Yes! They are still all mine...

Backspace: Essays on Everything

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Yes - they’re all mine.
“Are they all yours??” I used to get this incredulous question often in the old days - or at least - my old days…you know…back in the 1990’s. I always wanted to answer something like, “No. This one I found by the side of the road and this one won’t leave us alone.” But I think that stuff is probably funnier in my head.
My old days had me up at 3:30 am nursing whichever baby I had going then. I have been actively mothering for 32 years now. I have 8 kids and while I have never had all eight living under my roof at one time - Matt, the oldest, was 21 by the time Ani, the youngest, was born - I know what it is to corral four or five littles at a time into a fair, a store, any event anywhere actually. I know what it is to live with a teenager or two or three at a time while simultaneously changing diapers and wearing kids on my back.
A woman I don’t know recently wrote an article in The New Yorker, I think, about women who are well-educated and who have a lot of kids. Basically, it was why would you do that. I haven’t gotten to read it yet, as it’s behind a paywall, but I found myself - sadly - lingering in the comments section on Facebook. Ugh. I know. But…well, I couldn’t help myself. And there it was. Breeders. Can’t believe people would do this to children. Do what, exactly? I wonder and always I had one or two or three and it was too much for me. So many people, so negative about having a lot of kids. Accusing us of having older kids parent the youngers. For what purpose, I’m not exactly sure. The Duggars did not do large families any service.
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