I'm very interested in this thread...we always said 3, maybe 4 (which meant that we definitely wanted 4 but weren't advertising it because of the reaction from people and all the "are you mad?" comments).

However, I'm pregnant with Number 3 and we are now thinking we might be done because we just don't get a break. We don't have any family support at all, nobody living close, new to the state so no friends yet either. DS is in bed with us every night, DD wakes up and needs resettling once or twice at night. We are in an endless Groundhog Day...a happy Groundhog Day...but the buck always, always stops with us and we have nobody to call on except each other.

When I first found out I was pregnant I was still thinking this was my second last but as time has gone on I am finding it much more physically taxing. I am so tired and I am not being the parent I want to be because I simply do not have the energy. I am having some pelvic instability, my varicose veins are playing me up something shocking. I cannot imagine doing this again with 3 little kids to look after, I am really worried I wouldn't cope.

DH is leaving it up to me, he says it is ultimately my decision. He is happy with 3 or 4...I must say it is me thinking that my body has had enough and I don't physically want to go through another pregnancy and labour.

There are also practicalities in play in our discussions...3 kids are "easier" than 4 in terms of holiday accommodation, cars and whatnot. However, we have already bought our 7 seater which will accommodate 4 anchored carseats. We chose it when the 4th was definitely still on the agenda and that's okay...we may still change our minds.

Schooling..we are putting money away for it now via an Australian Scholarship Group fund but we are still planning on public school. We would only go private if we had a child with a gift a particular school would be better able to facilitate.

Physical and practical considerations aside, emotionally I would love a 4th, especially a brother for DS (Number 3 is a girl). I would need to get past that, though, and make sure I want a 4th for itself...not because I want DS to have a brother. And practically speaking, how close would they be if the 4th was a boy? There would be an age gap there of at least 5 years. I am another one who has deliberately chosen small age gaps between my kids because I grew up with larger age gaps and I hated that my siblings weren't my contemporaries. I am now 34 and we still haven't bridged those gaps completely.

All the same people who were all that we were even entertaining the idea of 4 are all very negative about only 3...."middle child, middle child!" I keep hearing, which is really p!$$ing me off, like I am deliberately making DD's life a misery going forward and that she is going to be somehow disadvantaged. My sister (the middle child) is saying to me "at least you'll be aware of it" which just annoys me even more. I think being a middle child is the lesser of two evils when the alternative is a mummy who is struggling to cope and not feeling like she has any quality time for any of her kids, not to mention to special time the middle child seems to require, massaging away any potential chips on shoulders, if I am to believe what I'm hearing.

But my best friend's mum is 4th of 6 and says SHE feels like a middle child...would I then get two middle children if we had 4? I've thought long and hard about this and I think it will come down to personality in the end...DH is one of 2 and he and his sister only just tolerate each other and both have said they wished they had another sibling because they hated the one they had!

DH and I have talked and talked about it and the idea of stopping at 3 is really growing on us...it started off a bit like "are we soft? are we giving up? we always said we wanted 4, we're in the thick of it now, what's one more? is this really the last one?" I think we've talked about it every day for the last 3 months...that's a lot of talking!!

Now we are thinking more along the lines of being able to have more time for each of the 3 children we will have...being able to move on to the next stage of life (ie no nappies, cots or highchairs) and the freedom that gives us in making family outings and holidays easier. That's been a big thing for us, as it turns out, we feel the longer we wait to have a 4th kind of also means we are holding back DS a bit in terms of doing things he is more than capable of but the younger ones might not appreciate eg going camping etc. In a perfect world we'd just keep having babies, we love them so much (and we make such beautiful babies!) But we don't live in that perfect world...and we are worried we wouldn't get to enjoy them or nurture them as they deserve. And although it is sad...I think at the moment we are feeling a sneaking sense of relief that perhaps this is the last one. We keep reminding ourselves we are entitled to consider our own needs too.

We have agreed that there will be no final decision made (ie no snipping of any sort!) until this one is about a year old...when we think we'll be able to make a clear headed decision as to whether we go back one more time.

I totally get what you mean about feeling there is another one waiting to be born. I know that feeling. In the months before I got pregnant, I could sense the presence of someone "waiting". However what is confusing me is that I always somehow knew my youngest would be a girl and I feel that this little soul is the one I have always been able to sense as being my youngest.

Those are my thoughts anyway...bit disjointed but hopefully something there helps you crystallise some thoughts of your own one way or the other.