Lots of food for thought here I didn’t get married til I was 33, not because I didn’t want to, but because I didn’t meet my husband till I was 32 (and the options I had before then, for many reasons, would not have made good husbands). We have 3 kids and hope for at least one more, but I’m already 40 and chances are we won’t have a huge family. I hope my boys will marry and start having kids much younger than I did, if they are able to! When I meet young couples who say they’re waiting for the “right time” to have kids—one guy recently told me he thinks that he and his wife, who have been married almost a decade, are “finally mature enough” to have kids—I want to say, “but it’s the *having kids* that foments the maturity!” My husband and I were eager to have kids ASAP when we got married due to our ages, but neither of us could have predicted the ways in which having children has shaped us and grown us up, even though we were already very much “adults” when we married.
I think the best way to ensure this is to immerse your children in a culture where having a lot of kids is normal/people tend to have kids earlier than average, but not too early. I've talked about my conversion to Catholicism as an adult and the fact I was inspired by attending Catholic school for a few years. Even though my parents weren't religious, living in an Irish Catholic enclave (where my great-grandparents came from their various homelands) is what planted my hopes of having kids on the younger side and having a large family. I think you're already doing that because your parents had so many kids!
Great article. With fewer children everywhere and a less supportive culture for families, it's going to take a good deal of intentionality if you want your kids to have kids.
My husband and I were recently talking about all our aunts/uncles/cousins, and counting up how many grandchildren there actually are for our parents' generation in our respective families. It's.... pretty dismal, relative the amount of cousins we have. So, this isn't solely an "out there" situation. We could very much observe how the factors you describe here (plus others) played out in our own families. My husband and I got married the week of my 27th birthday, and promptly had three children. He was an only child and none of my three siblings have children (for varying reasons), so with no cousins on the horizon for them.... we wanted to give our children the gift of each other. We'll see how many that turns out to be, but we often think of how we hope to guide our boys into more prudent adult decision-making, getting married earlier if possible, and having children. There's things we want to do, teach, and model differently with them to facilitate that. So this was a great read in that vein.
The no-cousins plight makes me so sad. We were the first on both sides to get married and I don’t anticipate any of our siblings having kids for a few more years at least.
We were the last and most recent ones to get married, ironically. But the one couple who wants children has not been able to carry to term, and it's been heartbreaking.
We are very fortunate and are a part of a vibrant parish community and parish school. The average family size is 5. We have 6. My kids laughed when I told them that we have a large family. “No we don’t Mom! The Smiths have a large family!” The Smiths have 15 kids.
One thing my husband and I try our hardest to do is avoid complaining about parenting at all but especially around our three children. Instead we often focus and comment on all of the great things about being a Mom and Dad. And we actively say things like “well when you have kids of your own it will be so great …” Our kids are still young enough that this feels like fun conversation.
This is definitely applicable to the newer parents crowd, of which I am a member haha. Our two boys are both still under 5, so I want to get on it as soon as I can with them!
My husband and I both come from families where it's just us and our older siblings. So our parents also only had two kids. I think, in my case, my parents didn't exactly encourage me to have kids, but they didn't actively discourage it either. I did have to come to the decision mostly all on my own. They did do things to set me up for it (especially financially), but those things could have applied to other life choices as well. My husband would probably say that his situation was similar! So anything both of us could do to be more encouraging to our sons is very helpful.
I am going to offer a different position on why I don’t think this is OK, as someone who was raised this way, with a lot of brothers/sisters/cousins.
We were taught that there was nothing greater in life than to keep close ties and celebrate the creation of new life. My brothers went off to successfully have new kids and I, twenty one to thirteen years younger than the oldest/youngest of my siblings, was ecstatic to have more family even though I wouldn’t be old enough to have kids for some time. We gushed over their plans for the future, decorated nurseries, and I started dreaming about my special day—which has never come.
I was born with the same kidney issues that killed my paternal aunt. It also played havoc on my hormones. I wound up being one in 10 with PCOS and unlucky enough to also have endometriosis on my organs. I cannot have children.
Yet every Christmas, some “well intentioned” relative brings up the fact that I don’t have children like they don’t understand infertility. I heard my own mother say that she doesn’t expect children from me and the tone was not empathetic.
You can be sad for yourself and happy for others, but it’s abysmal to be told you’re going to die alone because your body isn’t having it.
Not knowing how your kids are going to turn out, if they are going to have to be on chemo or hemo-dialysis, I do not think it is wise to push this idea. Too many in my family simply say ‘she doesn’t want them’ when that isn’t true at all. I feel like we are losing empathy when we assume the younger generation simply doesn’t want to when we have zero idea what they are going through medically or financially.
My mother in law openly blames me for marrying her son when she wanted grandchildren, even though she has a doting husband and has two other sons. So, should I relinquish my childhood sweetheart and die alone so she, who is very much not alone, can have the opportunity to see her favorite son reproduce?
My nieces and nephews, all grown now, do not want kids and one was recently diagnosed with PCOS like me. Their parents don’t understand why they don’t want kids. Frankly, we need to stop putting our desires on others. There are other ways to build a life and be content if we are even lucky enough to grow old. Stop feeling bad for us. We don’t need that negativity.
My husbands mom got lucky. She wanted him to be gay or trans (yeah...). And he's Catholic (they're agnostic/hippie-ish). We have two kids and I just turned 30. So we could have a little gang soon. An my MIL is as happy as she can be. She had a playground put in at her house... I feel bad for those who'll never be grandparents but it's hard when you're raising your kids in a death culture (abortion and euthanasia are OK). My family members have stopped saying 1 or 2 is enough. Now it's when is 3 coming.
Lots of food for thought here I didn’t get married til I was 33, not because I didn’t want to, but because I didn’t meet my husband till I was 32 (and the options I had before then, for many reasons, would not have made good husbands). We have 3 kids and hope for at least one more, but I’m already 40 and chances are we won’t have a huge family. I hope my boys will marry and start having kids much younger than I did, if they are able to! When I meet young couples who say they’re waiting for the “right time” to have kids—one guy recently told me he thinks that he and his wife, who have been married almost a decade, are “finally mature enough” to have kids—I want to say, “but it’s the *having kids* that foments the maturity!” My husband and I were eager to have kids ASAP when we got married due to our ages, but neither of us could have predicted the ways in which having children has shaped us and grown us up, even though we were already very much “adults” when we married.
I think the best way to ensure this is to immerse your children in a culture where having a lot of kids is normal/people tend to have kids earlier than average, but not too early. I've talked about my conversion to Catholicism as an adult and the fact I was inspired by attending Catholic school for a few years. Even though my parents weren't religious, living in an Irish Catholic enclave (where my great-grandparents came from their various homelands) is what planted my hopes of having kids on the younger side and having a large family. I think you're already doing that because your parents had so many kids!
Great article. With fewer children everywhere and a less supportive culture for families, it's going to take a good deal of intentionality if you want your kids to have kids.
My husband and I were recently talking about all our aunts/uncles/cousins, and counting up how many grandchildren there actually are for our parents' generation in our respective families. It's.... pretty dismal, relative the amount of cousins we have. So, this isn't solely an "out there" situation. We could very much observe how the factors you describe here (plus others) played out in our own families. My husband and I got married the week of my 27th birthday, and promptly had three children. He was an only child and none of my three siblings have children (for varying reasons), so with no cousins on the horizon for them.... we wanted to give our children the gift of each other. We'll see how many that turns out to be, but we often think of how we hope to guide our boys into more prudent adult decision-making, getting married earlier if possible, and having children. There's things we want to do, teach, and model differently with them to facilitate that. So this was a great read in that vein.
The no-cousins plight makes me so sad. We were the first on both sides to get married and I don’t anticipate any of our siblings having kids for a few more years at least.
We were the last and most recent ones to get married, ironically. But the one couple who wants children has not been able to carry to term, and it's been heartbreaking.
We are very fortunate and are a part of a vibrant parish community and parish school. The average family size is 5. We have 6. My kids laughed when I told them that we have a large family. “No we don’t Mom! The Smiths have a large family!” The Smiths have 15 kids.
One thing my husband and I try our hardest to do is avoid complaining about parenting at all but especially around our three children. Instead we often focus and comment on all of the great things about being a Mom and Dad. And we actively say things like “well when you have kids of your own it will be so great …” Our kids are still young enough that this feels like fun conversation.
This is definitely applicable to the newer parents crowd, of which I am a member haha. Our two boys are both still under 5, so I want to get on it as soon as I can with them!
My husband and I both come from families where it's just us and our older siblings. So our parents also only had two kids. I think, in my case, my parents didn't exactly encourage me to have kids, but they didn't actively discourage it either. I did have to come to the decision mostly all on my own. They did do things to set me up for it (especially financially), but those things could have applied to other life choices as well. My husband would probably say that his situation was similar! So anything both of us could do to be more encouraging to our sons is very helpful.
I am going to offer a different position on why I don’t think this is OK, as someone who was raised this way, with a lot of brothers/sisters/cousins.
We were taught that there was nothing greater in life than to keep close ties and celebrate the creation of new life. My brothers went off to successfully have new kids and I, twenty one to thirteen years younger than the oldest/youngest of my siblings, was ecstatic to have more family even though I wouldn’t be old enough to have kids for some time. We gushed over their plans for the future, decorated nurseries, and I started dreaming about my special day—which has never come.
I was born with the same kidney issues that killed my paternal aunt. It also played havoc on my hormones. I wound up being one in 10 with PCOS and unlucky enough to also have endometriosis on my organs. I cannot have children.
Yet every Christmas, some “well intentioned” relative brings up the fact that I don’t have children like they don’t understand infertility. I heard my own mother say that she doesn’t expect children from me and the tone was not empathetic.
You can be sad for yourself and happy for others, but it’s abysmal to be told you’re going to die alone because your body isn’t having it.
Not knowing how your kids are going to turn out, if they are going to have to be on chemo or hemo-dialysis, I do not think it is wise to push this idea. Too many in my family simply say ‘she doesn’t want them’ when that isn’t true at all. I feel like we are losing empathy when we assume the younger generation simply doesn’t want to when we have zero idea what they are going through medically or financially.
My mother in law openly blames me for marrying her son when she wanted grandchildren, even though she has a doting husband and has two other sons. So, should I relinquish my childhood sweetheart and die alone so she, who is very much not alone, can have the opportunity to see her favorite son reproduce?
My nieces and nephews, all grown now, do not want kids and one was recently diagnosed with PCOS like me. Their parents don’t understand why they don’t want kids. Frankly, we need to stop putting our desires on others. There are other ways to build a life and be content if we are even lucky enough to grow old. Stop feeling bad for us. We don’t need that negativity.
My husbands mom got lucky. She wanted him to be gay or trans (yeah...). And he's Catholic (they're agnostic/hippie-ish). We have two kids and I just turned 30. So we could have a little gang soon. An my MIL is as happy as she can be. She had a playground put in at her house... I feel bad for those who'll never be grandparents but it's hard when you're raising your kids in a death culture (abortion and euthanasia are OK). My family members have stopped saying 1 or 2 is enough. Now it's when is 3 coming.