Large Families

[cmotherofpirl]

[quote name='CatherineM' post='1782148' date='Feb 15 2009, 11:49 PM']One of the advantages of both being black sheeps (we are still practicing Catholics, poor, and content to be so) is that we are excused from attending cattle calls.[/quote]
We are not, the whole lot of them is irish catholic

[Socrates]

I've got nothing against large families, but that woman with the octuplets disgusts me. It's really the flip-side of the contraceptive mentality. With the God-given roles of sex and procreation divorced, people want sex without procreation, and procreation without sex.

While I'd say clan-type families are probably a more "natural" form of human society, I'm not sure how if they could really be cohesively recreated in modern society, especially given the the geographical and social-religious division in modern families. (For example, my nuclear family are the only Catholics in our extended family, and some of our relatives are liberal Democrats).

Having grown up knowing a quite a few large families (10+ children), I'd have to say that the idea that they are not close-knit is simply false. Some of the most close-knit families I've known are also some of the largest.
It's not about size; it's about the family doing things together as a family. While there may not be as much individual parental one-on-one, older siblings help raise the younger, and there seems to be a lot of connection between family members.
A lot of these families seem closer than a lot of families with 1.5 kids.

[MithLuin]

What makes a good family is love. Leave that out, and the kids will be miserable, regardless of how many or how few you have.

Parents should be aware of their own limitations, and not have more children than they can care for (whatever number that might be).

Also, while it might be tempting to think that people used to always have large families, it's not entirely true. In Medieval times, infant mortality was pretty high, so families weren't all 12 kids. In fact, it was unusual to have a very large family, I think. (I remember they had census data for one 10th century town, and the largest family by far was 9 kids - that was the exception.)

Some people who grow up in small families felt lonely, so want to have large families themselves. Some people who grew up in large families felt limited/neglected so choose to have fewer children. And others loved their own experience, and would like to duplicate it in their own families. I mean, there is an incredible variety among families, and I don't think there is a 'right' number of kids to have.

[missionseeker]

yes there is! As many as God gives you!

[Azriel]

Ponder the flip side for those of us who only have one child, or are an only child and wonder why you as a good Catholic mom only have one child. People will ALWAYS find ways to judge other people without being in their particular position. I should not have to explain to anyone why I have only one child. Its between myself, my husband and God.

[picchick]

[quote name='Azriel' post='1784344' date='Feb 18 2009, 09:39 AM']Ponder the flip side for those of us who only have one child, or are an only child and wonder why you as a good Catholic mom only have one child. People will ALWAYS find ways to judge other people without being in their particular position. I should not have to explain to anyone why I have only one child. Its between myself, my husband and God.[/quote]

I agree with you.

I think the decision to have a large family or a small family is up to the parents and to God. I have seen some of the larger families look down on the smaller ones (even though they were Catholic) like they were not pullng their weight. I love seeing large families and I am in a large family. Will I have a large family myself? Probably not but I don't know. I have to decide that later.

Also as far as the close knit thing goes. I agree with Socs on this one. It is not the size that matters. It is what you do together that does. Furthermore, sibilings will be closer to some rather than others. That is just how it goes. But a family that prays and plays together stays together. You could have one or two kids and take them to the park, take them places, play games, watch videos and be very tight knit and close. You could have a large family that does the same thing. And then you could have the complete opposite.

Meg

[Era Might]

[quote name='Azriel' post='1784344' date='Feb 18 2009, 09:39 AM']Ponder the flip side for those of us who only have one child, or are an only child and wonder why you as a good Catholic mom only have one child. People will ALWAYS find ways to judge other people without being in their particular position. I should not have to explain to anyone why I have only one child. Its between myself, my husband and God.[/quote]
The intent of this thread is not meant to be about any specific family, but rather, about large families in general, and how the parent-child relationship functions in those families. I didn't want to get into a discussion on any specific family situation, because every family situation is different. But I do think there is a certain attitude held by some people in our society, that large families are weird and/or unhealthy for the parents and the children, and that's what I wanted to discuss.

[Azriel]

My apologies, it was not my intent to hijack your thread. I think it is valid that many people hold an attitude about large families. It just brought to mind my particular situation and so, I commented, I thought it was a value added comment or I wouldn't have made it.

Funny, I don't post much anymore, thought for once I may have something of value to say. Oh well.

[Era Might]

[quote name='Azriel' post='1784974' date='Feb 18 2009, 09:05 PM']My apologies, it was not my intent to hijack your thread. I think it is valid that many people hold an attitude about large families. It just brought to mind my particular situation and so, I commented, I thought it was a value added comment or I wouldn't have made it.

Funny, I don't post much anymore, thought for once I may have something of value to say. Oh well.[/quote]
You didn't hijack the thread. I just wanted to make clear that I was not trying to judge anyone's personal family situation, just trying to have a general sociological/psychological discussion on large families. It's fine if someone wants to post about their personal experience, I just don't want them to feel like this thread is meant to be a judgment on their specific family. I just meant the thread as a general discussion.

[Saint Therese]

I think large families are such a witness today. Even Catholics often dont' have many children.
I knew a lady who had 13 children. She was awesome.
In southern Lousiana its not uncommon for the Cajun families to have 18 or 19 children.
I think its beautiful. Children are a gift from God but society today only sees them in terms of dollar signs.

[homeschoolmom]

[quote name='Azriel' post='1784344' date='Feb 18 2009, 09:39 AM']Ponder the flip side for those of us who only have one child, or are an only child and wonder why you as a good Catholic mom only have one child. People will ALWAYS find ways to judge other people without being in their particular position. I should not have to explain to anyone why I have only one child. Its between myself, my husband and God.[/quote]

[Archaeology cat]

[quote name='Socrates' post='1784029' date='Feb 18 2009, 02:51 AM']It's not about size; it's about the family doing things together as a family. While there may not be as much individual parental one-on-one, older siblings help raise the younger, and there seems to be a lot of connection between family members.
A lot of these families seem closer than a lot of families with 1.5 kids.[/quote]
Very much agreed.

[quote name='picchick' post='1784463' date='Feb 18 2009, 05:32 PM']Also as far as the close knit thing goes. I agree with Socs on this one. It is not the size that matters. It is what you do together that does. Furthermore, sibilings will be closer to some rather than others. That is just how it goes. But a family that prays and plays together stays together. You could have one or two kids and take them to the park, take them places, play games, watch videos and be very tight knit and close. You could have a large family that does the same thing. And then you could have the complete opposite.[/quote]
Yep. In any size family some will naturally be closer to some than others. For example, I'm the youngest of three, and have always been closest to my brother, who is the oldest, even though there's 12.5 years between us. It's just the way it happens.

[tinytherese]

[quote name='Azriel' post='1784344' date='Feb 18 2009, 09:39 AM']Ponder the flip side for those of us who only have one child, or are an only child and wonder why you as a good Catholic mom only have one child. People will ALWAYS find ways to judge other people without being in their particular position. I should not have to explain to anyone why I have only one child. Its between myself, my husband and God.[/quote]

It's ironic because the Holy Family only had one child.

[tinytherese]

[quote name='Deeds' post='1781805' date='Feb 15 2009, 06:34 PM']I was an only child until I was nearly 9. I remember very clearly being around 6 or 7 and thinking that I would never have a sister or brother and feeling very sad. My parents planned to have such a large gap because they thought it would be good to give me lots of attention for those years, but it was no substitute for having siblings around. I have one brother now and we're very privileged materially, but I've always felt drawn to the idea of having a large family myself.

[url="http://www.conversiondiary.com/search/label/Family%20Size?max-results=200"]This blog[/url] contains some very interesting posts about openness to life and societal expectations of family size.[/quote]

There are considerable age gaps between my brothers and I. My half brother from my first dad's disaster, that was originally called a marriage that got annuled, is ten years older than me. He visited my dad, mom, and I a lot when I was a baby and toddler but after that he only came around for special occasions or for a few random visits a year. He lived with his mom and step dad in another town and his mom and my dad were on (and unfortunatley still are on) really bad terms. Their divorce was very bitter and his mom lied to my brother about my dad in an attempt to turn him away from him. My brother is commitment phobic because of this and the behavior problems that he had growing up might have been influenced by the very bitter divorce as well. He was just a baby when they split.

During some of my childhood I didn't understand what a half sibling was and didn't understand or know about really the situation about my dad's first marriage. I mistakingly thought that he was my step brother but my mom explained it to me when I was eight. So I technically had a brother but didn't see him much and thought of myself as only child. My brother was (and still is to a certain extent) a stranger to me. He lived somewhat closeby when he went to community college and then when he was at the police academy and at his job in another town of my state but he wasn't as interested in visiting us (except for when our little brother was a baby.) He's now in another state far away back in school getting his bachelors and might go onto law school.

Last Christmas Eve, he and I had a breakthrew. Before on his visits he and I didn't have much of anything to talk about but that night he kept complimenting me, telling me that I was beautiful, and actually took an interest in me. He seemed to want to make up for all of the time that he wasn't around when I was growing up.

Other than the decade between my older half-brother and I, there's also the miscarried baby that died inside of my mom when I was eleven. I really was heart-broken when that happened. What was even worse was that that baby's due date was on Christmas, so that was a really bad Christmas for me because no baby was coming. I had really looked forward to not being the only kid around. I might have wanted that baby more than my parents did. I hated being basically an only child. My difficulty in making and keeping friends and the scarce amount of cousins that I had didn't help. I named that miscarried baby Nicholas and the middle name that I gave him was Theodore because it means gift from God which is what he is even though I never met him.

Then at thirteen my little brother was born. Years ago my mom joked about the age gap of us kids--24, 14, and 14 months. That kind of age gap in siblings has its pluses and minus but if I ever have kids I would preferably have them be closer together. I would have liked to have actually grow up with my little brother instead of almost being old enough to be his mother (which on more than one occasion I have been asked if I was) and for the situation with my older brother to run smoother.

[dairygirl4u2c]

[quote name='CatherineM' post='1781979' date='Feb 15 2009, 09:12 PM']My husband has 50 first cousins. He doesn't even attempt to know or remember all their names, let alone their spouses or children. One of the questions that Immigration asks is for you to name your spouse's siblings and cousins. It's a way of proving the relationship is real, and not just so you can immigrate. I told the officer that my husband didn't know all of them, so there was no way I was even going to try.[/quote]

yeah this is what i was talking about.
it's just not possible at a certain stage of the familys growth, to maintain anything meaningful, wth ever typcally thought relative ie, cousin uncle aunt bro sis perhaps cousins kid etc.
as i mentioned in that last post of mine.

[kavalamyself]

I come from a family of eight. Very cool.

[hoosieranna]

[quote name='Era Might' post='1784987' date='Feb 18 2009, 09:17 PM']You didn't hijack the thread. I just wanted to make clear that I was not trying to judge anyone's personal family situation, just trying to have a general sociological/psychological discussion on large families. It's fine if someone wants to post about their personal experience, I just don't want them to feel like this thread is meant to be a judgment on their specific family. I just meant the thread as a general discussion.[/quote]

I'll attempt to address the original question. I'm a geographer by education and training, with some background in population geography.

Historically, families have been large. What you also have to keep in mind is that infant mortality has been high for most of our history. A female might have seven or eight children, but only three would live to adulthood, and then have more children. With such a large chance of losing a child, parents and children didn't really get close, at least not in the way we now mean it. It wasn't a good or bad thing. It's just the way things were.

Personally, if a couple wants (and CAN support) a large family, more power to them. I feel the same way about small families, which is likely one of the reasons I'm still not Catholic (I know, I know, you're gradually wearing me down...). I have one sister, and we are each very close to our parents, but we weren't smothered. I've known some other families that were a little too close for me. My great-uncle had nine kids, and parties with them usually devolve into a sort of cheerful chaos. It's not bad.

edited for a typo

Edited February 26, 2009 by Nadezhda

[elizabeth09]

Large family is fun to be in. I always hear how many child we have. They told us that they can only have two children. When they grow older, they wish that they had more children then two.

[takebacktonight]

My Mom is one of 11 (well, 13 actually but I'll get to that)..

I can't imagine not having so many aunts and uncles and cousins...it would just be weird...and my mom and all of her siblings (except for one) are close.

That being said, my mom does not have very fond memories of growing up. She was small, quiet and lost in the crowd I think. There wasn't a lot of food or money (she remembers having a glass of chocolate milk as a huge treat) and the girls had to wait on the boys hand and foot. There were definitely favorites of the parents...and she wasn't one.

Then, about 7 years ago...we find out that there were two more full-blooded siblings...twins, that were conceived out of wedlock...but born into it. There was a lot of pressure from people (the Church included) to give them up, and nobody knew.

Chaos is not a strong enough word.

I guess my verdict is: Large, stable, families: cool. Large families with tyrannical mothers and deep dark skeletons in the closet: bad.

[elizabeth09]

So sad.