Family with 12 Kids -- Their Rules, and How All 12 Paid for College Themselves

Parent Cafe
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<p>There’s a huge difference between older siblings helping younger siblings and being “paired” with another that they were specially responsible for.</p>

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<p>@romanigypsyeyes Of course a 3 year old isn’t cleaning out the bathroom by himself… There definitely was supervision involved.</p>

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<p>@romanigypsyeyes if you’re going to quote me, please do it properly: “but in turn we were primarily responsible for helping my mom out with that child”</p>

<p>No where did I say that we were “responsible for” any child. The parents were in charge, and responsible for everyone.</p>

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<p>I do not see any difference but ok…</p>

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<p>@CF I am Child #6 and we are not nearly as organized in our parenting styles as our parents, but really each of us parent in our own way. Not all of us have children either. 5 of the adult children don’t have children. Who knows what their parenting styles will be. Does your parenting style resemble your parents, or do you see their flaws and benefits and take from it what you will? I think each of us has done that our own way</p>

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<p>Given the age of the “kids”, credit for the system shouldn’t go to the Duggars. I think you can go back to “Cheaper by the Dozen”, for that matter. </p>

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<p>For “foist them onto older kids”, substitute “put them in daycare”. How do you feel about that sentence now? Lots of other judgemental substitutions: “stick them in the substandard public school”, “conceive them as a single parent”, “raise them without a religion”, “raise them with a religion”, “buy them whatever they want”…</p>

<p>:rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:</p>

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<p>Romani,</p>

<p>You don’t have children yet. I have two. My son is responsible for helping me with my daughter. It’s part of his chores. For example, sometimes when I have to finish my work in the evening and don’t have time, I ask him to make sure that my daughter did her math homework correctly. Today he will be dropping her off at the dance lessons, because I have evening teleconference. I don’t see it as me making my son responsible for my daughter. He is helping me and I see nothing wrong with it.</p>

<p>Moerderin, thank you for coming here and explaining. I personally would not want to be pregnant for better part of 15 years of my life and I don’t think I would want to live in your parents household, but it obviously worked for you. </p>

<p>I do have a question regarding not being together since 1998. It does strike odd to me that there was never an occasion (wedding, anniversary, big birthday bash) which everyone attended.</p>

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<p>Those of us who have done genealogy are more than aware that our foremothers were often pregnant for years on end and often lost a lot of babies or small children along the way. And that education was interrupted at an early age so that there was help either on the family farm or in the factory to put food on the table. I can point to my great-grandmother, who lost twin siblings in the flu epidemic of 1917, another great-grandmother who had no choice but stop her education at age 15 so she could work in a factory, a great-great-grandmother who worked as a domestic, or my great-great-grandmother who lost 4 children in a row, each under a year.</p>

<p>No one is silly enough to romanticize those bigger families as being “better”, though. They just didn’t have the healthcare, sanitation and birth control options we have today. And there’s nothing to indicate those families were anything special in terms of “closeness” compared to today’s families. They were just … bigger. That’s all.</p>

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<p>Personally I think the skills needed to care for a child can be picked up on a just-in-time basis. There’s no need to learn how to change diapers, etc. until you have your own. I doubt my kids have changed diapers aside from maybe the occasional babysitting or looking after their cousin who is much younger. Maybe a half dozen times tops. Oh well. When they have their own kids, they’ll figure it out with a five-minute lesson.</p>

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<p>A lot of people have said that it is odd that we haven’t been together since 1998. I want to set that straight, since my dad’s memory is slightly faulty, but everyone got together at my wedding in 2002. But the truth is that we don’t all get together very often. Usually there are only about 30 of us together at a time. Trying to get all those people together on that many different schedules is hard. Usually only one or two people will be missing at a time. We are honestly very very close. I consider my family my best friends.</p>

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<p>As long as it was legal, I see no problems. No abuse here that I see. I don’t know why anyone is being so critical. It’s a choice and it appears to have worked fine. I admire the parents for being able to maintain the consistency and discipline over all of those years. I could not. I could not even stick to my own rules and standards–maybe things would have worked better if we could have. So I am full of admiration.</p>

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<p>Not that out of the norm to have a hard time getting everyone together at one time (and this is me and my five siblings). Maybe 3 or 4 times in 20 years we were all together with my mother in the same room. It gets harder as children become adults and go off to work and then move to different parts of the country.</p>

<p>Also I get your point pizzagirl but bigger also doesn’t mean worse either. It’s just different since we now have more access to birth control, I think we think that everyone should want smaller families, but people are different. I know one very large family and she just likes having babies (yes they are self sufficient). Yes they are discriminated against and parenting skills questioned for the sole reason of being a large family.</p>

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<p>moerderin and sthomson6 - so awesome that you stopped in! I appreciate your comments.</p>

<p>I’ve always been in awe of the large families that seem to have it all together. I have a friend who is mom to a huge family and it works well. I have told her I suspect that she is a clone and there are really six of her doing it all.</p>

<p>Romani- I don’t know how all 3 year olds clean toilets. I can tell you how mine would if left to their own devices. First the swisher, which would leave a trail of blue all over the toilet. Then a little plastic toy soldier would go for a swim, before he got flushed. Maybe dino would get thrown in to save him. </p>

<p>Glad to see that the three year old was supervised. Mine would be too.</p>

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<p>Your toddler may not do a great job cleaning the toilet, but your baby can mop.
[Baby</a> Mop Polishes Floors as Baby Crawls - YouTube](<a href=“- YouTube”>- YouTube)</p>

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<p>So, I can believe that the mom in this article had no help at home. I can also believe that there were stricter rules than most posters had, although it doesn’t sound very different from my family of origin. My parents had only three kids, but our household was run like a military operation and I had friends whose families were the same. I was the youngest, and by the time I was in 4th grade I spent every Saturday doing housework for at least half a day. My mother wanted our house to look as if it could pass a white glove inspection. </p>

<p>We had supper at 6:00 p.m., without fail. By the time I was in grade school, my dad was an exec who insisted that he and his staff leave the office by 5:00 daily, so I can see how the 5:30 dinners in the article happened.
<p>I find myself hoping that Mr. Thompson got a bad edit or simply did a poor job of describing their family life. It would be interesting to read his wife’s version, as well as comments from the kids.</p>

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<p>That was actually not too uncommon a generation ago. But, back then, colleges cost a lot less, and high school graduates could relatively easily find jobs that would support themselves and have some money left over for college tuition and books. Unfortunately, the current generation of high school students faces much higher college costs and much worse work earning prospects, making it much more difficult for them to work their way through college than their parents.</p>

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<p>I’m number seven. I want to add to the clarification about being a close family. I’ve rarely seen a family as close as us. Maybe we can’t all be together (in-laws, nieces and nephews, etc.) at once, but it is over 30 people. </p>

<p>I live multiple states away from the next nearest family member, yet I fly to visit family at least 4 times per year (in 2013 it was 7 times). In addition, I talk on the phone to at least 3-4 siblings per day and usually talk to all of them at least once per week, including my parents. </p>

<p>With so many children being so close in age, we were always each other’s best friends. Like my siblings have said, it wasn’t always easy, but I loved having such a large family. I loved having siblings who could play tag outside with me, or ride with me on our bikes to the beach. Earlier this year, we had >30 at my sister’s wedding and now that we’re older, we suceeded in a human pyramid with a 5-man base!</p>

<p>We are getting together again in May and are already planning a handstand competition (the teasing beforehand is pretty entertaining)! I am sure to practice so I might be able to beat the youngest brother. Right now he is a favorite to win.</p>

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<p>@ucbalumnus, You’re right, college tuition has risen sharply the past couple years. I graduated in 2007, but started off by going to community college for the first 2 years, then transferred. That lowered the cost a bit, but I have several siblings who went directly to a 4-year university.</p>

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<p>Human Pyramid with 5-man base - <a href=“https://scontent-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn2/t1/960021_10201222261260089_559111433_n.jpg[/url]”>https://scontent-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn2/t1/960021_10201222261260089_559111433_n.jpg&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>(edit) 4-man base was a LOT easier! - <a href=“https://scontent-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn2/t1/969629_10201222202498620_1897560176_n.jpg[/url]”>https://scontent-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn2/t1/969629_10201222202498620_1897560176_n.jpg&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Coordinated push-up contest (1st one to fall while all doing push-ups simultaneously was eliminated)- <a href=“https://scontent-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn2/1151007_10151602058392894_1039647987_n.jpg[/url]”>https://scontent-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn2/1151007_10151602058392894_1039647987_n.jpg&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Tickle torturing the last one to jump onto the pile (me) - <a href=“https://scontent-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/943080_10152879704495537_476931083_n.jpg[/url]”>https://scontent-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/943080_10152879704495537_476931083_n.jpg&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>I don’t care if someone has one child or 21. No matter how many they have they should take care of them, feed them, clothe them, and raise them to be decent folks. If they’re doing that, it’s no one’s business to criticize or comment.</p>