Parents, how did the size of your family growing up affect the size of your family as an adult?

I had just one sister (and some step-siblings) and for as long as I could remember have wanted a much larger family. Once I married and we began having kids I used to say I wanted at least a basketball team (5). My husband didn’t feel the same so we stopped at 3…but we’re the ‘kid house’ so it’s not uncommon for us to have 5 or more kids staying with us on any given night. I just look up at meal times take a head count and cook a little more or less accordingly.

My sister married a man who is one of 12 kids..and some of those (now grown-up) kids have intentionally decided to NEVER have kids because they never want to share their space again. Something about having to share with 11 other siblings was enough to make some of them (primarily the younger ones for some odd reason) not want to have a large family of their own.

I have three siblings. We are all very close, but always knew we were accidents, and the bite of poverty will never leave me mind. I have two, and just can’t imagine how people provide for more on a normal income. I married a man who was number 9 of 11, never wanted nor had kids, and was very possessive and territorial.

I have 2 siblings. I only had 2 kids but always wanted a large family – it just didn’t work out that way.

I was one of four, my ex one of two. Of my kids 4 grandparents, 3 were only kids, my dad had a sister, so that was it.

I was married rather late (age 35) and my ex had infertility problems, so 2 was pushing our luck, a third would have probably killed my ex. We never ever talked about a third, I think the size of our families of origin had nothing to do with it, just most families of my generation are limited to two.

When my kids were 5 and 3, one Saturday as we were going to the park, my son said, “Dad, Sarah and I were talking, can I get a brother?” and his sister said, “Yeah, and I want a sister”!

We were three boys and my dad. I was the eldest; our mother died when I was nine. I would say that none of that had anything to do with the size of my family although I did breathe a sigh of relief when our oldest reached her 10th birthday and my wife was alive and well.

The real thing that controlled the size of our family was the computer control system at our local paper mill. I was the resident service representative. In that capacity, I was on-call 24 hours a day. The computer had an uncanny ability to know when my wife and I were making love and I would get a call from the mill. It didn’t make much difference whether I had to go in to fix the problem or trouble-shoot over the phone. Either way we lost the mood.

Because of this coitus interruptus, we had only two children. I am pretty sure there would have been at least two more if we were able to live an uninterrupted love life.

The sheer cost of having kids affected the size of my family. I wanted more but couldn’t afford more than 2.

I’m an only child and my wife might as well be (as there’s fifteen years between her and her brother). We adopted only one child.

We may adopt one more girl, but I’m not comfortable around big families.

For example, my nephew has three kids and I can only be around them for short periods of time. Too much craziness.

It didn’t.

I was the oldest of three , but that had no influence on my choice. When I was 20, I thought it would be great to have a dozen kids. (I had just read Life with Father). I didn’t marry until I was 30 and thought 4 was a good number. (My husband said, “Have as many as you want to take care of.” So we had a boy and then a girl 20 months apart. I talked to my doctor about having 4 and about how tired I was with only two. He said,“That’s easy. Just wait until the first two are in kindergarten and then have two more. I said, But I’ll be 36,” He replied, “That’s okay.” I stood up and said, “It’s not okay with me!’ And that was the end of that. I had my tubes tied ASAP. Turned out a family of four fit ‘just right.’

I didn’t grow up with any siblings, and my ex-husband had 1 brother and 1 half-sister. Both of us initially wanted tons of kids, six or as many as we could afford. We had to stop after three, due to my health problems. Looking back, it’s a damn good thing, too. Three is plenty! :p