Question for those with large families

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First off, what is your definition of “large”? I post on a board for moms of many and our minimum for large is 5,but in our family,5 would be considered “just getting started”!
I’m the mom of 6 and any comments I’ve ever gotten were all positive and approving.One time,a waitress asked my husband if the kids were all his and I had to pipe in that “I helped!” lol! I don’t like to have snappy comments because I like to be a postive advocate for a large family and not some stressed out harried mommy (even if it KILLS me to be patient!).
If I get any kind of comment about my “large” family, I generally say that it is larger than some I know and smaller than others. There are many Amish families around here so maybe people are used to seeing many kids in tow!
 
Hey, we’re just doin’ our part to save Social Security!!!
Or, if they are all boys…
Just heard there was a priest shortage.

Or:

“T.V.'s broken.”

Of course, I usually just grin and say, “Oh, yes, they are all mine.”
 
THutch04 said:
I’m sure those of you with large families have experienced many comments from people about your family size. I was wondering how you all react to the comments and questions people have, such as “are they all yours,” “you must really be busy,” “they have pills for that” ect. Just curious to hear your thoughts!
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My dear, devoutly Catholic mother used to stop the questioner dead-in-his-tracks with a sweetly worded, “Yes, they’re all mine…but from different fathers…” 😃

And she’d laugh and laugh the whole ride home.
 
An internet friend of mine on another site has the best comeback: “Yes, we know what causes this, that’s why we’re so good at it!”

She’s working on her sixth right now. That aint so many. Course, easy for me to say since I’ve only got the one right now…
 
Thank you all for your replies. I have to say, there are some REALLY good responses here. I love that one about all of them coming from different fathers!!!

I don’t know what it is about large families that I like so much. I’ve never been much of a “kid” person, but whenever I see a large family I can’t help but smile. Of course, for me, “large” is four children or more. Actually, that’s not TOO big, but it’s huge for America today. I hardly know anybody who has more than three siblings.
 
lifeisbeautiful said:
Lol, although I only have two, yesterday while doing grocery shopping I experienced two out of the three comments you just presented as examples. I was trying out my new double stroller, the newborn in the back and the 1 yr old up front. Are they all yours? (lol, two kids, yeah, they are both mine). You must be really busy (Sure, but I wouldn’t trade it for the world or Actually its not as hard as I thought it would be). Hehe, I just thought it was funny that I got these comments, I guess the stroller is kind of big so it draws attention to us. Anyways, the people who said it were not being mean or rude, but I just thought it was funny that people made the comments you listed. I only have 2 but I do get comments on having them close together, or on how I should stop now that we have a boy and a girl. Although it has come from some well meaning confused relatives, usually it just comes from people are just trying to make conversation or are just ignorant and don’t know better. I just tell them we are open to more. Sometimes it comes from people that are trying to compliment you, but there aren’t very good at it 🙂
I can’t imagine what it will be like if we are blessed with a larger family (like many of you on here) since we get so many comments with just 2. I don’t understand society nowadays where its ok tell someone to stop having kids, but not ok to mention God. Sheesh
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The same here with twins.
Double Trouble! (No, four times the fun.)
You have your hands full! (ALL moms have their hands full. Whatever time you have, take what you need for yourself, because you can just hand over the rest.)
Are you going to have more? (Well, gee, that’s kind of personal, don’t you think? Besides, if I say no, and have another, some nitwit will have to tell the poor kid, and I say yes and don’t, I’ll be dogged with questions until I’m ten years past menopause. So my answer is that we’d feel lucky to have whomever God sends.)

We still have just the two, but the kids were listening. We saw a woman crossing the street with four little kids, including two in a stroller. My kids said, “Wow, Mom, look at that lady! She’s really lucky!”

I do remember a priest coming to our Catholic high school, urging us girls to be more generous than our moms. I had two classmates from families of 16. They nearly passed out! 😃
 
BLB_Oregon said:
We still have just the two, but the kids were listening. We saw a woman crossing the street with four little kids, including two in a stroller. My kids said, “Wow, Mom, look at that lady! She’s really lucky!”
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Isn’t it amazing how kids listen to and observe (and assimilate) their parents’ attitudes towards things? Almost scary. One more reason why our giving a good example is sooo important.
BLB_Oregon said:
I do remember a priest coming to our Catholic high school, urging us girls to be more generous than our moms. I had two classmates from families of 16. They nearly passed out! 😃
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:rotfl: LOL
 
My favorite response to “are they all yours?” is:
"No, these aren’t all. We have a couple more at home.🙂 "
 
I had my license plate frame custom made to say “Mom of 5 - I know, I have my hands full”.

I have 5 kids, all 4 and under. We are ALWAYS getting comments. The rude ones come more from family than strangers. People in public just usually do the “Are they all yours”, “You have your hands full”, etc. Family does the “Don’t you know what causes that?”, “Are you done yet?” etc.

In public I smile and wisk my cart away. It’s harder to do that now that I have 2 6mo old twins. Everyone wants to oogle over them, and then they pop in the “you have your hands full” comment, or go on about their husband’s fourth cousin twice-removed sister-in-law who had twins.

I like the grandma’s comment “We LOVE makin’ babies”!! If I get the guts, I’ll have to use this 🙂
 
AirForceMama said:
I had my license plate frame custom made to say “Mom of 5 - I know, I have my hands full”.

I have 5 kids, all 4 and under. We are ALWAYS getting comments. The rude ones come more from family than strangers. People in public just usually do the “Are they all yours”, “You have your hands full”, etc. Family does the “Don’t you know what causes that?”, “Are you done yet?” etc.

In public I smile and wisk my cart away. It’s harder to do that now that I have 2 6mo old twins. Everyone wants to oogle over them, and then they pop in the “you have your hands full” comment, or go on about their husband’s fourth cousin twice-removed sister-in-law who had twins.

I like the grandma’s comment “We LOVE makin’ babies”!! If I get the guts, I’ll have to use this 🙂
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Yeah, twins make you a celebrity, whether you want to be or not. Oh, well. You have to keep it in perspective. If that’s part of the price of having them both, then it is more than worth it.

As for the “don’t you know what causes that?” comments, I always thought I’d want to answer the same way as I used to with the variation that I would hear: “Glad it’s you and not me.” My stock answer was: “Oh, I’m sorry you feel that way. It may not be the easiest life, but we’re as blessed as the angels! We couldn’t imagine it any other way. We are very, very lucky.”

The main thing is to say what you want your kids to remember you saying. They are the only ones who will, and they will remember always.
 
Well, we have 5 children and I consider that medium sized but I know that many people in our culture consider more than 2 to be large. I think big families are beautiful and I am envious of those with bunches of children. If I had it to do over again, I’d try to have as many as we could.

I don’t think we’ve ever had any negative comments about our family size. Many good ones, though. Our family is kind of unusual because we have a severely disabled (birth) child and two adopted children(one is special needs, though it isn’t obvious by looking at him). People think we are so wonderful (if they only really knew us, LOL!) because we adopted older kids and have a disabled child.

Oh, the comeback about them having different fathers: I can truthfully say that I have 5 children with three different fathers.😉

Our oldest is off to college so our family is starting to shrink now. I think when people have young children, their family looks bigger. I think little ones are more labor intensive so even if total number of kids is less, the family seems bigger if the children are very young.
 
When we found out that we were having our 4th, we had just started looking into the Catholic Church. Mind you, when we were expecting #3, a lady at our old church actually expressed sympathy for us! One of my co-workers said, “Oh, so you’re planning on being one of those good Catholics.” Fortunately, she was joking, but I’ve heard similar comments from other folks, particularly, “You do know what causes that, don’t you?” My response is usually something like, “Yeah, we know, and we kinda like it, too!”

I don’t consider our family particularly large, especially considering the number of families in our parish with more than 7 children (I saw two such families at Mass on Sunday). I know of at least one family with 9, and have heard of some with more than that.

By the way, I love everyone’s responses, and Brendan, I may have to buy that t-shirt for my wife. Yeah, we only have 4, but most folks today think that’s a ridiculously large family.
 
I read an article “Wanted by the Fertility Police”, I think it was in ‘Celebrate Life’ from www.all.org

It inspired me to write my own article using the same title based on my own experiences. The most interesting feedback I received after it was published was from my own older kids, now adults.

They hadn’t thought through many of their experiences growing up, as one son said, we had lots of kids and no money, and he wanted lots of money and no kids.

The article made them stop and think about the fun they had as kids, improvising and compensating for the lack of material possesions. Now, instead of thinking they were deprived, they are looking at their childhood years with nostalgia.
 
I have 4 kids and I get the questions all the time! “Are they all yours?” Yes and I have more at home!!! lol I love to see their expressions. This older lady asked -just the other day-what do I do in my spare time. Hello-I am making a family!

I have read recently that the americans need to have larger familys to help the Social Security problem so now I answer that I am having children to pay for their Social Security!
When I get the question “You know they have pills for that” I answer "Who am I to think I am smarter than God. I am pro life and don’t believe in abortion devices. That seems to shut people up. I have a sarcastic aittude so nice people out there may not want to use my advice.
 
Frank Gilbreth (the real-life father in Cheaper By the Dozen) used to laugh when strangers commented on his “brood” and say, “If you like these,you should see the ones we left at home!”
 
I have the original “Cheaper by the Dozen” and “Bells on thier Toes” and they are hilarious! I loved that father!!
Anyone else ever see the original “Cheaper by the Dozen”?
My favorite part was when the Planned Parent Hood lady came by to recruit the Mrs. to speak and hold meetings in her large home. It is so funny how they respond to her!lol
 
I came from a large family, and the comment I heard most often was " are your parents done yet"

I would just tell people that I am not involved in that conversation at our house. It is not as though my parents went to all the kids and said, we are thinking about having sex tonight, what do you think?

That pretty much ended the questions.

A lone Raven
 
Unbelievable that people have to be so rude instead of welcoming when they see you have more than two children.

I had eight children, and, thankfully, no one made disparaging remarks to me.

Children are a blessing from God!..not a disease.
 
I laugh at the comments now, but there was a time when I was shocked by the audacity of some people. I think the ones that come to mind are the pregnancy comments:
“Oh what a shame that you are having twins this time instead of when you were on your first, then you would have been done”
Ummm…why? Am I only allowed to have two?
“Now that you have your girl you can quit right?”
Nah, I think every girl needs a sister!
“Wow twins, I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy”
Me neither, but I would wish it on my best friend! Just think…doubly blest

I think my favorite wasn’t even a verbal comment though. To be fair, all the kids weren’t mine either:
I am watching my friends 3 kids for the weekend, I have 3 of my own and at this time, I am a single mom. Sunday morning I pack all the kids up and trek off to mass. We get to the church and start piling out. The kids are 11, 8, 6, 6, 2 and 6 mos… This woman just stops dead in her tracks and stares. You know the kind of stare you only see in the movies…open mouth, catatonic, like she is truly in shock. I looked her square in the eye and said as sweetly as I could, “Either I am the bravest woman in the world or the craziest.” and I give her a big smile… She is indignant! How dare I speak to her or notice her staring! So I walk on and into mass with all my angels and sit 2 rows in front of her. All my kids are assigned one of my friends kids and they watch them and help them behave during mass. After mass you wouldn’t believe the comments on how well behaved the children were!!!

I still get comments or questions from people, usually they ask if they are all mine, even if I don’t have all of them with me!!! I only have 4!!! I just smile and say yes, and they are awesome kids!

I have had folks make the crude comments about what causes it… I just smile and say, “Yes, we have discovered what causes these and we like it!” That usually shuts them up pretty quick. Once I was in McDonalds with the hubby and kids ordering food and I had some women’s libber look down her nose at me and make a comment about how it is women like me that give all women a bad name and it’s why women can’t acheive in the workforce. I loved that one!!! My husband just took a deep breath and braced himself for my reaction. I looked at this lady and asked why she would think a thing like that, why she would think that children are such a liability. Then I didn’t give her time to respond, I just informed her that I am the Director of Information Technology at my company, and oh, by the way, my kids all attended college with me (I still swear they learned more than I did!) and that is why my oldest son has his own business at 17 yo and for her information…all my kids had to learn how to cook and do laundry and clean house, etc… how was that a liability to women in the workforce? The whole time my husband is grabbing my arm and patting me…the woman is totally speechless, I am red in the face, and one of the kids seeing what is going on comes up and asks if they can help me…the other kids take their cue from this one and all of them come to see if mom needs help…it was too cool to see the kids rally like that. I wonder what she thought 5 minutes later when we all folded our hands and prayed before we ate at McDonalds?
 
I don’t know if anyone in this forum is familiar with Dr. William Sears, a pediatrician with 8 children who has a website: askdrsears.com…

He and his wife Martha, who’s a registered nurse, have raised their 8 children (the youngest with Down syndrome) together and seemingly have done a fabulous job. 2 of the sons have joined their father in his pediatrics practice.

In response to accusations of having “too many children in an already overpopulated world” Martha Sears is said to have responded, “The world needs my children.”

What a wonderful reply, IMHO!
 
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