A big family? Why?

I voted 2...large family and wanted to be a parent and this is how it happened. I only have 1 sibling, but my mom had 12 siblings and we grew up with the extended family everywhere. So for me, I'm used to having a lot of people around and while I didn't say "Oh, I want 6 kids" or whatever, once we did find out about the kids, I did say "ah, 4's not that many!" LOL! We didn't plan on 4 kids at once though! Just happened that way.

I grew up in a large family and know how important siblings are. A relative grew up in fc separated from siblings and I saw how this affected the person terribly. It was important to me to keep siblings together if at all possible. I've adopted two sibling groups.

I grew up with one sibling, but always wanted more. I've always been the one in the family who loved the babies, wanted to play with the kids, etc. Always babysitting, etc. Knew I wanted to work with kids, and became a teacher. Even when teaching, I knew I wanted a large family, even though EVERYONE told me I was crazy, I'd change my mind after one, etc. Now we have 3 foster, hoping to adopt, plus planning on having bio, and possibly adopting again! I love being a mom and can't wait to grow our family however God sees fit!

We only looked at sibling groups because we knew we wanted more than one child, we thought sibling relationships are important and wanted to help preserve that for some kids, and because I knew the foster adoption journey would be arduous and a pain in the rear, so we wanted to get it over with. We've got a sibling group of 3 that are part of a larger group of 9. I love my kids and couldn't do without any of them. However, I often am struck by the thought that they would heal faster from their attachment disorder if they were an only child. It's harder for them having to share us. And yet, it is sad to see them miss their siblings who aren't with us. 3 are still wards, so we see them twice a month. They look forward to the visits, sort of, but my goodness, are they anxiety provoking! And the visits themselves are sort of depressing. Their siblings don't really know much about playing, so it's sort of awkward and forced. Two of them do not speak, although no one will acknowledge that they are delayed. Sad. Their oldest brother is an adult now and is not interested in spending time with them. We've seen him briefly when he has picked up their older sisters when they've visited. The visits with the older girls were hard, too. The last one was utterly crazy. I don't know what the answer is. If their siblings had more involved caregivers in their lives, it would work a lot better. Sorry for the downer of a post! I love my three kiddos and feel that we were all meant to be a family. I'm sure of that, anyway.

We knew that we were going to adopt transracially and that we wanted at least two children. We decided on siblings because we thought it would be best if our kids at least had someone else in the family that they looked like. I guess that's not only because of the transracial thing, because it was something we discussed when looking at the DHS system too. There was also a selfishness on my part, that I didn't want to have to go through the adoption process again also. I'm trying to make sure that I realize that just because they're siblings it's not like they'll necessarily be as close as my brother and me. There are all sorts of sibling relationships, but I would still love it if they were really close!