I wasn’t prepared for how expensive the teenage years could be

I have five children ranging in age from elementary school to teenagers.
My husband is a public school teacher and I am a freelancer.
Little did I know that kids would become more expensive as they got older.

The sad truth about my life as a mother of five children, ranging in age from teenagers to elementary school, is that I lived below my means for a very long time.

my husband public school teacher in the countryside, and I am a freelancer, so our income is modest. But with five kids—teenagers at that—I just don’t know how to make it all work.

I knew having children would be expensivebut I didn’t expect or plan for how much more precious the kids would be when they got older.

Our cost of living has increased

Between groceries, electricity and heating bills, car insurancehealth insurance, homeowners and property insurance, car bills, life insurance, dental insurance and unexpected expenses, we’ve seen the cost of living rise dramatically over the past three years. In some cases, our bills have literally tripled, but our income has not.

To explain a little about my finances, just this month the following bills came due at checkout:

Tourist sports: $1,000
Car insurance for 6 months for two adults and a teenage driver: $2,800
Homeowner’s Insurance: $4,000
Winter Property Tax: $2,200
Braces: $4,000
New winter tires: $2,000

I guess I should have expected how expensive life would be as a parent, but I can honestly say that I didn’t expect how much more expensive my children would be when they grew up.

Teenagers are so expensive

Teenagers come with a whole new onslaught of expenses that I wasn’t prepared for — everything costs more with teenagers. Besides the “big” expenses like more expensive car insurance and tech for college and gas, even the little things cost more. For example, while I used to be able to run to the store and buy my kids $5 shirts for the school year, now it costs a lot more to put them on. Prices for everything from socks to shoes, toiletries, and sports and school supplies are on the rise, with no end in sight.

Aside from the controversial extravagance of travel sports, my husband and I do everything we can to make our lives work. I buy groceries at Aldi, our kids wear Walmart souvenirs and clothes, I save when possible, we rarely go out to eat, my kids have jobs, and my husband works two other jobs besides his full time job. as a school teacher. My job pays for our limited streaming services and phones, and our entertainment is mostly at home (or watching siblings play, of course).

I wonder if I should have stayed home when they were little

The disappointment of feeling like ours costs are out of control made me think about the choices I made as a mother. I have always prided myself on being mostly at home with my children. After I unexpectedly became a mother in the last year of collegeI did my best to do what I thought “good” moms should do and worked very hard to always be home with my kids as much as possible—I worked night shifts and built a freelance career to be consistent presence of parents at home. And I was proud of it.

But now that I have two teenagers and about to give birth to a third, I wonder if I did the right thing after all. Should I have spent more time working then and saving money for this time in my life when my children still need me in very tangible and precious ways? Have I really considered the trade-off between my earning potential and how much we might need this money in these teenage stages?

My experience is that adolescence is just as intense as early childhood. Sure, it’s not the same level of physical exhaustion and sleep deprivation, but it’s incredibly mentally and emotionally draining. Add to that the stress of trying to pay for everything and work more because you think the kids are “more independent” and it can be a recipe for disaster. I feel so exhausted right now trying to afford a life when the truth is my teenagers need my emotional and physical presence more than ever.