Having so many children was not a plan. When my husband and I married we were both older, and as I was recently diagnosed with a second autoimmune disease, there was uncertainty about how my body would respond to pregnancy. We also weren't sure if we'd be a fertile couple, even without my health complications. Infertility affects roughly 15 percent of couples and we might've been one of them. We were, however, open to children. We had a combined openness and a desire for our marriage to produce fruit.

Openness is a common theme in the recent book by economist and social scientist Catherine Pakaluk titled, Hannah's Children: The Women Quietly Defying the Birth Dearth. In this book, Mrs. Pakaluk seeks to uncover the reasons why only five percent of women are having five or more children, and why—despite numerous government programs in countries around the world—most women are decidedly not. In fact, most of the world is currently at below-replacement fertility rate.

In our current culture family planning is the norm. If a child is conceived without planning, it is an "accident" or a "surprise." In the book Peter and Wendy, Mr. Darling considers their financial situation upon the birth of their first child:

For a week or two after Wendy came it was doubtful whether they would be able to keep her, as she was another mouth to feed. Mr. Darling was rightfully proud of her, but he was very honorable, and he sat on the edge of Mrs. Darling's bed, holding her hand and calculating expenses, while she looked at him imploringly.

But having children isn't just about monetary calculations, children are experience goods.

Pakaluk states, "'Experience goods' is the economist's label for goods whose total costs and benefits cannot be fully assessed in advance, before being acquired and experienced."

Pakaluk continues,

. . .women make choices about having children based on costs and benefits, but not in the way we usually understand that phrase. Women compare the subjective personal value of having another child with the subjective personal value of what they will miss out on if they have one. Both sides of the scale include gains and losses.

Children do improve one's quality of life, but you can't know that unless you choose to go through the experience of having one. Children get a lot of negative press too, and this affects women's perception of what their quality of life will be as a mother. One of the women interviewed in Pakaluk's book perceptively pointed out: "I mean, seriously, children are the scapegoat of this culture…the destroyer of marriages, and individuality and freedom, the suppressor of women - a child. That's irrational." Pakaluk adds, "If children are bearing all the negative emotions of the culture, how could they possibly be an object of desire, something you would make sacrifices to obtain?"