Yahoo Lifestyle 'How I raise 15 children': one (busy) mum tells all
LaChelle Adkins and her husband Jerome pictured with 12 of their 15 children. Photo: Yahoo Shine
Adkins and her husband Jerome welcomed a 15th child into their sizable family on Sunday.
Adkins and her husband Jerome welcomed a 15th child into their sizable family on Sunday.
Former corporate attorney turned stay-at-home mother Adkins, 43, gave birth to daughter Hope Monique, the newest addition to her brood, which includes 13 children and two stepsons with her husband Jerome, 45, who juggles three jobs as a US Major in the Army Reserves, a manager of a retail chain, and a church pastor.
“The chaos is normal to us and we love it,” Adkins tells Yahoo Shine.
The children (deep breath) are as follows: Jerome Brendan, 24, Taylor, 21, Christian, 20, Jonathan, 19, Alexandria, 17, McKinsey, 16, Victoria, 14, Elisabeth, 13, Olivia, 11, Danielle, 9, Jeremiah, 7, Joshua, 5, Jordan, 3, Faith, 2, and Hope Monique, 3 days old.
All were natural births. “No pain medicine!” says Adkins, who grew up an only child and never imagined she would have such a large family. But when she got married, Adkins decided to forgo birth control. “Taking it became a burden and I wasn’t opposed to having more children with my husband,” she says.
Although there are 15 kids living in a four-bedroom house, Adkins runs her home like a well-oiled machine. She drives a 15-passenger Ford van, an upgrade from the two minivans she and her husband previously owned. “It was hard before, because we couldn’t go anywhere without two cars,” she says. “Now, everyone just piles in one van.” When the family goes grocery shopping, they’re bound to get a few stares and people often approach, asking if Adkins is running a daycare center. “The children get a kick out of the attention,” she says.
Baby Hope Monique - the newest addition to the Adkins clan. Photo: Yahoo Shine
Surprisingly, the Adkins’s morning routine is fairly seamless. “The kids pack their own lunches in the morning and I keep snacks in zip-lock bags so they can grab and go,” she says. Fortunately, the children’s schools are located on the same street so they take the bus or are driven by various family members. The family spends around $350 per week on groceries, thanks to Adkins’s dedication to clipping coupons, and they sit down for dinner each night between 6:00 and 6:30 p.m.
In order to keep a lid on their schedules, each child is allowed one after-school activity per year (basketball, cheerleading) and weekends are spent at church and attending each other’s events. The children are allowed their freedom, however Adkins and her husband have banned sleepovers. “It would be difficult to host extra children for the night and because my kids range so much in age, other parents might not feel comfortable,” she says.
Bedtime, she admits, can be a struggle. “Our goal is to get everyone in bed by 9:30 p.m., but that doesn’t always happen, especially with the older kids,” she says. “And our two-year-old still insists on sleeping in our bed but that will change soon when we move her into the older kids’ room.” And like any siblings, arguments break out occasionally. “If both kids are eating the same snack, one might shout, ‘She’s copying me!’ but everyone really gets along,” she says.
It’s no surprise that date night is a rarity, but when Adkins and her husband do manage to catch dinner and a movie, they have built in baby-sitters. “We’ve never paid for childcare because the older kids watch their younger siblings,” she says.
According to Adkins, the children don’t mind the attention that comes with being in a large family and they've even been approached by reality television show producers (a show has not yet panned out). “We don’t want to be freak shows but there’s a lot people can learn from our large, blended family,” she says.
And that family may even get larger. “We’re not opposed to having more children,” says Adkins. "We'll see what happens."
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