- Feb 5, 2002
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Humans are, hands down, the single most fascinating set of creatures on the planet. If you want to understand how humans work, just make a few, sit back, and watch them do their thing.
My wife and I have many kids.
We didn’t plan to have many kids. It just sort of happened. After our fifth child was born, a friend asked my wife how many children she planned to have. She said, “Two.” Yet each of our six kids has been both a joy and an endless source of parenting lessons. Whether you’re considering producing your own mini-platoon, or are merely curious as to how it’s possible for apparently sane adults to cope, I offer here a few insights and one piece of advice: don’t take yourself too seriously, hang on, and enjoy the ride.
How do you handle sickness?
Commercials where the kid has a cold and the parents give him cough syrup and lovingly tuck him into bed are a joke. Nursing numerous children is like playing whack-a-mole. One kid gets over his cold just in time for another to get it. No, they can’t all be sick at once. They must do it sequentially. What to a normal family would be a three-day cold, to a large family is a month-long affair. When you have a lot of kids, you don’t quarantine the sick ones. You want them to infect each other as quickly as possible, because you need to process all of them before you come down with the bug yourself. You start to thank God for the blessing of acquired immunity that guarantees each kid will only get the disease once.
Then you discover pink eye.
If dealing with a cold is like playing whack-a-mole, dealing with pink eye is like playing a macabre game of telephone. Kid #1 gives it to Kid #2, who gives it to Kid #3. By this time Kid #1 is cured, but Kid #3 has given it to Kid #4. Now Kid #1 has forgotten your repeated warnings about washing his hands and keeping his fingers out of his brother’s eye, and sure enough, Kid #1 has it again. He gives it to Kid #2, and the whole cycle continues. You find yourself praying for a harsh winter so the freezing temperatures can kill off the germs these house creatures have painted on to every surface.
What do you call them?
Continued below.
Why Not Have a Bunch of Kids? - Public Discourse
My wife and I have many kids.
We didn’t plan to have many kids. It just sort of happened. After our fifth child was born, a friend asked my wife how many children she planned to have. She said, “Two.” Yet each of our six kids has been both a joy and an endless source of parenting lessons. Whether you’re considering producing your own mini-platoon, or are merely curious as to how it’s possible for apparently sane adults to cope, I offer here a few insights and one piece of advice: don’t take yourself too seriously, hang on, and enjoy the ride.
How do you handle sickness?
Commercials where the kid has a cold and the parents give him cough syrup and lovingly tuck him into bed are a joke. Nursing numerous children is like playing whack-a-mole. One kid gets over his cold just in time for another to get it. No, they can’t all be sick at once. They must do it sequentially. What to a normal family would be a three-day cold, to a large family is a month-long affair. When you have a lot of kids, you don’t quarantine the sick ones. You want them to infect each other as quickly as possible, because you need to process all of them before you come down with the bug yourself. You start to thank God for the blessing of acquired immunity that guarantees each kid will only get the disease once.
Then you discover pink eye.
If dealing with a cold is like playing whack-a-mole, dealing with pink eye is like playing a macabre game of telephone. Kid #1 gives it to Kid #2, who gives it to Kid #3. By this time Kid #1 is cured, but Kid #3 has given it to Kid #4. Now Kid #1 has forgotten your repeated warnings about washing his hands and keeping his fingers out of his brother’s eye, and sure enough, Kid #1 has it again. He gives it to Kid #2, and the whole cycle continues. You find yourself praying for a harsh winter so the freezing temperatures can kill off the germs these house creatures have painted on to every surface.
What do you call them?
Continued below.
Why Not Have a Bunch of Kids? - Public Discourse