They Gave Up Everything for Their Kids… and Never Regretted It

Added: 2026-05-16

[00:00:00]Their stories taught me that falling birth rates are not a cost problem. At least not the way we normally think about a cost problem. The real obstacle to choosing a child, they said, was the cost of missing out on other things you could have done with your time or with your life. The price that they really leaned into, the cost of having children was what they had to give up. They talked about sleepless nights, about giving up comforts and plans and hobbies, status, a clean house, giving up alone time, achievements, freedom, giving up meeting your own needs. Having children and parenting is all about living for someone else, one mom said, and not for yourself. These costs they granted were big and consequential, but the reason for missing out. Their purpose was so much bigger than the losses. They would give up something of themselves, but their children would give it back to them with interest. One woman told me they had a reason to have children big enough to give up their lives more than once. And that reason came from deep trust in God, from love for their spouses or love for their children, and often all three. In any way, they said the losses weren't the end of the story. Their children were their greatest blessings.

[00:01:13]They told me how their children had saved their lives, saved their marriages, and saved their souls. By their own reports, have been saved from immaturity, loneliness, selfishness, and uselessness.

[00:01:27]And so had their children and their husbands. They told stories of healing and growth. The upshot of all of this, they believed the nation would be happier and more virtuous if we spent more of our adult lives taking care of children and if our children grew up with more siblings. Their stories taught me that having a family is possible today. Very much so. They didn't seem to face different trade-offs. They didn't drop out of college. They didn't think that having children was easy. But they wanted children enough to overcome the costs and quietly arranged their lives to welcome them. Like the biblical Hannah who prayed to be relieved of barrenness and was blessed with Samuel and later with five more children, America's Hannah believe children are blessings, expressions of God's goodness and the purpose of their marriages.