"One of the best gifts I ever gave you," my mother told me recently, "was your brothers and sisters." How very true!  I LOVE being a part of a large family - seven siblings, five girls and two boys.  What a joy to have four sisters and two brothers!

[caption id="attachment_1057" align="aligncenter" width="479" caption="My parents, with all my siblings and my grandmother, at their 45th anniversary celebration in 1983. This is one of the last formal pictures taken with my Daddy."]<a href="http://motherhoodstress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Anniversary_45th.jpg"><img class=" wp-image-1057 " title="Anniversary_45th" src="http://motherhoodstress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Anniversary_45th.jpg" alt="" width="479" height="274" /></a>[/caption]

When I saw an article,<a title="The_Omnichild's_Dilemma" href="http://articles.boston.com/2012-01-30/opinion/30674003_1_child-abuse-parents-friend" target="_blank"> "The Omnichild's Dilemma,"</a> I clicked on the link and read one woman's tale of being a singleton.  She referred to being an only child as "child abuse — a cruelty that only gets worse as the Baby Boomers age."

"Consider my friend," the author says, "an only child struggling to care for her parents. . . but with young children and a full-time job, my friend can only do so much. Limitless, however, is the crushing sense of responsibility, angst, and guilt."

As I read that article, I thought of the contrast with my family. Last week, my brother-in-law had heart surgery. My sister had two siblings to sit with her through the long day of surgery, and other siblings who took turns coming by to encourage and distract her, to pray for her and her husband. Those at a distance called to offer their support.

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