To wonder how mums of yore did it

[Peonii]

I just read on another thread that "you should only have as many children as you can cope with on your own" and "three kids is already too many for most people to handle".I feel like these are relatively new ideas as there were bigger families in previous generations. I only have one DC (14 months old)and with that limited experience I totally get those statements. I am in wonder at how mums juggle having babies, recovery, weight loss, back to work, emotional transitions, career progression, another baby, rinse and repeat. Before DC I really wanted four children. But honestly WTF. How the fudge do women do it!? I would still love a big family but I am terrified for a) my body (it's still healing 14 months later) b) my energy levels c)the lack of time I have for things that aren't family related eg. exercise or hobbies.

How do women do it? Men could never. I have never been particularly the "down with men" type but having a baby has completely changed my perception of what a successful man and woman are. But I'm waffling. I'm just curious how women have managed large families and careers and life. I am frazzled after just one.

Some very good comments, thanks PPs!
I often wandered how women did it all in the "dreaded" fifties, feeling inadequate and incapable.
You know, staying slim, make up, all the household, food preparation and kids...
Then someone said they were on antidepressants or husbands paid for outside help.
Well, my late Granny had neither and seemed to have done very well. 😊

Out of context, does anyone else hate that drooling emoji? 🤢🤤

In previous generations older children were expected to look after the younger ones, children were expected to amuse themselves and help at home/in the family business or, depending on how far back you go, go to work as soon as they could walk.

The last 2 on your list have always been done by (mainly) mothers.

More so than now without the labour saving devices we have now. Mum didn't have a washing machine until after I (number 5 or 7) was born.

Overall, eating was healthier too with less meat and no take aways (manybe fish and chips 2 or 3 times a year).

Life was more active (fewer cars and no labour saving devices) definitely more active to burn up any excess carbs. Excercise was part of life and didn't need special equipment or time.

I suggest they actually did all the above but in different ways (inlcuding 'lack of' sleep) and with different expectations - Women didn't even think of having 'it all'. (We often put most pressure and expectations on ourselves and of course SM is constantly sticking the boot in)

Some say happier but Valium was the Prozac of yesteryear and many a gallon of gin was drunk

Most women stayed at home looking after the children. Men went to work. And the bigger the family the more involved the older children were in child care and household chores. Most kids left school as soon as they could and got jobs.

Even in the baby boomer generation there was less expectation around careers for women. Work was work. It fitted round family where it could. And yes they were exhausted. It is only really since the 90's have women been expected to have careers as the norm. And the chances are they have had smaller families (if at all) as a result.

As others have said there were also less expectations around lifestyles. Fewer after school activities, almost no overseas holidays, clothes were hand me downs etc.

The reality is we can't do it all. There is always a compromise.

Have loved reading this thread.

Lots of working class women worked in the evening with cleaning jobs usually in schools or office blocks. This work was very low paid.

No idea how they, or more of them, didn't go stark staring mad. Discovered my great grandmother had FIFTEEN children, of whom 13 reached adulthood.

My kids are older now and I look back and wonder how I coped in the early days. Eldest is severely disabled and I needed to watch him 24/7 . When he was 7 I had my daughter and 14 months later my son. I think life must have been a bit hectic and I’ve blocked it out!

I’ve no idea how mums coped back in the 50’s 60’s without the labour saving devices we have now especially.

Tranquilisers, house prices in keeping with a single wage, hitting the kids when they played up/backchatted/existed in the wrong place at the wrong time, smoking, amphetamines for a pick-me-up and diet helper, chucking them out onto the street to go and bother somebody else, daughters forced into childcare and housework - all the shitty things associated with a lack of power or control over fertility, expectations of having larger families, less car ownership (or at least second car ownership), fewer activities - and not getting out of your lane, as that only led to pretensions and, worst of all, girls getting notions of wanting to stay on at school instead of getting a shop or at best, as typing job until she married in her early twenties and started the whole cycle again.

It might have been nice for some people, but being in a large family that was in poverty was utterly shit from my perspective, my sister's perspective and two out of three brothers' perspectives - borne out by the usual not having any more than two children themselves (if any).

In answer to the question in the OP about how mothers manage "large families and careers and life", well one thing is that a genuinely large family (three kids doesn't count as large!) is not compatible with two careers. That's as true today as it was in days of "yore". I know a lot of large families, and the mothers almost universally don't work, or if they do work it fits around the family. There is always one main family income. Means financial sacrifices but also some financial gains (no £££ in childcare!) and a lot more time to spend on the kids. Far less of a family juggle, and less of a need to deal with the stress of employers' expectations and career needs vs family needs.

Again, kids from large families tend to do fewer organised extra curriculars but on the flip side need much less entertaining.

It's just a different lifestyle, with different compromises.