Where to put all these kids?! Wwyd?

[MissMooley]

Wasn't sure where to post this to get the most advice.
Basically I'm in a 3 bed house. Me, dds 14 & 19, and ds 11&8.
Currently, dd 14 & 19 have their own rooms, and the boys share. I have a bed in the living room.
It's worked for us nicely, but now I'm due twins in 10 weeks 😂🙈
I have no idea where they're going lol
My options so far are:

1- Scrap having a living room and just make it a full bedroom for me and the twins.

2- make the living room a full bedroom, and move the sofa etc into the outshed, but not sure how that will go in winter, it gets pretty cold and I don't have the money to fully convert it (also a council house, so would need permission I assume?)

That's it. I don't like the idea of having no living room but there's literally no space to have the cots and all the baby stuff in there with my bed and the sofa etc too.

I've considered the girls sharing, but eldest has asd and several mh disorders so can't see that working for her.

Just feel a bit stuck and hoping someone has a magic solution I haven't thought of!

Twins are exceptional circumstances! There is a rule for multiples that where the first won't be eligible for UC purposes due to there being 2 or more existing children on the claim any other babies are. So twins can claim for 1, triplets 2 and so on.

With this number of children I'd be concerned OP might run into the benefit cap though when on maternity which could make things very tough. Personally I'd wonder if the eldest might do better moving into her own supported space.

It's always twins 🙄

Nonsense. Girl/boy twins are the most common fraternal twins.
https://www.verywellfamily.com/what-are-dizygotic-twins-1960107

Could you and the twins move in with the twins father with the youngest children, and then the oldest two continue living in the house?

And PIP is not means tested

I appear to have far too many fars in my post! Wasn’t intended to be particularly dramatic though.

It's a sad situation all round I feel for the kids but I suspect op is vulnerable.

What kind of life are you giving your children all crammed into a 3 bed with you using the lounge as a bedroom? I'd have loved more kids after my twins but I don't have the space and felt it unfair to force my life choices on my existing children?

My advice? Twins will benefit from the extension of funded hours. Go back to work as soon they are in funded hours and start working yourself out of your housing situation - your 19 year old is an adult - if they are working then they need to pay you rent - if they are in education then they also need to be working alongside and paying you rent - if they can't work and have to have use of a sole room then their disability payments is now rent. Where are the father (s) ??

Well, it’s not about the mother, it’s about the children. If she can’t adequately house them, benefits are limited, so she will struggle to provide for them, then she really needs to consider where the children’s needs are going to be met best. She is also forcing the already overcrowded children she has into even worse living conditions.

Many kids are adopted. Open adoptions are possible. Giving the babies up would probably give them the best chance of being quickly adopted and having a good start in life and enabling the 4 kids that the OP already has of having their lives impacted as little as possible. People need to understand responsibility sometimes means hard choices and sacrifice.

You can have as many fars as you want 😂

I’m 100% sure the NHS would pay for you to be sterilised. If you are not lying about truly being done with having children.

That way there are no more “accidents”?

Yes, let's start taking kids of anyone who doesn't have an extra bedroom, ffs you sound evil

Fuck me, have I logged on to the Daily Mail by mistake?

I don’t think that poster said anything about ‘taking’ children, she just listed the OP’s realistic options. She also did not just demand the OP give the twins up for adoption.

Really?

I didn’t get that impression at all. I just think she comes from a background in which this is normal. Some people see parenting as having a baby and keeping it alive. They don’t understand about investing into your child, spending time, resources and energy on them. So you can “parent” six kids in a 3 bed easily. Having a termination is “unthinkable” but chaos, poverty and squalor are just par for the course, unfortunately.

How irresponsible to get yourself in this situation. Where are the Fathers? I don’t like the word vulnerable being thrown around. Why are they vulnerable bar the daft decisions they keep making and the crap choices they make with men time and time again.

She made a comment that alluded to anyone not being in the best position to give up their kids. Nasty, callous and tbh downright insulting. What next, can't afford your electricity this week, let's whip your kids away and give them to someone with a better income!

Thank you for this post, I’m relieved to see some compassion and recognition of what it takes to be a civilised society.

There’s some folk on this site I think would be happy to return to Victorian workhouses or the forced adoptions of the past.

Oh dear. Oh dear. How the hell have you got to such a position where someone who is suggesting that people should take personal responsibility, deal with the consequences of their actions and put kids first is evil??? The OP started running out of room for more kids several years ago but went on to have two more, now she’s got pregnant again, and in a couple of years time when she’s pregnant again????

Actually this sounds a familiar rhetoric.

Can you extend? Loft conversion? How big are the bedrooms?

Babies don't need a cot each or even a full cot to start with.

Rubbish. Non identical twins are two eggs fertilised separately by two sperm, both can be either sex.

Where is the father? Why are you bringing more children into an already overcrowded situation?

100% this.....expecting the state to pay for your life, yawn

Again, she didn’t say anything about the children being taken or ‘whipped away’.

That’s is all good and well but you’re forcing this onto your existing kids is well. Did you really consider their needs and decide that having two more children is what was best for all of you? It clearly isn’t, so bizarre

I’m not ashamed at all, I think it’s a pretty reasonable opinion (and judging by others comments, I’m not alone in my view)

No, you're not alone. In my experience there are multiple shitty people that live around us and even post on MN. There's absolutely nothing to be gained from your posts (and the other similar comments) than perhaps inflating your own feelings of superiority at having made a nasty dig at someone and potentially made them feel worse. Not one of those posts telling OP to not have 6 kids is at all practical.