I’m the youngest of three daughters. While I thought I was picked on or treated as a baby at times, I have overall enjoyed my birth order position. My mom recently sent me an old Erma Bombeck column, clipped from a 1993 newspaper. Regardless of your birth order position, or perhaps as a mother of several children, I wonder if you can relate.

A recent column I wrote on how mothers age and change priorities with each child prompted a reader from Dallas to pass on a chart called, “From Here to Maternity: Oh How We Change.” It was written by P.E. Luecke Jr., M.D., and should hang on the walls of every pediatrician’s office in the country:

Birthdays: First baby: Tuesday, Jan. 26, 1956, 7:34 a.m.. Second baby: July 28, daytime. Third baby: the year the grocery store burned down.

Named after: First baby: grandmother and paternal aunt for political reasons. Second baby: Daddy. Third baby: Daddy’s boss.

Godparents: First baby: Bernard Ryan and Joy Smith. Second baby: Martha Dunn and either Uncle Fred or Fred the barber. Third baby: relatives.

Formula: fortified prepared infant formula with 1.25 water. Second baby: heated cow’s milk poured from a carton. Third baby: cold milk, Cokes and Kool-Aid.

Bottles: First baby: boiled 10 minutes, removed with tongs and rubber gloves. Second baby: boiled five minutes, removed with beer can opener. Third baby: rinsed in cold water and dried on apron.

Handling: First baby: right hand behind head, left under knee, clutch baby close to body. Second baby: place hands under armpits and lift. Third baby: one arm around stomach.

Length and weight at one year: First baby: 15 pounds, 14 1/2 ounces, 26 1/4 inches. Second baby: 16 or 17 pounds, same height as vertical knob on TV set. Third baby: heavier than a bowling ball. Short.

Sanitation: First baby: rubber gloves, face mask, scrub floors weekly, mosquito net. Second baby: use air freshener weekly, swat all flies. Third baby: keep the dog out of the playpen.

Baby records: First baby: detailed in gold embossed book. Second baby: written on back of old envelopes. Third baby: Ask grandma.

The good doctor is right. As the challenges keep coming, mothers realize they can’t possibly keep pace or they’ll wind up comatose under the kitchen sink. I got to the point where I was feeling sorry for the dog, and when one of the kids kissed him, I washed the dog’s mouth out with soap and said, “You never know where that mouth has been.”

It’s hard to believe that I needle-pointed my first child’s name on a pillow. By the time the third one came along, I wanted to do that – but couldn’t remember it half the time.

Okay, so perhaps a few of these are a bit exaggerated, but there’s a hint of truth. What have your experiences been?