Family has 18th child

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I'm curious as to the Duggar family's religious affiliation. I also hope, for all their sakes, that the TLC Network is going to help them raise all those kids.

For God's sake, man-- get a vasectomy!

They are christans.

Number 18 topic

This family adheres to a fundamentalist religious sect. I have watched a few episodes on TV out of curiousity. There is something inherently dysfunctional about their lifesyle. I would be surprised if any of their children follow the lead of such a family size.

I do believe they earn money through their reality TV series. Methinks this is not done for free.

Hundreds of years ago, many women were pregnant 18 times, and even more. What was different was that only half of these children were born and lived to adulthood.

Multiple births, physical challenges, and huge families such as this were virtually uncommon a century ago, apart from a few exceptions like the Dion Quints, Chang and Eng, and a South American family with 20 children, and a few people born with unusual physical occurrences- the latter usually ended up as sideshow spectacles (like Chang and Eng) and most did not marry and have families, if they lived so long.

So we have dispensed with viewing extreme situations/people as though they were "freaks" to be stared at--or have we? This is a money maker.

Someone should offer Mr. Duggar a free vasectomy for humanitarian reasons.

Their names all start with J.

She should get a free vaginal tightening operation after all those kids! I wonder how long she's been UN-pregnant in those 21 years..

They certainly seem to be in the wrong century..Most people today have 1-3 children, with several step-children as well. All of their children have been taught to play the violin, do household chores better than Martha Stewart, pray and attend church faithfully..She is a wonderful example for many young women, yet most people today could never follow in her footsteps.Today , people are too selfish, too impatient, too materialistic, thinking only of themselves, letting daycare, grannies, and teachers raise their children for them. I commend this family, though they do stick out as oddities in this world today. And this is from a mom of 5 children: 4 raised and 1 stillborn..

My guess would be Mormons of some type or another.

Having that many kids is just insane.

My ex-wife, who grew up VERY sheltered, stopped having kids when she figured out what was causing them!! ! I'm not kidding!

If the Duggers love kids that musch, why not adopt unwanted kids then?

Exactly. As recently as 100 years ago, women did not usually have access to birth control. However, diseases, poor sanitation, poor nutrition, etc. killed off many infants and young children. Women gave birth to many babies, but often, only two or three reached an age at which they could have children of their own. The worse-off you were financially, the more children you tended to lose at a young age.

It is thought, too, that earlier in history, women breast-fed their children for about as long as possible. Breast milk is a convenient food source, and it decreases the likelihood of becoming pregnant (but is not exactly reliable as a birth control method!). This meant that a woman would typically have a new child every few years or so, and many died due to disease, poor nutrition, poor sanitation, hypothermia . . . the list goes on.

Other animals reproduce in large quantities for the same reason - in the wild, most offspring will die before they reach sexual maturity for a wide variety of reasons.

Now, all of a sudden, we have birth control, medications and vaccinations to prevent the spread of disease, an understanding of how diseases are spread and how to prevent common illnesses (e. coli infection, for example) through proper hygiene, a good understanding of nutrition, the ability to heat and cool our houses through use of gas and / or electricity, etc.

But it takes time for society to adjust, especially in social classes that were (and still are) the most greatly affected by the factors described above, and also have always had the lowest rates of access to education and information of all kinds.



Until about 150 - 100 years ago (industrial revolution, development and advancement of modern science), it was common for children who were born "defective" in some way to be killed, abandoned, or neglected until they died. This was because a lot of people believed that to be given such a child was to be cursed by the devil, or that these children were "changelings" . . . There were multiple superstitious beliefs that made it socially taboo to even give birth to a "defective" child. On top of that, the children were feared, along with the curses that were thought to accompany them. So the parents would dispose of them and then claim that the child had been stillborn (also more common back then). And yes, some of those who got to live did not live long, depending on their exact disability.

But today, most children born with deformities are made to look as normal as possible as early as possible, and many formerly fatal disabilities (such as type I diabetes) are easily treated, so now a lot of these people go on to live normal lives and have children of their own. Doctors encourage genetic counseling so that people refrain from passing on genes that are considered problematic, but from this point on, the issue becomes ethically complicated and controversial.

And yes, many of these reality shows / documentaries / whatever on stations like TLC and Discovery Health are essentially freak shows; I have noticed this as well.

Wow, I have 3 and those are quite a handful. My wife's aunt has a similar attitude towards childbirth. They are some sort of fundamentalist Christians and they say they will stop having kids "when God wants them to stop." She is on her 6th or 7th now I think. I'm not sure if I've ever seen her not pregnant.
I haven't watched that TLC special, but I watch another one a long time ago that was probably the same family, but I think they only had 14 or 15 kids then. They said they use a buddy system to raise them. Life must really suck for the older ones.

The last sentence is so funny, but probably very, very true. Some of those kids are being left out of the loop here, the middle child is the one left out, so which 4-5 is it?

My head is spinning... oh my! I couldn't even imagine having 3 kids, let alone 18! How in the world are they going to afford all of that????

I'm interested to know what the effect is on the mother's body. And I don't mean the obvious pencil-down-a-mineshaft kind of effects that are on everybody's mind (including my own haha). Being pregnant all the time like that can't be healthy, can it? It seems like a lot of strain on the human body.

I would say the uterus is blown out of proportion, all the stomach muscles are stretched out beyond tightening, the knees are weak, the breasts hang to the floor (sorry, people), and the arms are strongest of all.

And I hate it when they say "We will have kids as long as god gives them to us"

People saying that god gives you kids is a real pet-peeve I have. People make kids, not god.

I completely agree. And it's not too far a leap to get to "God made them, God will provide for them and care for them."