Sleeping on shelving??

[GenerationCedarchip]

The very bottom bunk looks so dark and dangerous. What if the whole thing collapses on that little girl?

Also, it looks like they can't sit up without banging their heads. How do those poor girls get in and out of bed? Not to mention moving in that room?

[Guest Anonymous]

Wouldn't it be cheaper to just have all the kids sleep in a pile on the floor, like a litter of kittens?

It sounds ridiculous phrased that way, but surely just filling the floor with wall-to-wall mattresses would be preferable to undustrial shelving. I wonder if they even considered that?

[Brainsample]

What do you do if someone is sick or injured? I guess you could switch bunks around, and mom could lay on the floor to attend to the one on the bottom bunk.

I also wonder about tipping of the unit because the bottom is not always weighted, but they could have easily bolted the upper part of the shelving to the wall and hope that they did.

I guess if you're trusting that your girls will be moving out eventually, it is seen as only temporary, too.

I tend to be a little crunchy about this kind of thing, because the kids have grown up with this kind of arrangement, and it is not like they were taken out of huge bedrooms and put on shelving. People live in hot climates without air and sleep in hammocks or on woven mats on the ground. China is full of people who use a public toilet which is shared by hundreds of others because they don't have facilities of their own at home. You get accustomed to whatever you've been exposed to and acclimated to, and if this is all you've experienced, it is not a hardship. I disliked the climate, but I grew up in the NE, so it was a shock, but it is normal and "feels like home" if this is what you know.

The question is whether or not a situation is safe.

If one of the girls had a communicable illness or disability or something like bad asthma, this could be problematic. Even so, I don't know that, as a nurse, that I'd call that environment unsafe if all of those girls are healthy. If I were called in there to do a health inspection or something like that (which is a part of home care nursing anyway which is required of the job), I would be concerned about safety of the girls getting in and out of the shelves without something like a safe ladder. It's easy to miss your footing if you're using the edge of a shelf as a step. I'd suggest a narrow stationary ladder from and secured to ceiling to floor at the top end of the "bunks." You can say that the Navy does this, but these are men who have passed physical training requirements and are in fit health. I don't think that you can argue this same thing for growing girls.

It would be great motivation to get your girls up and out of the house, however, to marry or get a career and get out of there.

[Brainsample]

Also, it looks like they can't sit up without banging their heads. How do those poor girls get in and out of bed? Not to mention moving in that room?

They could always pad the bottom of the shelf with something to avoid that.

[Brainsample]

It sounds ridiculous phrased that way, but surely just filling the floor with wall-to-wall mattresses would be preferable to undustrial shelving. I wonder if they even considered that?

I knew "house poor" families in the '80s who did this, buying big houses that they really couldn't afford. They had a bunch of boys, and they had good mattresses and box springs right on the floor in generously sized room(s). The girls had beds, though, but there were fewer of them.

I think that Kim's in a mobile home, and I think that it would be a safety issue because I don't think there's enough square footage to spread the girls on the floor. You wouldn't be able to walk in there without stepping on another person or tripping over the mattress.

[Ridiculous]

I don't think Kim is in a mobile home. I think it's a house but not totally finished yet.

[ricky_ticky]

I would not want to be on the bottom bunk of that arrangement. She says they are the same size as navy bunks, so remind me not to join the navy!

What I found even weirder was the mom who put the kids in the closet

aspiringtosimplicity.blogspot.com/2010/08/behind-curtain-1.html

[theologygeek]

I had to stop reading inashoe.com because it made me physically sick. The posts about rats in the walls, all the flies, and kids sleeping in death trap contraptions were too much for me.

[theologygeek]

What I found even weirder was the mom who put the kids in the closet

aspiringtosimplicity.blogspot.com/2010/08/behind-curtain-1.html

Uhhhhh, what does she intend to do when one of the kids bolts up in the middle of the night because they suddenly awaken startled? They will knock themselves unconscious.

[Guest Anonymous]

I would not want to be on the bottom bunk of that arrangement. She says they are the same size as navy bunks, so remind me not to join the navy!

What I found even weirder was the mom who put the kids in the closet

aspiringtosimplicity.blogspot.com/2010/08/behind-curtain-1.html

Uhhh, so that is a total firetrap. Where would those little girls go if a fire were to end up in their room? Answer: They'd cower deeper into their closet and die there. How the heck small is their room that there's no room for a bed? Even if they had to share it, it would be safer! FFS. It's honestly like these people are trying so hard to outfrugal each other that they forget that children are people, not canaries to be stacked in cages.

[lilah]

I really hope the duggars don't ever come across this blog and try and construct something like that for Jordyn, Jennifer and Hannie.

[Witsec6]

I would not want to be on the bottom bunk of that arrangement. She says they are the same size as navy bunks, so remind me not to join the navy!

What I found even weirder was the mom who put the kids in the closet

aspiringtosimplicity.blogspot.com/2010/08/behind-curtain-1.html

HAHA! It's like Harry Potter!

[bananacat]

What do you do if someone is sick or injured? I guess you could switch bunks around, and mom could lay on the floor to attend to the one on the bottom bunk.

If someone is sick or injured, one of the older girls who is already in the room would care for that person. The mom already moves babies in there at just a few months and tells the girls to take care of it and not to wake her up unless there's something really serious. There's no way Mom is gonna take care of a sick or injured child. She's too busy making more babies and getting good sleep so she'll have more energy for making more babies.

[Kelya]

Are there no occupancy laws in Texas? Where I am shoving ten kids into one room DOES NOT fly. Square footage requirements ftw?!

[Patsy]

I find LiaS especially infuriating. (It was basically my first fundie blog. Incidentally, I tried to comment there once and it never went through; after I'd found freejinger and while I was still lurking, Kim C made some comment in a post about "yes, I know you guys are watching me", and I though "ohhhh, you thought I'd come from fj? No, actually, MOST people disagree with you, not just ones from that website.") The mother's attitude towards the people she calls "blessings" makes me angry.

You can bet your ass none of the Quiverfull moms and dads are sleeping in make-shift bedding.

There's a post once where she points out that "twin beds" are called that because they can take two people. LOL, but the kids complain about it! I don't see her sleeping in a fucking twin bed. Haha, and the kids complain about having only one bathroom! LOL, we're not providing very well for them :D :D :D

What do you do if someone is sick or injured? I guess you could switch bunks around, and mom could lay on the floor to attend to the one on the bottom bunk.

No, once the kids are out of the bedroom, they're their siblings responsibility. If the younger ones disturb the older ones' sleep, the response is "so what?" Perhaps a parent would attend to a kid in the room if they were sick, I don't know. I don't think it's ever been stated one way or the other.

A few people have commented on the fact that their house is unifinished. That fact is occasionally referred to - ideas for how to expand the bedrooms, add an extra bathroom... fact of the matter is, they haven't made any changes in what, five years? They're not getting a second bathroom or a new bedroom for the kids. I think the only extension that would ever happen would be an area for the boys to sleep in (and in that case, MAYBE they'd actually get a decent-sized room. Anyone see Pa Coghlan's blog after the first son was born?)

[O Latin]

They don't look that bad, as long as all you ever want to do in your bed is sleep. When I was younger I would sit on my bed and read, write, watch movies on my laptop. I practically lived on my bed. The multiple-bunk setup seems like something that would have been cool for, say, a week at summer camp, but not forever.

Honestly, I am most disturbed that the closet bed lady has a child named Organique. Please tell me that is some sort of blog code name and the poor thing isn't actually called that.

[slickcat79]

They don't look that bad, as long as all you ever want to do in your bed is sleep. When I was younger I would sit on my bed and read, write, watch movies on my laptop. I practically lived on my bed. The multiple-bunk setup seems like something that would have been cool for, say, a week at summer camp, but not forever.

Honestly, I am most disturbed that the closet bed lady has a child named Organique. Please tell me that is some sort of blog code name and the poor thing isn't actually called that.

Oh yeah, I was thinking that too. But considering that she calls the other ones Little Artist and Big Sister or something like that, I'm fairly sure it's a blog nickname.

I actually got a little short of breath thinking about trying to sleep in that top bunk, and I don't have claustrophobia issues. Plus it's over 5 feet off the ground! I'm not sure how the poor kid even gets out of it without falling.

[Maul the Koala]

I stayed at a hostel in London that had shelf bunkbeds. I think the room I was in was 2 beds wide by 4 beds tall. I can't remember offhand. I did not like that at all. I couldn't imagine sleeping in one of those every single day.

[Brainsample]

I had to stop reading inashoe.com because it made me physically sick. The posts about rats in the walls, all the flies, and kids sleeping in death trap contraptions were too much for me.

Rats are very common in that area around San Antonio, and I heard physicians with whom I worked talking about vacating so exterminators could come in to get rid of them. Out in the country, they are also common, and indigent kids will tell you of how they wake up with rats in their beds. They crawl in your bed at night to eat your hair -- good source of protein. Yummy rat breakfast.

So for those who don't live in rat infested cities, know that it is not just a sign of poverty in the San Antonio area. There are rats everywhere, even in exclusive and wealthy neighborhoods there.

[Brainsample]

Are there no occupancy laws in Texas? Where I am shoving ten kids into one room DOES NOT fly. Square footage requirements ftw?!

That would be interesting to find out, but I bet people are not inclined to enforce those laws if there are any.

It's the same kind of thing with lay midwives which are illegal in the State of Texas. There are so many of them, no one really cares about them and they are winked at. There's also a former mayor's wife who is a a lay midwife and has some who work for her, and because of the money and political connections, no one questions them. Money and political power rule in San Antonio and that area of Texas. You know who you can mess with and who you can't, and you don't want to tick any of these officials off there. You will never see justice.

So it is my guess that if there are any laws, you would have to grease some palms and have some political backing to get someone to investigate. And frankly, in the city, anyway, there are bigger fires to put out. Resources are thin, and these kids seem well cared for, so no one is likely to say much of anything.

[Brainsample]

Organique is a "bloggy-name"...thank God.

aspiringtosimplicity.blogspot.com/2011/01/little-late.html

[Belle0000]

Here's another closet bed, this one with lots of stuff stored about a foot above the top "bunk":

homesteadblogger.com/lindseyinal/153864/

[bananacat]

Here's another closet bed, this one with lots of stuff stored about a foot above the top "bunk":

homesteadblogger.com/lindseyinal/153864/

Wow, they literally treat their kids like possessions. They just put them on a shelf to put them away along with all their other stuff.

[SquirrelySquirrel]

Here's another closet bed, this one with lots of stuff stored about a foot above the top "bunk":

homesteadblogger.com/lindseyinal/153864/

That just gives me the shivers. And are they kidding with that "rail" on the top bunk? Flimsy wood held in with a couple of nails?

I'm mostly disturbed at the lack of real mattresses in all of these blogs. $36 of foam for 3 kids? We bought a cheapo foam pad (it's still thicker than many of these look) for my daughter to use for about a week while waiting for her new mattress to come in last year and I felt like the shittiest mother ever for making her sleep on that short-term. (Though I must confess that she's using that foam pad this very night because she wanted to 'camp out' on her floor in her sleeping bag, but that won't last long and at least she has a real mattress to go back to when the novelty wears off.) The lack of clearance comes in a close second, probably because I used to have those dreams of falling all the freaking time when I was a kid and I shot up out of bed when I woke up every single time. I would've killed myself in one of these fundie contraptions.

[theologygeek]

Rats are very common in that area around San Antonio, and I heard physicians with whom I worked talking about vacating so exterminators could come in to get rid of them. Out in the country, they are also common, and indigent kids will tell you of how they wake up with rats in their beds. They crawl in your bed at night to eat your hair -- good source of protein. Yummy rat breakfast.

So for those who don't live in rat infested cities, know that it is not just a sign of poverty in the San Antonio area. There are rats everywhere, even in exclusive and wealthy neighborhoods there.

I don't know what that has to do with children pouring gallons of water into a wall to drown rats, nor how it is comparable to a doctor who has hired an exterminator. If she can't afford an exterminator, then she certainly can't afford to be a perpetual baby maker. The woman is disgusting and lazy.