On screen and off, really big families are really fascinating

By Elsa K. Simcik

For the AJC

John and Lauren Nelson of Cumming say they have always been open to having as many children as God would give them. That’s a good thing because they got 12, now ranging in age from 3 to 22.

The Nelsons, who are Catholic, say that when they’re out with their kids -- in their 15-passenger van -- people ask all kinds of questions:

“Are they all yours?”

“Don’t you know what causes that?”

And, most often, “How do you afford them?”

To that, Lauren responds, “You sacrifice. Do we have cable? No.  We don’t go out to dinner a lot. A challenge is the affordability but you do it. Would you trade any of them in? No.”

Nine Nelson children now live at home. In addition, two international students plus Lauren’s mother live with them. “There is never a dull moment,” says Lauren, who works full-time as a bookkeeper. Besides, says John, “Where else can you have a pick-up Wiffle Ball game or a pick-up basketball game?” Peter, age 13, says his favorite part of having a lot of brothers and sisters is “the company. You never feel lonely.” And the worst part? “The bickering,” says Kristen, 15.

Every Saturday the entire family pitches in to clean the house. And when it comes to laundry, Lauren says the rule is, “At age 12, you get a laundry basket. And they start their own wash.” They have two sets of washers and dryers and she estimates they do a load or two a day.

Lauren cooks nearly every night. John, who works in IT, says they probably spend $300 a week on groceries. Their home—a Victorian-style farmhouse—technically only has four bedrooms. But with a finished attic (where six of the boys sleep) and a basement, they have plenty of room. Room for more, perhaps? John says yes; Lauren, who is 46, says she’s not as sure. She does, however, recommend that anyone who is considering a large family do it. “You can’t turn back the clock,” she says. “It’s easier the older they get.”

TV’s big families

The questions the Nelsons get show the same kind of interest millions of viewers have in big broods on TV. Take the Duggar Family. Their TLC hit "19 Kids and Counting" averages more than 1.4 million viewers each week. It seems audiences can’t get enough of large families: "Jon and Kate Plus 8," also on TLC, had folks hooked for five seasons. This month, "Kate Plus 8″ (the same show, minus Jon) premiered to more than three million. Bravo recently entered the big-family genre with "9 by Design," a show about a couple who remodel houses, and by the way, also have seven children. And let’s not forget Nadya Suleman (“Octomom”) who grabbed attention after giving birth to octuplets, bringing her total kid count 14.

Are the days of 2.5 kids per household gone? Yes, but not in the direction the TV programming suggests --  families are actually continuing to shrink. According to the U.S. Census, the average number of children per household is now 1.86. And that, in part, fuels interest.

“I think we’re always curious about things that we’re not around,” said Dr. Jan Ligon, associate professor of social work at Georgia State University.  “In 1790, about half of all families were comprised of over six people. Now only 3 percent of families have that many. We moved away from an agricultural society so you didn’t have to have a bunch of kids around the house. They, at one time, would have been contributors to the family with labor.

“This would not have been television in 1790. Probably what would have made television [then] was someone who had one kid."

How do they manage?

Stacy Palmer and her husband, David, of Cumming have seven kids, ranging in age from 14 to eight months. Stacy, who home-schools them, says she gets lots of questions about what she fixes for dinner, how she keeps up with all the kids’ activities and how she manages the laundry.

“It’s really funny how people assume that we are different,” she said. “I always say if you can handle three kids, you can handle seven.”

Shandrecka Murphy of Stone Mountain raises her seven children (that includes triplet boys), ages 2 to 13, as a single mom. She had plans to attend medical school when she unexpectedly became pregnant at 21. Murphy has not attended medical school, but she is close to completing her doctorate in public health and epidemiology through Walden University, an online degree program.

“I’ve always known I wanted to take it to the top,” she said of her education. She works for the Department of Community Health as an AIDS drug assistance program supervisor.

Like heads of other big households, Murphy’s life is not just busy, it’s expensive: She spends about $600 a month on groceries. Daycare, she said, is another $600 per month and would be higher if she didn’t receive support through Georgia’s CAPS (Childcare and Parent Services) program. Murphy said she lives paycheck to paycheck. Sometimes, she said, “You have to rob Peter to pay Paul.”

Dawn Crain, a married mother of seven in Milton, knows first-hand realities of raising a large family. “Children are a wonderful gift but a huge financial obligation,” she said.

Crain said that raising responsible, productive members of society starts with the parents’ choices. “If you have more children than you can afford and you turn to public assistance, it becomes a social responsibility,” she said.

At that point, opinions on society's supporting role continue to be divided.

Marjean Birt, who is president of the Chattahoochee Republican Women’s Club, is among those who believe people should have has many children as they want, as long as they can feed, clothe and educate them.

“The government should only do for people what they cannot do for themselves,” she said. Birt, who is opposed to abortion, suggests that those who do have more children than they can afford consider adoption.

Jeff Utley of Duluth, who has two children and another on the way, sees it differently.

“ I believe we need to attempt to intervene with education, counseling and other means of assistance before a single parent finds themselves with seven, eight or nine children,” he said. “For the sake of the innocent children, our tax dollars must help them.”

Their decisions, in hindsight

Stacy Palmer said she didn’t always want a big family. In fact, she and David laugh now when they think  about when they were first married and he said he wanted six kids. “I told him ‘You better find a new wife.’  Of course, I wouldn’t trade it for the world,” she said of life with seven.

While Lauren Nelson has no regrets about having 12, she said she's met several women who do have regrets— about not having more. “They’ll say, ‘I only had three and they’re all over the country and I don’t see them anymore,’” Nelson said.