Highest number children you know someone to have in real life?

[Newsenmum]

People talk about these crazy massive families that exist on news but what is the largest family you know? Im from quite a middle class area down south. Most families I know have one or two kids, sometimes three. I have one friend pregnant with her fourth and know one school mum with five! Very unusual though.

Girl I went to school with (our Mums are friends) has at least 8 with around a 25 year age gap, started at 15 and still going strong at 40!

She had immense support from her Mum with the first few as she was very young and still wanted to party but her Mum said no more financial subsidy and endless babysitting after 4 as she was getting too old for it.

It all went very wrong after that, kids being left alone, charged with neglect , dog shit all over the house and named in our local media etc. Kids were taking into care, some sent off to various family members of their Dads etc. The younger ones produced afterwards have a high level of social work supervision.

I have six. I knew a woman down south who had fifteen. I rarely meet anyone with four or more.

I know a mum about to have her 16th child. All same dad and same mum. Very happy family.

My Mum is one of 3 which isn’t super remarkable, and my paternal grandfather was one of 4 (but one died in childhood, 1930s).

I have two friends who have 4 kids each, one of them had her first at 17 and her last at 40! I know casually someone who has 5.

Most of DSs friends have one or two siblings - he’s the outlier in that he’s an only child.

This makes me realise how small my family is! I'm 1 of 2. Both my parents are the same. I only have two cousins.

On the other hand, my husband has so many cousins he can't keep track - about 20+?

We're both early 30s

I know a couple of families with 5 kids and many with 4. When I was growing up, we knew a family with 13 children.

6 and all at private school too!

I went to school with a lad who was one of 17 (Catholic family). My dad is one of 8 and my best friend's sister had 5 kids by 30.

13, at one stage they had 5 under 3. 2 x sets of twins and a toddler 🙈

My mother had 7 babies, she had around 80 first cousins, her father, my grandfather was one of 14 or 17, I forget how many, but I’ve seen a photograph of them with their mother, one of my aunts has 8, my children, born this century, have one aunt who had 7, my children have 28 first cousins. (We are Irish). The trend now is for minimum of two, often 3 or 4 max, in general. When I went to school you’d have been abnormal to have only 2.

i am one of 5, my dad was one of 10 and mum was one of 9. Not that unusual in Ireland back in the day. When I was growing up in london 70s and 80s I knew lots of families with 3 or 4 kids. My best friend at school was an only child - he was the only, only child that I knew.

things have certainly changed

I’ve got 4, lots of my friends have 3 or 4 kids. My brother has 4 too. I can’t think of anyone I know now who has more than 5 though

I know someone who's one of six because her mum and dad wanted a third child and then had natural quadruplets

I have seven.

My cousins mum has 6, four with my uncle and 2 with her current husband.
my grandad is also one of 6.
tbh my dad technically has 5 kids. Me and my brother with my mum and 2 boys and 1 girl with his wife. I’m the oldest and there’s 26 years between me and my little sister.

I have three. The vast majority of my friends have two, plus a handful of other ‘3 kids’ families and a few with four (among those are a family who went for a third and got twins!)

My friend’s sister has TEN though! Had her first children very young, and three different dads to all the kids…

My grandfather was the youngest of seven.

A family friend's DS and DIL went for a third, partly to fill the last seat in the car... and got twins. Having upgraded to a 7-seater, the dog is firmly put in the seventh seat so that his wife doesn't get any further ideas of having another baby! 😂

Through working in education, I've known students who are one of 6 and 13 (including half-siblings).

I had a school friend that was 1 of 6 and my children went to school with siblings that were a family of 6 children. I did meet someone that was 1 of 9 but she was from the Middle East.

12 or 14, can't recall now. When I was a child. They were dirt poor, and mostly not very happy children.

I have a friend who is one of nine, and I have two friends who have seven.

6 and lots of 4’s. Growing up I knew lots of 6 and 7’s and one 9. My parents were both one of six DC and my DH has 4 siblings. I have 28 first cousins!

I used to work in a religious area and knew one mother of 16. I will say that even in that area, there are fewer double digit families than there used to be.

Amongst friends, the most is six, but a pair of surprise twins was involved. A couple with 5, more with 4, but 2-3 is more typical.

when I was a child I was friends with someone who had 21 siblings. She was my age and her brother was my dads age.
quite recently I know someone who has 12 DCs she kept on having DSs. She wanted a DD. She had her DD it was her tenth baby. Everyone thought she would stop but she went on to have two more DSs. Her DH is working so they’re not on benefits but they do have a council house. They had to have a house that was two knocked into one to accommodate them all.
I am one of five and one of my other friends is one of eleven.
I live just outside the Valleys in South Wales 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

My friend has 8.

Both my parents are 1 of 6 children.

we have 5 children ourselves.

One of my in-laws is one of 11 but in their 50s now. More recently my sister went to school with someone who's also one of 10 who will be early 20s. I know a few people with 3 but no more than that. Both my parents were 1 of 4 though which I always thought was normal for their generation but would seem like loads now, especially with 2-3 year age gaps.