for a child is practically the only type of love in the material world that has some resemblance of pure love.

However, love alone is however not sufficient. One needs to be able to spend quality time with the child. This is also quite natural, the problem is that modern life and our own desires make us very busy and this leads us to try to find all kinds of solutions to keep the baby entertained, so we can keep him more time alone. Sometimes this may be out of necessity (when both parents need to work, or there are a lot of services to do), and others it may be due to personal ambitions or lack of organization, but in all cases, it will result in all kinds of problems. It's better to plan our lives in advance so that when the children come we can spend time with them. We should not let our personal ambitions stay on the way.

A final point is that most material things tend to come naturally because the child has his own karma. Just like Krsna provides for all living beings, from the elephants to the ants, He also provides for the children who take birth, making sure that they get what they need to develop. A child that is fortunate and is entitled to a good life will actually bring this good fortune to the family where he or she takes birth. As a result, money and other facilities will appear, even if we don't look for them. People give out things, opportunities appear, and money comes.