Growing up in a Large Family

Lack of attention
- There is insufficient attention from parents as they may not
have the time to adequately develop an interest in the welfare
of every individual child in the home; interests ranging from
schoolwork to keeping in touch with the childs peer life. These
aspects may suffer a little, as keeping abreast of every
progress made by each child would be a heavy burden for very
busy parents. It will then often be expected that elder siblings
would assist in keeping an eye on the younger ones.

Parents get easily stressed out

- It is hard work bringing up children and harder work when
there are a considerable number of them. Because parents
have to take care of the physical, emotional and financial
needs of not just one child, but of five or six children as the
case may be, they are likely to start complaining of frequent
exhaustion. When this happens and frustrations set in, the
children are usually at the receiving end. Exhaustion may
become less frequent when children are grown.

Financial difficulties may arise

- Having a large family on a tight income may result in financial
worries in the home. With a larger family, more money is spent
on feeding, clothing and education, thus creating a strain for
families living on low incomes. Sometimes a brother or sister
would not get the same kind of education an elder sibling had
had the opportunity of getting as a result of the financial
constraints in the home.

Health implications due to overcrowding

- If there are more people living in a house that was made to
comfortably hold less, a not-very-comfortable situation arises.
A child, in this case, would often complain of headaches,
fatigue, restlessness and sometimes, insomnia as a result of
the lack of space. This living condition is further made
unpleasant when siblings constantly chatter and argue loudly
and are left to run wild due to lack of discipline and control.

Fending for self early

- Children of larger homes would likely start looking after
themselves and supporting one another earlier than later
because parents may not be able to provide enough financial
support. However, they may sometimes do this in an effort to
assist their parents and ease the load, and this is fine just as
long as it wouldnt interfere with their schooling.

Feelings of not being special

A child begins to develop the feeling that they are not special
enough to their parents when the father or mother finds it
challenging trying to get a simple thing as the name of the
child right, and always seems to get them mixed up. Every
child takes a personal delight in the knowledge that special
interest is being shown them by their parents, but when this
isnt the case, they may gradually start detaching and isolating
themselves from the rest of the household.