Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought we were going away from huge families with the advent of birth control but I guess not.

None of my six kids were accidents, dear. We knew exactly what we were doing. What a stupid statement.

Yes but can you afford to send them to college or do you expect the rest of that to do that on our tax dimes?

And the stupid statements keep on coming. I expect nothing of you, and you keep illustrating that my expectations are being met.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought we were going away from huge families with the advent of birth control but I guess not.

None of my six kids were accidents, dear. We knew exactly what we were doing. What a stupid statement.

Yes but can you afford to send them to college or do you expect the rest of that to do that on our tax dimes?

I’ve actually noticed it in the news recently for talent. In the last week saw Alyssa Liu (the figure skater I think that’s her name) is from a big family and the Voice winner was one of 9.
Made me wonder if there is any correlation with them being very motivated, but most likely it’s just something out of the ordinary so it gets press.
Big families are great!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought we were going away from huge families with the advent of birth control but I guess not.

None of my six kids were accidents, dear. We knew exactly what we were doing. What a stupid statement.

Did you want such a large family from the start?

Yes. Would have had more if not for age and complications.

Are you religious? Or have a farm?

No farm. As for being religious, it is defined as, “relating to or believing in a religion,” so yes. I’m sure you’d like to believe it means something different though so I’ll leave any conjecture up to you.

Do other people in your religion also have large families?

Does your religion encourage large families or discourage birth control? Does it play a factor at all in your family planning?

I see where you’re going, but there’s really no correlation. It’s somewhat offensive actually. We’re quite capable of controlling ourselves and not having kids, you know? We’ve chosen to have a large family.

my friend who is the least likely person to be the mom of a large family has 5 kids - 2 bio, 3 step. It is crazy to think of her with that many kids - it was kind of surprising she had any in the first place.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought we were going away from huge families with the advent of birth control but I guess not.

None of my six kids were accidents, dear. We knew exactly what we were doing. What a stupid statement.

Did you want such a large family from the start?

Yes. Would have had more if not for age and complications.

Are you religious? Or have a farm?

The questions on this thread are special.
I have 7 and NO FARM. My girls wear pants and we use electricity in case you were wondering.

Ha! Good for you. Not my cup of tea (I have 3) but some these posters are being quite ridiculous. The main reason people have a lot of kids? THEY LIKE KIDS. Yes religion and income play a factor, statistically but geez. DH has a friend from college- he and his wife have 6. They are no different from us, demographically- they just really like kids and wanted a big family. They aren’t particularly religious, and they don’t live on a farm! Both from families of 2-3 kids themselves.

In my peer group, I have been surprised at the number of families with 3 children. I'm 40, and when I was growing up almost every family had 2 children.

But, I only know two families my age with more than 3, and I know zero families with more than 5. Most of my neighbors have 2. Most of my friends have 0 or 1. I have 1, myself.

My mom has 5 siblings (plus an infant sibling who only survived days) and MIL has 8 siblings. Mom and MIL each had only 2 children. Mom has 1 grandchild (my child) and MIL has 4.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These are horrible news stories OP. How is your first thought about the Brady Bunch? You know it’s uncommon so why ask?

I’m so heartbroken for that father who lost his wife and six children. I can’t even imagine.

+1. Scary stuff, any of us could have an electrical fire (if that is the cause, as suspected).

I lived in a condo in Arlington where there was an electrical fire that killed someone. It was pretty terrifying how ltitle time we had to get out.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought we were going away from huge families with the advent of birth control but I guess not.

None of my six kids were accidents, dear. We knew exactly what we were doing. What a stupid statement.

Did you want such a large family from the start?

Yes. Would have had more if not for age and complications.

Are you religious? Or have a farm?

The questions on this thread are special.
I have 7 and NO FARM. My girls wear pants and we use electricity in case you were wondering.

I had two when I was a teenager. Two in my late twenties/early 30's, then got two stepchildren when I re-married. That's how I have six. Four live at home now. Very few people where we live have more than three.

I do personally know 4 families with 6 kids. All of them I met here - 2 are still here and 2 have moved. One is Greek -cultural thing. 2 are adoptive/foster families with a couple bio and a few adopted children. The last is actually quite religious and went deep into the bible to name one of their girls "Scarlett" - they have moved closer to their families.

Anonymous wrote:No. Not common. Anywhere. They are outliers.

It is very common in some areas. Get outside your bubble.

I have 7 children. We are definitely the outliers and it would be the first thing everyone points out about us. We are slightly religious but it has nothing to do with the number of kids we have. I always knew I wanted a large family and just enjoy it.

In my local area I know one other family with 6 and two with 5. I have a friend who is Orthodox and the majority of families are 5+ in her urban area. The Mormon friends we have actually tease us as we have more kids than they have.

Not common especially in this area, but certainly not unheard of.

Anonymous wrote:These are horrible news stories OP. How is your first thought about the Brady Bunch? You know it’s uncommon so why ask?

I’m so heartbroken for that father who lost his wife and six children. I can’t even imagine.

+1. Scary stuff, any of us could have an electrical fire (if that is the cause, as suspected).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These are horrible news stories OP. How is your first thought about the Brady Bunch? You know it’s uncommon so why ask?

I’m so heartbroken for that father who lost his wife and six children. I can’t even imagine.

Except its not so uncommon anymore? Every week I see an article on IVF multiples or somehow a family of 5+ got into some kind of trouble or a celebrity with the same number - Eddie Murphy has 9 and Kevin Costner has 7.

I thought we were going away from huge families with the advent of birth control but I guess not.

The data supports the fact that family sizes are getting smaller in the US. Large families are outliers. Yes, they exist. But they are not the norm. There is not one family of more than three children in my neighborhood that has over 200 large single family homes.