Why the dislike for larger families?

[momtoboys]

Posting here for traffic.

There was a post yesterday from a mom who had five children. I was surprised at the level of vitriol leveled at her for her larger than normal family. Things were said such as “you can’t properly parent five children”, “well, that’s your fault for having so many children”!

I have five children who are now grown. It made me wonder if people in my real world were thinking those mean things about my family. Why does it seem to be such a big deal? People choose the number of children that will complete their families. For some families it is one. Others it is six. Why do people seem to judge harshly if it is a higher number?

I don’t think there’s any inherent dislike for larger families, the issue just comes when the parents (somewhat predictably) can’t cope and think they are entitled to additional help.
Nowadays you only have a large family if you consciously want one. It’s wildly irresponsible to keep growing your family and then be surprised when you’re overwhelmed.

I know a family with 7 children who are always moaning about the council not getting them a bigger property (obviously the people to blame are the foreigners) but realistically, why do you keep popping out children? Just stop. It really shouldn’t be anyone’s obligation to keep upgrading you to a bigger property.

”She then took her youngest four out in the rain.”l

Good gods, how shocking. Call social services. They might dissolve!

Youre missing the point. She had to because her 16 year old can nit be trusted with the younger ones.

I think if people can have as many children as they like but if they expect help then that's a different matter.

Come on...if you have children, which I'm assuming you do, can you really say that you never had a difficult time with organization or never ran short on nappies? If you can, bully for you. I cannot say that. I did have five children. 4 of them came in sets of (unplanned) twins. We are financially stable and are a loving, cohesive unit. My husband is a wonderful father and I had more help than most. However, life was hard sometimes and most of the time it had very little with the number of kids I had.

I had five boys! They are young adults now and people still say to me "Oh, I'll bet you wish you had a girl!" (insert eyeroll)

Because that particular poster just churned out babies, contributed zilch to society and expected other people to 'help her' with them. I have no time people like her.

On the other hand I know a couple who have 4 children who both work FT, all 4 children are lovely, polite, and are doing well at school and are a huge credit to them. No problem at all with them.

Because not many families wit five children are able to have so many without being subsidized by other people who are paying for the privilege for others to have these large families.

In general, it’s because people consider it irresponsible. In spite of all the worries about birth rates, the world’s population has exploded over the last century. In 1900 there were a billion humans. By 1960 that had trebled to three billion. It’s now eight billion and we’re going to hit ten billion just as climate change is causing chaos. Africa’s birth rate is so high the African population is going to double. When you think about mass extinctions and declining fish stocks and that kind of thing, having five kids does seem a bit much.

People should have as many children as they themselves can manage.

If you can only manage two, stick at two. If you can manage five, have five.

But when you have a large family and then complain it’s hard work, and start putting upon friends and family for help, babysitting, running errands - that’s not on. You chose to have them, no one else. You made your bed, so you lie in it.

That was pretty much my experience as the eldest of five, but add in my parents just not having the money or emotional ability to parent five adequately, grinding poverty and overcrowdedness. It was less that I never had my parents to myself than that my role as the eldest was to ‘be fine’ and get on with things. They jist didn’t have the bandwidth for anything else.

Oh I don’t know- maybe they are one of “The Gang” or “The Crew” or whatever cutsie mass noun term you used for those children and thought for themselves “it is not so great”.

I’m one of six, all successful kids. I never had a one on one conversation with my mother because six kids is too many, and she was too busy keep everything spinning to have the time to get to know me as a person.

I don’t know anyone that is the child of a large family who thinks they got enough attention.

So to answer your question- the hostility comes from adults who’ve experienced what you’ve decided is best for your kids - and just disagree.

Because some of us were children in those larger families and it was shit. But hey, she had a new dolly for a couple of years until it developed a mind of its own and then she remembered how much she despised children, the latest just being added to the heap of damaged individuals (along with the multiple animals that were all cute until they weren't).

This ^^ hits the nail on the head. I wouldn't have liked lots of children because I hate chaos and drudgery, but if other people want large families it is up to them.

Is it that mum who has five boys with a big gap between the eldest and the youngest? She’s on her own, doesn’t seem to understand how the world works and has various problems with each of her sons. The fathers are also useless. Yes I do wonder why she continually had children despite clearly struggling so much with life skills in general. I feel more sympathy for her children. She clearly has needs herself and seems to have no support. It’s a very sad situation.

Surely people tend to judge more based on whether someone has more children than you can either afford, cope with and care for properly? I think most people don’t really care whether you have one or five, but whether you have the capability to meet all their needs without taking a victim approach of ‘why isn’t someone doing a, b or c to support MY kids that I chose to conceive?’.

It’s also very unfair when the eldest ones are expected to regularly help parent the younger kids because the parents can’t cope or to be mature beyond their years simply because they’re the eldest.

OP are you American? I only ask because of a couple of spelling differences. If you are, then I believe that larger families are more common in the US. In the UK, particularly with SAHM's, there is often stigma about claiming benefits for "children you can't afford". On the other hand, birthrates are falling overall, everywhere, are they not?

Except she would be accused of parentifying her teen if she expected them look care for four younger siblings.

I’m one of 5 and I don’t really recognise the stories of no 1-1 with mum ever, or no privacy. I mean, it was the 80s so the concept of “ parenting” hadn’t really been invented yet, but I definitely had 1-1 time, and the oldest was never expected to be an extra parent.
We didn’t have much money but did go on holiday once a year and my best memories are holidays/ Xmas when it was a lot of fun.
There was always someone to hang out with and talk to. We still all get on as adults for the most part.
Both parents worked, although my mum often worked part time. We were very self reliant, and by today’s standards, yes, not a lot of structured activities but if someone was really into a thing ( a musical instrument for example) it would be found ( often second hand, my mum was a magpie and brilliant and finding bargains)
Honestly, I don’t know where they found the energy!

I have 6! Ranging from 26 to 3 years old and I raised every one of my children without help from a single family member. I have been a single parent since my last pregnancy.
My children are all well mannered and career focused (the older ones) It can be done and im sick of whiners about family helping with 1 child! 🙄

This is a different one who isn't pregnant, youngest is a baby and has a (useless) DH.

Both have 5 boys and very, VERY similar writing styles. It's an amazing coincidence.

For watching 2-3 siblings for ten minutes?

The disdain wasn't directed towards her children. She made a very unwise decision to continue having multiple children with an absentee parent She was foucusing her ire at her mil instead of her dh. In the meantime her two eldest children were either vaping or stuck on the Xbox all day. That is poor parenting.

I have nothing against larger than average families, I'm one of 4 myself and have 3 of my own dc. What I wouldn't do is have another because I'm aware that I wouldn't be able to give my children all the time and energy they need to flourish. I'd need to drop hours at work to be able to mange another and i have no wish to do that. I have never relied on anyone (including grandparents) to take care of our kids, we work around each other and always have. Yes that means we make scarifices but they were our choices and it's a blessing to be their mum so I accept it.

I do find it annoying when parents who can't afford the kids they have already have more or those that hate parenting. We often see if on here where they hate the drudgery first time around but miraculously expect it will all work out the 2nd, 3rd or 4th time. People need to take responsibility for themselves and their choices.

It has come about on other threads to though, where number of children had no bearing on what poster was talking about.