When we share our FIRE plans with family, friends and online, the most controversial topic of all is – What about raising kids while planning for Early Retirement? We heard all sorts of remarks such as: Yeah we will see once you have kids, things will change once you have kids, What about kids – they are expensive to raise etc.
These are valid concerns and we agree that raising kids takes effort and money. Now that we are new parents we can share our experience of raising our Son while pursuing early retirement. We plan to write regularly on this subject and especially cover the actual cost of raising our kid with middle class values in India.
*we spruced up the house a bit because it was due and we knew after baby comes we will not get a chance for a while- will write a detailed blog post on that.Â
TABLE OF CONTENT
Pregnancy Costs
This post is dedicated to expenses incurred by us during pregnancy and the delivery. Here is what 9 months of pregnancy and delivery (we had a C-section) costed us:
Below is the month-by-month cost of consultation, scans, medicines and the C-section. As per our doctor vaginal delivery cost is 15-20K less than C-section.
We were very fortunate to get a very able doctor who was also known to our family friends and they made sure we got extra attention from him. Overall we could not have been happier with the entire experience. We can’t thank our Doctor, friends and family enough for making our pregnancy and delivery as smooth as possible.
We are doing well and baby is healthy. Past month with the newborn baby was exhausting and deeply satisfying at the same time. sharing a recent photo with you all:-)
Doctor Consultation: Total Cost INR 8,400
Our Ob-Gyn’s ( Obstetrician- Gynecologist) consultation charges were Rs.500/visit. We visited him in 2-week and 4-week intervals for the first 8 months and every week after that.
Scans and Tests: Total Cost INR 13,365
Other than pregnancy-related scans and blood tests, I had to get monthly thyroid tests done, which costed 750 bucks each time – this is an exception and not a regular pregnancy expense.
Medicines (mostly supplements):Â Total Cost INR 11,622
Most of the medicines during pregnancy were supplements such as Vitamins, folic acid, calcium and iron. These supplements are taken for entire 9 months and some continues later as well.
Other Optional expenses: Total Cost INR 53,527
- Ayurvedic Consultation & supplements: We took Ayurvedic Consultation & supplements for the entire duration of pregnancy. Weekly cost of the consultation and supplements was Rs 900. We were guided by our doctor on a fortnightly basis on what to eat. We also went to him for minor pregnancy issues such as constipation, back pain etc and the total cost for this over the entire pregnancy was 36,000 Rs. We believe in Ayurveda, it was not something necessary but something we wanted to do.Â
- Maternity Clothes: I got a few hand-me-downs from a dear friend so I did not need to spend much on maternity clothes. Total spend was 8,426 Rs.
- Dry Fruits: 🙂 You will be surprised how expensive that can be when you are eating a bunch of them every day. Our Ayurvedic doc had recommended eating a mix of soaked almonds, figs, apricots, raisins, walnut. I could only eat it for 5 months and then I just could not bring myself to eat them. The total cost for 5 months of dry-fruits was 9,101 Rs.
Total Cost of Pregnancy and Delivery
Excluding the optional expenses on Ayurveda, Maternity Clothes and Dry Fruits we spent roughly 1.5 lakhs during Pregnancy and on the Delivery.
A note on Maternity Cover via Health Insurance:
We did not opt for the Maternity Cover add-on offered by our Health Insurance. This was because there was a 3-year waiting period to become eligible. Since we were already in our 30s when we got married we assumed that we would have kids soon and waiting for 3 years to have kids was not the plan. As it turned out we had our kid 4 years after marriage 🙂 as we did not feel ready until then.
We did a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation and found that even if we had paid Rs.10,000 extra in annual premium for the maternity cover for 3 years costing a total of Rs.30,000 in extra premiums we would have still saved Rs.20,000 since the Cesarean was covered upto Rs.50,000. You can do your own math to see if Maternity Cover makes sense for you. While thinking about waiting periods don’t forget to include the 9 months of pregnancy 🙂 So the waiting period is technically only 2 years and 3 months! Also this maternity cover allows upto 2 pregnancies so it may make sense if you are planning to have a second kid in quick succession.
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Little off-topic, We recently watched trailer of @PlayWithFIRECo- A documentary featuring 30 F.I.R.E Couple in the USA. Though it is made in US but story is true to INDIA as well:-) It bought so many bitter sweet memories of our own journey. it will be very exciting to watch real people talk about their personal journeys on screen when it is released. For now sharing the trailer-
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