To wonder if you're one of the older members of a large family you ever stop and think

[PlayOnWurtz]

No more kids please mum and dad!

How much were you expected to do to support them?

The real problem with this thread is people comparing apples and oranges. Back in the Day people who weren't particularly interested in parenting or good at it had huge families because they didn't really have a choice.

Now big families are the preserve of people who have found they love parenting (probably because they are good at it).

So all this 'my dad was 1/11 and hated it' is totally irrelevant to the discussion..and so are most of the 'I am 1/11' too unless the others are still children atm.

I am a rubbish parent, and tbh I wish I had know before I had my 1 child because it isn't very fair on her to have such an ungifted Mum. But I certainly have the sense to stop at one, given I can barely cope with that!

Now big families are the preserve of people who have found they love parenting (probably because they are good at it)

I know 5 families of 4+ children and none of them are good at parenting
1 family is very religious, 1 family is very hippy, they are all chaotic and muddle along

yep and not all families last century were big by accident - the point is the general trend is towards big families because you really want to parent a lot of kids.

People may be not as great at parenting as they think they are, but WANTING to do it is a major step in the right direction!

Engagement and interest is the single most important thing a parent can bring. Organisation skills might be useful but isn't as important by a long shot.

My mum is the 9th of 10 children, and she is in her late 60s. Most of her siblings are still alive, if they are not alive, the sibling's spouse is still alive. All siblings save for one went on to have their own children, and have grand-children and sometimes great-grandchildren.

My mum and her siblings all live in the area they were brought up. But the siblings' children and their families don't all live in that area, many (including me) live hours away.

As a result, my mum finds that she takes her siblings and their spouses to lots of health appointments, out for the afternoon shopping or for something to eat etc, does some shopping or cleaning for them, that kind of thing. So even though she is one of the youngest in the family, she is doing a lot for the older ones now.

She did the same when she was growing up too. As the 9th, there is 18 years between her and her eldest sibling. As a teenager, she would be taking her nieces and nephews to school, picking them up, babysitting etc regularly.

I'm quite happy if people have big families because we have an ageing population & we need all these children to grow up & work to fund pensions etc to support us all.
Someone said about big families being looked down on because its traditionally what poor people do, I agree. I've seen so many tv programs with big families on benefits etc & their children repeating the cycle & therefore never really contributing to the economy. This thread however shows me that there are plenty of large families who do it really well & have lovely children.

Now big families are the preserve of people who have found they love parenting (probably because they are good at it)

That is complete nonsense. There's no link between lots of children and being good at parenting, or lots of children and loving parenting, either.

I am the eldest of six though three are half siblings from my dads second marriage and I love coming from a large family.

I was asked to babysit a lot in my teens for my youngest siblings, but at the same time, I was always allowed friends around to hang out while I was doing so and free to say no if I had other plans. To me, family is all pitching in when needed, despite age.

Now we are all adults, we always look out for each other. I am closer to some siblings than others but none of them would turn me away if I needed their help with something - but there is such a large range of ages that it makes sense that I would spend more time with my sister who is close to my age than with my younger brothers who are a decade younger than me.

It has affected us differently in our own life choices though - We were quite poor when we were young (me, my sister and eldest brother), though we were always fed clothed. My mother was a stay at home mum, so had more time to play with us and utilise free/cheap means of amusing us, salt dough, bowls of water outside, long walks to the library and back etc whereas my sister and I both work full time.

My sister goes above and beyond to make sure her children never want for anything, even if that means getting into debt, because she never wants them to feel like we did - "Must not ask for that as we know Mummy doesn't have enough pennies" whereas I am more of the opinion "Well it never did me any harm to learn the value of things" and wouldn't put myself in a worrying position financially at the expense of saying no to some requests. That's probably the difference between being the stoic responsible eldest and the overlooked middle child haha.

U2

I don't think I'm superior to you but I feel generally that people should be aware that having more than two children has an impact on the environment and that impact isn't good.

my Granny was the oldest of 2. But there was big age gap. She spent all her teenage years looking after her younger brother and hated it and swore she would never expect her kids to do it.

So I don't think this is the preserve of large families.

My dh's family are huge. His Dad is one of 10 and many of those have gone on to have big families themselves. Dh has over 40 cousins, and doesn't even know their names!

We were born in the 70's and 80's. Contraception was available but my parents didn't want to use it. My mum was quite anti the pill when I was a teenager because she thought it was dangerous although she did change her mind when a sibling became pregnant at 15.

Of course people can have a moan about how much things cost Complaining that your children are not able to do (paid) extra curricular activities that their friends do because you cannot afford it is bizarre to me when you are still adding more children. It is as if this particular family feels that the world owes them.

The notion that big families nowadays have them purely because they love children is very untrue. Going back to my uni days if I recall correctly the children from larger families are often living in greater levels of poverty. From a governmental policy perspective the greater the amount of children the higher risk they face in terms of poverty, neglect, abuse, poor educational outcomes etc (this was ten years ago, don't know if it still applies)

I am one of the older ones of a very big family. Our heritage is Catholic. My Catholic parent is from a very big family, my other parent is an only child and the fact that there are so many of us speaks volumes as to which of them had the happier childhood.

I love all my siblings, all our inside jokes, all our shared experience, Christmas is brilliant, you never need to worry about no-one showing up to your birthday party. They are fantastic. It's not the Waltons, sometimes they're dickheads, sometimes I am, but I think being part of a big family teaches you how to get on with people and make up and not be so precious about everything. The people on here saying 'I hate all my siblings and don't talk to any of them' - I often find people who are like that with their families have other problems socialising too.

Yes, growing up we all shared bedrooms and there were lots of sibling battles, but I wouldn't swap my bunch for any amount of money or privacy. My parents both worked very hard and we were fine financially. They're obviously much better off now lots of us are grown up and have left home. I did have a lot of hands on experience and babysitting practice, which has proved very useful when having my own children (and definitely encouraged me to be bloody careful with contraception until I was sure I wanted them!)

Of those of us of marriageable/childbearing age, we have/plan to have bigger than average families. I know all my siblings feel the same as I do about our upbringing and as I know lots of big families (Catholic!) I would say 90% of them would agree with me, completely contrary to most of the people posting on here. My RL experience doesn't match up with this thread at all.

Jed, are you male?

I do think there is a difference between people who choose to have large family and those who had no choice due to lack of access to contraception. DH is one of 12 (North African), his older siblings have large families but not as large (7 or 8 children) the younger one's all have smaller families (3 or 4 children). DH is the youngest and we have 2. None of DH's nephews and nieces have more than 4 children at the moment. I think that as women have had more access to contraception and become more economically active they are able to exercise more control over the size of their families. I do think it is interesting that none of them have chosen so far to have a really large family.

reallyanotherone no, why?!

I come from a Catholic background and went to a Catholic school. My parents were each one of 4. They all had 2 or 3 each. There were many children I was at school with who had 10 + aunts and uncles, but were only children themselves. My best friend had 20 aunts and uncles but was an only child with 2 cousins. I think there is a difference between choosing to have a large family and it being part of your fate

This is an interesting question. I'm the youngest of 8. I assume my eldest siblings' experience was quite different to mine. I'm going to ask them.

tea that is ridiculously simplistic.

A family with 6 kids may well use less resources than a family with 1 depending on their level of consumption. The smaller family could go on and on making a bigger impact on the environment their entire lives.
And of course relying on other people's children to care for them and pay for the services they use.

Not sure why U2 is taking this so personally, you only have 4 kids! I have quite a few pals with that many - it's pretty normal.

As one of full siblings, 8 of us, raised together in same house all the time (there's a 15 year gap between eldest and youngest although eldest 3 are one after another, 2 with less than a year between them) it was not a utopia.

I had nothing private / sacred. Everything was a compromise to accommodate all which made nobody happy- we never went to anywhere like funfairs / the theatre a though there's not a cathedral / museum / art gallery this side of Moscow we were not dragged round...

Very middle class, Irish, Catholic background- all kept in our place by God and the constraints/needs of the family. No individual relationship / memories of childhood that are special to me/ about me.

I am not taking it that personally. Don't worry, I'm not losing any sleep over it it or feeling hurt.

I have quite enjoyed the discussion.

I have five kids, although right now I'm quite tempted to put one of them back.

I know 3 siblings who come from a family with 6 children - they have had large families themselves - 6, 7 and 10(!) - though the one with 10 has 3 grown up children from previous relationship and 7 with his wife. I think the other 3 siblings just had 2/3 children each.

For a brief time I had 3 step siblings (all younger) in addition to my younger sister - I quite enjoyed it (even if they did sometimes get on my nerves) Then stepdad left with his 3 children - I wish I had more siblings as my sister has cut herself off from the family and lives a very 'alternative' lifestyle and I really miss having a sibling relationship/ cousins for my children - I envy friends with a large and supportive extended family - though I recognise not all large families are like that.

It's not to be honest MrsDV

It's the single biggest way to impact your carbon footprint.

It isn't for me to say people shouldn't have children but I do think it's something we need to be aware of before we have to be aware of it, if you see what I mean.

But no one had mentioned it in this discussion so I thought I would :)

Now big families are the preserve of people who have found they love parenting (probably because they are good at it)

Not in my experience, it's either for the benefits / the need to constantly have a baby as opposed to a child / to gain a certain sex.

it's either for the benefits

of course, because we all know what a get rich quick scheme having a baby is

I hope no-one takes offense at this, but how does having 6+ children impact on you physically? Has your body changed much?