How Expensive is Raising a Baby?

If anyone would have warned me that raising a child would be so expensive I wouldn't have believe them. From day one since my son was born I am afraid to think how much money we have spent between diapers, formula, etc... I don't know how people have more than two children and stay afloat. I am petrified that when we have a second baby money is going to so tight. It's hard enough to balance the checkbook with just one child. I am a teacher and make a pretty decent living. My husband owns his own business and he makes a decent living. Both our incomes combined you would would be enough for us to feel comfortable, nope. We are so backed up on credit card bills it's suffocating. I know that we can't be the only ones in this situation although sometimes I do feel this way.

Raising a baby. Let's start with the cost of formula. I made the decision to formula feed not breastfeed my baby for personal reasons I won't get into right now. We chose Nestle Carnation Good Start formula. Loved it. I tried to save money buy using the mix but I just couldn't seem to do it. The formula always came out looking funny so I switched to the premade. Just by doing that it became more expensive. My son was a big guy as a newborn and he drank a lot of formula. I must have went through almost 2 cases a week. Each case cost roughly $36 for six big cans. So let's do the math. $36 a case times 2 cases a week equals $72 a week. Times that by 4 weeks in a month that equals $288 a month. Needless to say I was so happy when he turned one and he no longer drank formula. The pediatrician said it was alright to switch him to regular whole milk now. What a savings this would add up to be.

Now let's move on to diapers. My son loves to poop. He is what I call a pooping machine. So we have to change his diapers a lot. At the beginning I would buy his diapers at Babies R Us for $36 a case, ouch..very expensive. It took me about a year to realize I should be shopping at Target since their prices are much more reasonable. I am now able to buy a case of diapers for $26, what a difference. Still a lot of money though when your child goes through a case a week. So again let's do the math. Let's take an average of $30 a case times that by 4 weeks in a month and that equals $120 a month. So between the formula and diapers we are looking at a total of $408. We haven't even added in the cost of food yet.

Cost of food. My son loves to eat. When he was a newborn he was already on cereal by three months. We added baby food by the fourth month. If we bought a 2 pack for $2 and we had to buy 10 packs a day that equals $20. Times that by 7 days a week equals $140. Times that by 4 weeks equals $560 a month. Add that to our previous total of $408 we are now at $968. Almost $1000 a month just diaper and feed the baby. We haven't even figured in the cost of clothing! Where does it stop. Not to mention the cost of putting money into a college savings fund for their future. This was an eye opener for us.

I do wonder of other parents are feeling the money strain like we are. We can't be the only ones.