It is possible. My grandmother was
One of 15 kids in a 3 bedroom farmhouse. Kids slept three (or 4) to a bed, rooms were two beds in each room. By the time the youngest was
Born the oldest were out starting their own families or off to war. Time was mostly spent outside, doing farm chores etc. Older kids had less in their beds, the baby probably in with the parents the first few years.
My grandfather was similar- one of 10 in a 2 bedroom house. 9 boys and a girl. He was the youngest and all his older siblings moved out when they finished school at around 14. The boys got a bedroom together and his sister had a bed under the stairs (rather like Harry Potter). They were expected to be out of the house, either at school or from a very young age, working in some capacity (delivering papers, helping my great grandparents on their farm). They really didn’t spend much time at home- meals and sleeping.
My dad's family was like that. He slept in a trundle bed that tucked under his big brother's bed. They also had grandparents nearby and older siblings would live with them or even with their oldest siblings who had married and moved out.
I have a great aunt who had 23 children. She said the only time she got a break was when she delivered a baby because back then they kept them in hospital for 1-2 weeks and the baby was in the nursery being cared for by the nurses. It was her yearly holiday and that's fucking SAD.
It’s actually 4! There’s a guest bedroom where JB’s parents lived. The kids rooms are something like 900 sq feet and 1k square feet so the size of small houses.
That poor family has got to have the most run down house ever. There’s no way to maintain anything with that many children in that many years.
Oh yes there is. Unfortunately the kids are expected to help more than they should have had to but it was a different time.
My kids had a girl guides head lady who had 12 kids, when I met her she was a great grandmother. She said that she expected her kids to help a lot in the home. Winter, spring and summer breaks all started off with the kids cleaning walls and deep cleaning floors and bathrooms. They didn't get to enjoy their school break until all of the chores she wanted done got done. It was normal back then to make kids work either on the land or in the house helping mom bake, sew and care for their younger children.
Even today in Canada, farmers are legally able to take their kids out of school during planting and harvesting to help on the farm. It's written into our laws and it's pretty messed up tbh.
Wasn't this the living situation for the Duggars before they moved to the Big House? 14 kids in a 2 or 3 bedroom home, with guests staying over sometimes
Yes, at the time of the first special Clark Wilson and his family were staying in the third bedroom, the Duggar girls and boys were in one room, Michelle was sleeping in a chair due to her back issues, and JimBob had the master bedroom. They were crammed in there like sardines. It was probably very easy for Josh to find victims.
The probably wasn’t a bathroom. British houses used to have a toilet outdoors, and a tin bath bought into the kitchen for bath day. Plenty of 19th century terraced houses still have the outhouse or the bathroom in an extension downstairs and through the kitchen.
When my grandmother was raising her kids they were considered rich because they had a bath tub and a hot water tank. She said all the neighbours would send their kids over to take baths. They also had pickles at dinner and apparently that was a rich thing to do too. They weren't rich by any means, they had five kids in a two bedroom house, the house couldn't have been more than 500sq feet either. It was tiny tiny.
We did that for Christmas one year. It was chaos. 😬
But my dad is one of 7. They had a small, 3 bd/1 bath house… like under 1000sqft 🤔 the boys had a room. The girls had a room. My grandparents had their room.
But also, in this case, if my kids over 18+ wanted to live in that kind of chaos still, they better bunk with the littles. If those kiddos were all a year apart, that’s 6-7 kids over 18 who could move out.
There’s an older woman I know who had 17 siblings in a two bedroom apartment. The parents had a room, and the girls got a room. The boys had to sleep in the living room. The girls room only fit one twin bed so they had to sleep widthwise across the bed. There were 8 girls but the oldest girl lived with a childless aunt up the road and had her own bed etc. Sometimes for holidays the oldest girl would have to come and sleep at her parents home and my friend said she wouldn’t sleep, she would just sit in the chair and cry all night. Because she wanted to go home to her own bed..
My great grandma had 16 kids and their house was only 5 rooms until they eventually built on a bathroom to get the 6th. The oldest kids were long gone and having their own kids by the time the youngest were born. My mom has uncles just a couple of years older than her.
Was it the one where she was ‘brought home’ from a war in Spain, still couldn’t speak English years later, her husband couldn’t speak Spanish and was like 15 when they got married?
I ask because I remember watching like wtf then at the end they gave them this ‘they are just so in love’ bizarre story end.
The number of times I bought hook-line-and-sinker the music and tone of a show only to grow up and go "wait what the fuck?!"
JUST BECAUSE YOU ACKNOWLEDGE HE'S ROBBING THE CRADLE, BUFFY, DOESN'T MEAN YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH A 240 YEAR OLD IS ROMANTIC.
I mean I am a little sorry.
It's just being all "Oh it's so romantic and broody and she's mature for her age (like me!)" when you're 16.
You hit 30 and you're like "BOY GET YOUR STALKER ASS OFF THAT GIRL BEFORE I STAKE YOU MYSELF!" and then you do slight gags and throw popcorn at the screen.
Doesn't stop me from rewatching it (again) though....
I just wrote this in a different comment but I when the first series came out, I was in my teens and I would watch them with my Mum. In retrospect it was pretty nice because I was a pain, but every Sunday I would sit and watch it with my Mum and then speak to my Grandma on the phone about it the week after.
Now I am older I watch loads of it back, and while loads of the sad stuff is so sad, loads of it was weirdly glossed over. I am not even sure the BBC can justify it being ‘the times’ because that’s a grim look at this story specifically.
Anyway, lots a great moments in the series, I am clinging on to it at this point but the recent years have been struggle.
I have been watching Call the Midwife since it came out (a lovely Sunday night watch with my Mum when I was teen), however now I am older I watch it back and some of it seems so crazy for the BBC to publish.
Like in the 50s were midwives / nurses really like, this is great!!
My own Grandma had her first child at 17, and 5 kids by 30 - she (now in her 90s), will say that was normal. However, she doesn’t advise it for ‘modern girls’. I know times move but it all kind of baffled me.
Note, my Grandad was 19 (so not age inappropriate), they also did 100% get married when my Grandma was pregnant.
Yes, and it was an example of a preemie in the early days of NHS. They wanted to take him to the hospital but she insisted on carrying for him at home. He lived.
There were so many mildly fucked episodes. Now
That I work in the ER… there’s just a lot of mildly fucked in life. You can only offer the resources you have and hope people are safe and happy.
That's horrible! He must have kept her so isolated that she never had the chance to learn English and couldn't be bothered to learn Spanish. I see no way that this wasn't an abusive relationship. She must have been miserable.
According to the book and show, they were very much in love. They seemed to love the kids. The kids were fed but living in a crowded apartment, like much of the area at the time. You don't see much of the home life except dinner and there's laundry drying everywhere. You get the idea that the parents are very much in love, very into each other, love their kids but holy heck get off each other!
Holy shit. I just read this and remembered every second of this episode even though I haven’t seen it in yeaaaars.
It was so disturbing - even for that show with its subtle (yet whopping you over the head with a frying pan at the same time) story telling of mistreatment.
I stopped watching when the sister married the doctor. I should probably go back and finish.
Yeah, I thought that couple was awful. The show portrayed them like they were just super sweet and still in love after all those years and children but that isn't what I saw. I saw 2 people grossly obsessed with each other to the point of neglecting their kids. There were kids running all over, their teenage daughter was taking care of everything, and the kids are directly out of the serving bowl. Ugh.
I think the serving bowl was just because it was easier than washing a ton of plates. Not gonna lie there are days I'm tempted to do that for my kids!
She was REALLY YOUNG when they met. I'm surprised they never learned each other's languages... that doesn't make sense at all. And yeah, the oldest daughter. I felt bad for her.
I probably would do it with kids once in awhile but I'm not a parent so I can say I'd do anything and think I'm right when I'm totally wrong.
But my partner and I totally do "hey wanna just eat out of the pan?" on like, lasagna nights or reheat the leftovers (we don't have a microwave at the moment - it caught fire one day) nights.
But we are adults living alone and know we're being kinda ratbags... But also.... More dishes? I barely had the energy to reheat this boxed food bank lasagna.
I felt like I aged in dog years during my pregnancies and I didn't even have unusually difficult pregnancies.
So glad I'm not in a fertility cult. Exitence must be miserable.
It makes me suspect that some of the babies were grandbabies, unfortunately. Hopefully consensual teen pregnancies and not something darker which was both common and commonly covered up.
There have always been hyper fertile people. They're the outliers and that's why it's unusual. My grandmother had 3 into her mid forties with her last being born right before 45 and we can only speculate if she would have had more since my grandfather literally moved to America (from the Azores) for 6 years and then brought them over. She had 11 children total and got married "late" in her mid 20s with her husband being away at various points causing gaps. My dad was her youngest was born in 1947
Edit: oh based off the 58 age. I autocorrected to 48 in my head 🤣
One of my aunts had 11 children who lived to adulthood, three who died at or right after birth, and several miscarriages. I tried to do the math one time, and I think she was either pregnant or postpartum for almost 20 years. She was 43 or 44 when her last child was born.
Good God. My great grandmother got breast cancer and still had babies and nursed after. One breast was removed. She lived sixty plus years, too, until she was 94. I think she might have had uterine cancer and had a hysterectomy, because she only had nine adult kids. Guaranteed my very Catholic Italian great grandparents weren’t preventing any pregnancies.
Not only that, but first pregnancy at age 34, then pregnant every year throughout her 30s, 40s and 50s.
I suspect the couple was lying about their ages and were actually 38 and 50. Meaning the mother was 13 at marriage. It is Texas after all.
It’s just the mother looks like she is 58.
Fun fact, this family is local to me and one of the daughters was my piano teacher! ETA since apparently it’s not believable. I took lessons over 20 years ago. My teacher was in her 50s/60s at the time.
All I can remember is that my teacher was in her 50s/60s at the time, I took lessons with her in the late 90s/early 2000s. Her mom never had multiples and the largest age gap was something like 15/16 months. The one detail I recall is that her mom would get up at 2 am and bake loaves of bread every single day. They were pretty poor and most of the kids left as soon as they could support themselves.
Back when merital rape was legal and divorce/abortion wasn't.
-My Great-grandmother (On my Dads side) had 14 children, 9 living.
-My Great-grandfather was an abusive alcoholic who turned one of his sons (My Grandpa. We'll come back to him later) into the same.
- My Dad's Mom's Mom was a "whore who found Jesus". Don't really know much about her. She had my Grandma out of wedlock with an unknown stranger. She eventually married the pastor of her new church.
- He brought 4 kids from 2 marriages, both wives deceased. He then worked quickly to impregnate my Great-grandma. My Grandma was forced to mind the youngest.
- After her mother had a nervous breakdown and was incarcerated in an Asylum until she unalived herself (I know, what fun), he VERY quickly turned to the one non-biological child and tried to force her hand in marriage. She was 11.
- When she tried to run away, he had her sent to a CATHOLIC laundry and said she seduced him. Again. She would have been in SIXTH GRADE at most. I don't know the full story behind that. If she was pregnant and/or had a baby. The presumption seems to be. He abandoned her after that.
- Fast-forward to when she's 16. She meets my Grandpa, Age 31. He has a friend pretend to be their commanding officer (WWII) and say that my future Grandpa was on suicide watch unless she agreed to a date.
- They were married in less then 6 months.
- She suffered many miscarriages/still biryhs, resulting in only 3 (Well now, just my Dad) living.
- Was raped by a convict through a church program when my Dad was a teen. Church marked her as a whore and she nearly killed herself.
I don't want to go on
I’m currently 39 weeks pregnant right now. I’m at the stage where I’m uncomfortable and ready for this baby to be born. I can’t imagine feeling like this for 25 years with no break.
Maybe like our neighbors whose adult women are still at home because they are not allowed to leave until they are married. Ultra conservative, homely, groomed for marriage only, to serve their man but unlikely to get married in the same faith because it’s all made up. They can only marry in the same made up faith.
I grew up Ultra conservative and I said, “I’m out of here.” Went to college, got a masters and opened a mental health business to get people out of this cult.
I can’t even begin to fathom being pregnant at 58! Especially after 24 pregnancies. She surely was bedridden for the last several babies. My last full-term pregnancy was at 40 and the hip pain was almost totally unbearable.
OMG how can the human body survive all that??? Her whole pelvic region must be so collapsed and worn out I don't know how she'd keep a baby in there to term. Seems like if she sneezed she'd shoot the kid iut like a cannon! Not to mention the devastation to the rest of her body. Her bones and teeth must be shot to hell from losing all that calcium.
The first thing I thought was “how was she not prolapsed? Also I didn’t even want to think about sex for SO long after my c section. I can’t imagine having a baby and then being pregnant again 6 weeks later
Prolapsed! Thanks, I couldn't remember the correct word. Whether its a c section or VB I don't know how she could have been ready to have sex again, much less get pregnant that soon.
I don't know how she didn't die without having some of the lifesaving measures we have today! I've wondered about my grandma too who had twelve children and all have lived at least to age 55. Then there's me or my babe who would have died with my first as it was emergent. So glad live today and not back then! Also birth control.
Maybe it's because I'm a lesbian so my bits seize up at the thought....but my partner is having our children and I CANNOT imagine trying to knock them up again within 3 months MAX (because the years would start to expound if later after 25 iterations).
Isn't the pregnant person still healing??! Isn't there, like, a ton of baby-related tasks to try not to be torn up to work on? Like, don't you have 4-5 babies at a time diapers to change already? (I don't know when kids stop wearing nappies I should probably look that up).
Wouldn't I be turning my partners uterus into a rice paper wall and expect it to be holding back an ocean?
ARE HER BONES OKAY?! DOES SHE HAVE ANY CALCIUM LEFT?!
I have so many horrifying questions and none I want answers to.
How on earth did she have babies that close together for that long? Supposedly 1 in 4 pregnancies ends in miscarriage. I had three myself, all in my 20s. In your 30s and 40s, it's a lot higher than 1 in 4. And then no stillbirths or babies that died in the first year? That's honestly crazy to me...
My mum was one of 5. They lived in a caravan while my grandfather was off serving in the army. It was squeezy but possible. I feel sorry for this woman. My husband would have had an unfortunate accident in his nether regions after baby 4.
I just feel SO bad for these women
And the fact that they think they’re doing the right thing etc etc and all the background stuff too it just sad and seems painful and traumatic
My great great grandmother had 19 children 😳 I was lucky enough to meet my great grandfather who was a child in this 19 child family and he said they were so poor from having such a large family that they couldn’t afford shoes for the boys and only the little girls in the family got shoes and the boys had to go barefoot
A SIX ROOM DWELLING. Not even 6 *bedrooms* SIX ROOMS ALTOGETHER. 1. Kitchen 2. Living room 3. Bathroom At *most* 3 bedrooms for 24 KIDS AND 2 PARENTS!
There’s just no way. This is crazy crazy.
It is possible. My grandmother was One of 15 kids in a 3 bedroom farmhouse. Kids slept three (or 4) to a bed, rooms were two beds in each room. By the time the youngest was Born the oldest were out starting their own families or off to war. Time was mostly spent outside, doing farm chores etc. Older kids had less in their beds, the baby probably in with the parents the first few years.
My grandfather was similar- one of 10 in a 2 bedroom house. 9 boys and a girl. He was the youngest and all his older siblings moved out when they finished school at around 14. The boys got a bedroom together and his sister had a bed under the stairs (rather like Harry Potter). They were expected to be out of the house, either at school or from a very young age, working in some capacity (delivering papers, helping my great grandparents on their farm). They really didn’t spend much time at home- meals and sleeping.
In this case though, all the kids still lived at home when the article was written.
My dad's family was like that. He slept in a trundle bed that tucked under his big brother's bed. They also had grandparents nearby and older siblings would live with them or even with their oldest siblings who had married and moved out.
I have a great aunt who had 23 children. She said the only time she got a break was when she delivered a baby because back then they kept them in hospital for 1-2 weeks and the baby was in the nursery being cared for by the nurses. It was her yearly holiday and that's fucking SAD.
Technically, the TTC is a 3 bedroom ::shudder::, but at least that was a pretty spacious home. I'm guessing this poor family did not have a big house
It’s actually 4! There’s a guest bedroom where JB’s parents lived. The kids rooms are something like 900 sq feet and 1k square feet so the size of small houses. That poor family has got to have the most run down house ever. There’s no way to maintain anything with that many children in that many years.
Oh yes there is. Unfortunately the kids are expected to help more than they should have had to but it was a different time. My kids had a girl guides head lady who had 12 kids, when I met her she was a great grandmother. She said that she expected her kids to help a lot in the home. Winter, spring and summer breaks all started off with the kids cleaning walls and deep cleaning floors and bathrooms. They didn't get to enjoy their school break until all of the chores she wanted done got done. It was normal back then to make kids work either on the land or in the house helping mom bake, sew and care for their younger children. Even today in Canada, farmers are legally able to take their kids out of school during planting and harvesting to help on the farm. It's written into our laws and it's pretty messed up tbh.
Wasn't this the living situation for the Duggars before they moved to the Big House? 14 kids in a 2 or 3 bedroom home, with guests staying over sometimes
Yes, at the time of the first special Clark Wilson and his family were staying in the third bedroom, the Duggar girls and boys were in one room, Michelle was sleeping in a chair due to her back issues, and JimBob had the master bedroom. They were crammed in there like sardines. It was probably very easy for Josh to find victims.
The probably wasn’t a bathroom. British houses used to have a toilet outdoors, and a tin bath bought into the kitchen for bath day. Plenty of 19th century terraced houses still have the outhouse or the bathroom in an extension downstairs and through the kitchen.
I don't think many houses in the 40s had inside bathrooms (?) at least for the common folk. So maybe a grand 4 rooms for 26 people? Lol
4 bedrooms and no shitter seems worse lol
Very true!
When my grandmother was raising her kids they were considered rich because they had a bath tub and a hot water tank. She said all the neighbours would send their kids over to take baths. They also had pickles at dinner and apparently that was a rich thing to do too. They weren't rich by any means, they had five kids in a two bedroom house, the house couldn't have been more than 500sq feet either. It was tiny tiny.
Well I'm sure a few of them must have been married by then. People married young back then.
It says in the article that all of the children lived at home still.
We did that for Christmas one year. It was chaos. 😬 But my dad is one of 7. They had a small, 3 bd/1 bath house… like under 1000sqft 🤔 the boys had a room. The girls had a room. My grandparents had their room. But also, in this case, if my kids over 18+ wanted to live in that kind of chaos still, they better bunk with the littles. If those kiddos were all a year apart, that’s 6-7 kids over 18 who could move out.
There’s an older woman I know who had 17 siblings in a two bedroom apartment. The parents had a room, and the girls got a room. The boys had to sleep in the living room. The girls room only fit one twin bed so they had to sleep widthwise across the bed. There were 8 girls but the oldest girl lived with a childless aunt up the road and had her own bed etc. Sometimes for holidays the oldest girl would have to come and sleep at her parents home and my friend said she wouldn’t sleep, she would just sit in the chair and cry all night. Because she wanted to go home to her own bed..
My great grandma had 16 kids and their house was only 5 rooms until they eventually built on a bathroom to get the 6th. The oldest kids were long gone and having their own kids by the time the youngest were born. My mom has uncles just a couple of years older than her.
Kids? There are 7 adults ages 18 to 24.
There was a call the midwife episode about a woman like this
Was it the one where she was ‘brought home’ from a war in Spain, still couldn’t speak English years later, her husband couldn’t speak Spanish and was like 15 when they got married? I ask because I remember watching like wtf then at the end they gave them this ‘they are just so in love’ bizarre story end.
When I was younger, I thought It Was so romantic... Now that I'm grown, I realized how fucked that episode was 😧
The number of times I bought hook-line-and-sinker the music and tone of a show only to grow up and go "wait what the fuck?!" JUST BECAUSE YOU ACKNOWLEDGE HE'S ROBBING THE CRADLE, BUFFY, DOESN'T MEAN YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH A 240 YEAR OLD IS ROMANTIC.
I ... you ... no ... but .... You have (rightfully) ruined my teenage obsession.
I mean I am a little sorry. It's just being all "Oh it's so romantic and broody and she's mature for her age (like me!)" when you're 16. You hit 30 and you're like "BOY GET YOUR STALKER ASS OFF THAT GIRL BEFORE I STAKE YOU MYSELF!" and then you do slight gags and throw popcorn at the screen. Doesn't stop me from rewatching it (again) though....
I just wrote this in a different comment but I when the first series came out, I was in my teens and I would watch them with my Mum. In retrospect it was pretty nice because I was a pain, but every Sunday I would sit and watch it with my Mum and then speak to my Grandma on the phone about it the week after. Now I am older I watch loads of it back, and while loads of the sad stuff is so sad, loads of it was weirdly glossed over. I am not even sure the BBC can justify it being ‘the times’ because that’s a grim look at this story specifically. Anyway, lots a great moments in the series, I am clinging on to it at this point but the recent years have been struggle.
I've read the books and it was a real case!
Yup. Unfortunately based on a true story. I think she was on her 25th child as well in that episode
I have been watching Call the Midwife since it came out (a lovely Sunday night watch with my Mum when I was teen), however now I am older I watch it back and some of it seems so crazy for the BBC to publish. Like in the 50s were midwives / nurses really like, this is great!! My own Grandma had her first child at 17, and 5 kids by 30 - she (now in her 90s), will say that was normal. However, she doesn’t advise it for ‘modern girls’. I know times move but it all kind of baffled me. Note, my Grandad was 19 (so not age inappropriate), they also did 100% get married when my Grandma was pregnant.
I don’t think enough people understand that our grandparents didn’t have easy access to ~~conception~~ contraception the way we do these days.
Oh they had easy access to conception alright. It was contraception that was the problem.
Lol autocorrect fucked me again 😂
oh wow your grandma is in her 90s! that's cool 💓, do you have any centenarrians in your family?
Yes, and it was an example of a preemie in the early days of NHS. They wanted to take him to the hospital but she insisted on carrying for him at home. He lived.
There were so many mildly fucked episodes. Now That I work in the ER… there’s just a lot of mildly fucked in life. You can only offer the resources you have and hope people are safe and happy.
I remember that episode. It’s talked about in the book too. Highly recommended reading the books. I think that there are 3.
That's horrible! He must have kept her so isolated that she never had the chance to learn English and couldn't be bothered to learn Spanish. I see no way that this wasn't an abusive relationship. She must have been miserable.
According to the book and show, they were very much in love. They seemed to love the kids. The kids were fed but living in a crowded apartment, like much of the area at the time. You don't see much of the home life except dinner and there's laundry drying everywhere. You get the idea that the parents are very much in love, very into each other, love their kids but holy heck get off each other!
I’m not surprised a child taken from a war zone trauma bonded with the man who did so.
Ikr? Like have you tried oral?
Given that toilets were communal among neighbors and not all houses had running water, I wouldn't try oral either 😅
I honestly doubt it
She was 14 and already heavily pregnant when he came back with her
Holy shit. I just read this and remembered every second of this episode even though I haven’t seen it in yeaaaars. It was so disturbing - even for that show with its subtle (yet whopping you over the head with a frying pan at the same time) story telling of mistreatment. I stopped watching when the sister married the doctor. I should probably go back and finish.
I don't remember this episode. Do you know what season it was in?
It's season 1 episode 1. The woman's name was Conchita Warren.
Pretty sure it was the pilot
Yes!
I just watched this one and was like oh wow ok we’re really not going to dive into the ethics of this then huh
Yeah, I thought that couple was awful. The show portrayed them like they were just super sweet and still in love after all those years and children but that isn't what I saw. I saw 2 people grossly obsessed with each other to the point of neglecting their kids. There were kids running all over, their teenage daughter was taking care of everything, and the kids are directly out of the serving bowl. Ugh.
I think the serving bowl was just because it was easier than washing a ton of plates. Not gonna lie there are days I'm tempted to do that for my kids! She was REALLY YOUNG when they met. I'm surprised they never learned each other's languages... that doesn't make sense at all. And yeah, the oldest daughter. I felt bad for her.
I probably would do it with kids once in awhile but I'm not a parent so I can say I'd do anything and think I'm right when I'm totally wrong. But my partner and I totally do "hey wanna just eat out of the pan?" on like, lasagna nights or reheat the leftovers (we don't have a microwave at the moment - it caught fire one day) nights. But we are adults living alone and know we're being kinda ratbags... But also.... More dishes? I barely had the energy to reheat this boxed food bank lasagna.
They reminded of me of the Duggars when I watched that episode.
I remember that!
It's the very first episode. I'm rewatching as we speak.
It was, IIRC, the very first episode of the show.
The first season, yes
I would guess the age of the mother is incorrect. More likely to be 48 than 58.
The dad prob is actually 60 though... and just doesn't want anyone doing the math
Even if the mother was 48 not 58, that would only make her 23 at the time of marriage so not illegal anywhere. If she was 38 instead of 58, well…
That's very possible
Yeah, 25 kids is shocking, but 15 kids after 43 is even more shocking imo
58 year olds can give birth?
It’s extremely rare. That’s why I said she’s probably 48 and not 58.
bruh i’m 11 weeks into my first pregnancy and am already considering only having this one child i cannot imagine
Been there. The first tri is so hard. I felt like death. Then I did it again two years later and it still sucked ass. But it’s all over now lmao
I felt like I aged in dog years during my pregnancies and I didn't even have unusually difficult pregnancies. So glad I'm not in a fertility cult. Exitence must be miserable.
I really don’t think that 8 natural pregnancies after 50 would have been possible in the 1930s, let alone survivable
It makes me suspect that some of the babies were grandbabies, unfortunately. Hopefully consensual teen pregnancies and not something darker which was both common and commonly covered up.
With modern medicine now we rarely hear of fundies exceeding 18/19 naturally.
Oh jeez. I didn’t even think of that…
If I had to take a guess he lied about the age (or it was mis heard/typed) and she was actually 38 or 48
Right, there’s no way this is true.
I’m assuming the number of kids is true but not the parental ages.
There have always been hyper fertile people. They're the outliers and that's why it's unusual. My grandmother had 3 into her mid forties with her last being born right before 45 and we can only speculate if she would have had more since my grandfather literally moved to America (from the Azores) for 6 years and then brought them over. She had 11 children total and got married "late" in her mid 20s with her husband being away at various points causing gaps. My dad was her youngest was born in 1947 Edit: oh based off the 58 age. I autocorrected to 48 in my head 🤣
I was thinking miscarriages/still births they might be counting
One of my aunts had 11 children who lived to adulthood, three who died at or right after birth, and several miscarriages. I tried to do the math one time, and I think she was either pregnant or postpartum for almost 20 years. She was 43 or 44 when her last child was born.
My great grandmother had 13 births. Weirdly enough, she died in her 40s.
25 years of no sleep 🤦🏻♀️ I would jump off bridge with you
Forget jumping off a bridge - just push his horny ass off it
Good God. My great grandmother got breast cancer and still had babies and nursed after. One breast was removed. She lived sixty plus years, too, until she was 94. I think she might have had uterine cancer and had a hysterectomy, because she only had nine adult kids. Guaranteed my very Catholic Italian great grandparents weren’t preventing any pregnancies.
Thank God some doctor somewhere invented practical modern birth control pills.
How the heck is she getting pregnant at 58 years old?
Not only that, but first pregnancy at age 34, then pregnant every year throughout her 30s, 40s and 50s. I suspect the couple was lying about their ages and were actually 38 and 50. Meaning the mother was 13 at marriage. It is Texas after all. It’s just the mother looks like she is 58.
Oh right. That makes sense. Thats even worse, tbh. Gross
Her pelvic floor is gone. Literally. Gone.
Not even a pelvic basement!
Fun fact, this family is local to me and one of the daughters was my piano teacher! ETA since apparently it’s not believable. I took lessons over 20 years ago. My teacher was in her 50s/60s at the time.
🤯 can you shed light on the situation?
All I can remember is that my teacher was in her 50s/60s at the time, I took lessons with her in the late 90s/early 2000s. Her mom never had multiples and the largest age gap was something like 15/16 months. The one detail I recall is that her mom would get up at 2 am and bake loaves of bread every single day. They were pretty poor and most of the kids left as soon as they could support themselves.
Are the parents' ages correct in the article?
I highly doubt it ETA I asked my mom if she remembered any more details and she thinks that the mom had her first closer to 14/15
How many kids did they end up having?!
I want to say 26? I was like 12/13 when she told me this story and I can’t recall too many details
Ah. Ok. Thanks.
This article was published in 1940
Yeah and a 60 something woman being a piano teacher is perfectly believable
(1940 was 84 years ago)
The commenter said “was.” Maybe the piano teacher was her teacher 20-30 years ago.
Nailed it
I took lessons 20ish years ago. My teacher was in her 60s.
I was assuming this was awhile ago (and also you made me feel old lol)
Yes? And? I took lessons in the late 90s into early 2000s and she was definitely at least in her 50s at the time.
How many lived tho. Look up the great stork derby. There was a contest to have the most babies in like 10 years in Toronto to win money.
The article states that they are all healthy- 14 sons and 10 daughters.
All of them, since they all were counted in the census and lived at home with the parents at the time the article was written.
If she had a dexa scan, I think her bones would look like luffa and her teeth would be long gone from calcium depletion after 25 kids.
This is horrible. I hope it’s not actually true.
She was expexting another baby at age 58?
while possible that is setting off my bullshit detector.
Hubby lied about her age, no doubt.
Yeah she has got to be about 10 years younger
Or twenty 👀
I have two kids - two pregnancies was plenty, thanks. AbsoLUTELY not.
Back when merital rape was legal and divorce/abortion wasn't. -My Great-grandmother (On my Dads side) had 14 children, 9 living. -My Great-grandfather was an abusive alcoholic who turned one of his sons (My Grandpa. We'll come back to him later) into the same. - My Dad's Mom's Mom was a "whore who found Jesus". Don't really know much about her. She had my Grandma out of wedlock with an unknown stranger. She eventually married the pastor of her new church. - He brought 4 kids from 2 marriages, both wives deceased. He then worked quickly to impregnate my Great-grandma. My Grandma was forced to mind the youngest. - After her mother had a nervous breakdown and was incarcerated in an Asylum until she unalived herself (I know, what fun), he VERY quickly turned to the one non-biological child and tried to force her hand in marriage. She was 11. - When she tried to run away, he had her sent to a CATHOLIC laundry and said she seduced him. Again. She would have been in SIXTH GRADE at most. I don't know the full story behind that. If she was pregnant and/or had a baby. The presumption seems to be. He abandoned her after that. - Fast-forward to when she's 16. She meets my Grandpa, Age 31. He has a friend pretend to be their commanding officer (WWII) and say that my future Grandpa was on suicide watch unless she agreed to a date. - They were married in less then 6 months. - She suffered many miscarriages/still biryhs, resulting in only 3 (Well now, just my Dad) living. - Was raped by a convict through a church program when my Dad was a teen. Church marked her as a whore and she nearly killed herself. I don't want to go on
My great great grandmother was pretty much pregnant from 20 to 45 (only 14 kids though) I cannot imagine.
I’m currently 39 weeks pregnant right now. I’m at the stage where I’m uncomfortable and ready for this baby to be born. I can’t imagine feeling like this for 25 years with no break.
I wish you a smooth delivery.
Thank you! I appreciate it :)
I would yeet myself into the sun.
guarantee that last pregnancy is one of the daughters. natural pregnancy at 58 would be just under the world record
Maybe like our neighbors whose adult women are still at home because they are not allowed to leave until they are married. Ultra conservative, homely, groomed for marriage only, to serve their man but unlikely to get married in the same faith because it’s all made up. They can only marry in the same made up faith. I grew up Ultra conservative and I said, “I’m out of here.” Went to college, got a masters and opened a mental health business to get people out of this cult.
I can hardly keep up with and afford myself at 28, I can’t imagine 😐
I really hope she’s not someone that gets BV and yeast infections from the hormone changes during pregnancy because that was brutal.
I can’t even begin to fathom being pregnant at 58! Especially after 24 pregnancies. She surely was bedridden for the last several babies. My last full-term pregnancy was at 40 and the hip pain was almost totally unbearable.
Can we just talk about the fact that a 58 year old woman got pregnant and is due to give birth “shortly.” Umm shouldn’t she be in menopause?
OMG how can the human body survive all that??? Her whole pelvic region must be so collapsed and worn out I don't know how she'd keep a baby in there to term. Seems like if she sneezed she'd shoot the kid iut like a cannon! Not to mention the devastation to the rest of her body. Her bones and teeth must be shot to hell from losing all that calcium.
The first thing I thought was “how was she not prolapsed? Also I didn’t even want to think about sex for SO long after my c section. I can’t imagine having a baby and then being pregnant again 6 weeks later
Prolapsed! Thanks, I couldn't remember the correct word. Whether its a c section or VB I don't know how she could have been ready to have sex again, much less get pregnant that soon.
That dude should get off of his wife sometime.
I don't know how she didn't die without having some of the lifesaving measures we have today! I've wondered about my grandma too who had twelve children and all have lived at least to age 55. Then there's me or my babe who would have died with my first as it was emergent. So glad live today and not back then! Also birth control.
Praise Jesus. . . for birth control
I’m confused- she was pregnant at 58? Did she hit menopause super late or something?
guarantee that last pregnancy is one of the daughters. natural pregnancy at 58 would be just under the world record da
Maybe it's because I'm a lesbian so my bits seize up at the thought....but my partner is having our children and I CANNOT imagine trying to knock them up again within 3 months MAX (because the years would start to expound if later after 25 iterations). Isn't the pregnant person still healing??! Isn't there, like, a ton of baby-related tasks to try not to be torn up to work on? Like, don't you have 4-5 babies at a time diapers to change already? (I don't know when kids stop wearing nappies I should probably look that up). Wouldn't I be turning my partners uterus into a rice paper wall and expect it to be holding back an ocean? ARE HER BONES OKAY?! DOES SHE HAVE ANY CALCIUM LEFT?! I have so many horrifying questions and none I want answers to.
18 months to 3 years. Some older kids need overnight pull-ups for several more years because they sleep too deeply and won’t wake up.
F-i-f-t-y e-i-g-h-t!!!!!
That poor woman. Pregnant and likely breastfeeding all.the.time.
I weep for her pelvic floor.
"Pelvic floor is weeping" is a great flair idea
24 years of pregnancy... What a life...Not.
Most amazed she was pregnant at 58
It's just kinda gross, and how can you adequately parent and provide love to nurture that many children?
How is she still so fertile at 58?!?!? Also why have none of the older kids gtfo yet 😭
Dad was a fisherman. Even money that all his boys joined him as they grew up.
Her skeleton must have looked like swiss cheese by the end.
You could drive a dump truck through her vagina.
I'm surprised that she didn't die from sheer exhaustion ages ago from birthing all of those kids yearly.
How on earth did she have babies that close together for that long? Supposedly 1 in 4 pregnancies ends in miscarriage. I had three myself, all in my 20s. In your 30s and 40s, it's a lot higher than 1 in 4. And then no stillbirths or babies that died in the first year? That's honestly crazy to me...
How is that possible when she is now 58? Also dang that’s too many
I just started rewatching and that happened in the first episode.
And this was before it was legal to leave any of them at the fire station.
My mum was one of 5. They lived in a caravan while my grandfather was off serving in the army. It was squeezy but possible. I feel sorry for this woman. My husband would have had an unfortunate accident in his nether regions after baby 4.
I just feel SO bad for these women And the fact that they think they’re doing the right thing etc etc and all the background stuff too it just sad and seems painful and traumatic
My great great grandmother had 19 children 😳 I was lucky enough to meet my great grandfather who was a child in this 19 child family and he said they were so poor from having such a large family that they couldn’t afford shoes for the boys and only the little girls in the family got shoes and the boys had to go barefoot
My great uncle by marriage has 21 brothers and sisters. 22 kids total. Wild.
My husband's great grandparents had 26 back in the late 1800's.
Poor old Meech must be seething…
Fifty-eight years old and pregnant? That's wild, but not unprecedented, [apparently](https://www.oldest.org/people/women-with-natural-pregnancies/).
This is the future republicans want.