Radford Family #6 Sue claims Heidie is the last, something she's said many times in the pa

[emmawhu]

Can I just say, I just don't get it. I have a baby and a toddler with an age difference of 20 months (quite Radfordey of me) and my days are filled with changing their nappies, getting them dressed, feeding them, carrying them around, cuddling them, making sure they're safe and don't do anything dangerous, putting them down for naps, bathing them, reading to them, helping them go to sleep and getting up at night when they cry. My days and nights are full and that's just with two kids, how on earth do you do all that with 10 times that amount AND find the time to read through hundreds of comments on YouTube, Instagram and Facebook and respond to many of them. I suppose the answer is Sue doesn't do any of the above-mentioned activities that fill my days and which, although tiring, I enjoy, as that's what being a parent entails (at least at the baby and toddler stage). Getting pregnant isn't an achievement, I know for people struggling with infertility it's a different story, but generally it's what happens when people have sex and doesn't require any particular skills, training or brain power. Being a parent on the other hand is much more demanding and requires a lot more than a basic biological act. As far as I can see, the Radfords are great at getting pregnant, but when it comes to being parents, they're unable to do it properly or just aren't interested. Either way it's really sad and I feel sorry for all those children.

It's interesting rewatching some of the old KAC programs as Sue actually seemed far more stressed when she only had 16. These days, in the vlogs etc, you see her chilling in the garden etc, sometimes with only a handful of kids around (which for her must be bliss).

Now, I know they obviously only want us to see the positives in the vlogs. I'm not suggesting it's easy having 22 kids as I imagine her days are still largely full of chores and screaming kids but I have a theory as to why she seemingly finds it a lot easier now. Back during the early KAC she literally just had Chloe to help. Sophie was starting her own family, Chris had moved out and the other older boys didn't help at all (nor were they expected to). Fastforward 7 years and the other girls, who were all still little thenselves back when Oscar and Casper were babies, have grown up. She has 5 mini mums on standby in Chloe, Millie, Katie, Ellie and Aimee (obviously Millie will be busy herself soon but out of all of them she seems the least interested in helping with the little ones anyway). But we see it in the vlogs, even when Chloe is working, Katie, Ellie and Aimee are always there on hand to play with little ones, wipe away tears, keep a close eye on them to make sure they're safe etc. More to the point, they do genuinely seem to want to most of the time.

Sue knows she can sit in the sun fussing the dogs whenever she wants 10 minutes peace, as she knows Katie will fuss Archie when he falls and Ellie will keep an eye on Bonnie toddling around out of her sight and Aimee will pop Heidie's dummy in if she wakes crying etc. She knows Chloe will tell Hallie and Phoebe off for scrapping with each other, and Casper will snitch on his brothers if they're up to no good etc. She never use to have that luxury. But the older her other kids get (especially the girls) the easier this parenting lark is for Sue despite the fact she's constantly popping out new ones still.

Whilst the media often fawn over her, claiming how amazing she is for doing it all, I just can't help thinking how easy we'd all find it if we lived with that many other adults and teenagers who were on hand whenever we needed them for childcare/chores. She most definitely doesn't do it all and hasn't done for quite some time now. Those girls are a godsend to her and I honestly don't think she'd cope without them. She certainly wouldn't keep producing more if she didn't have all the help she does.

 

[Foxybrown]

One thing I always think when I watch the vlogs is, how do they know where all the kids are in the house? It's a big place and there are a lot of them to watch. Sometimes Sue is chilling in the kitchen or living room, how would she know if one of the little ones was climbing somewhere, or playing with something dangerous?

Probably cos she relies on the older ones to 'care' for the toddlers whilst she works out her ovulation dates

 

[have the privilege]

I completely disagree with this.
Innocent or not at 13 you are not developed enough mentally to make those choices.
She cant agree to it, because she didnt understand what she was agreeing to.

While it’s obviously on a completely different scale, it’s the same principle as the likes of Rotherham isn’t it? They’re not old or mature enough to consent, and feel flattered that an older boy’s showing them attention, etc, which in turn makes it more likely they’ll give into a perceived pressure to have sex early with someone far too old for them in order to make them happy and make them love them/stay with them.

I work with teenagers and if one of the 17 year olds was involved with a 12/13 year old we’d be looking at child protection concerns now. Not calling the child a slut.

 

[Lola123]

I feel bad for babies born to teen parents like no one is ready for a baby so young some teen parents are good parents but like having a baby when your not with the dad still living in your family home it’s just a bad situation I know protection doesn’t always work but why aren’t people more careful I’m not from England but their seems to be so many teen parents where as where I live you’d never hear of any

Lots of married couples end up divorcing, it actually doesn’t matter a lot of the time if you have one parent or two!

 

[Lucyinthesky88]

I hate the new feathered eyebrow thing everyone’s doing. However I won’t bitch about a teenagers makeup skills - pretty sure I was wearing blue mascara at her age

Isn’t she about 22?

My bad - 25 in July.

She looked a lot better before!

 

[Mrs Cucumber]

You could learn how to blend your neck? Or match your foundation to you know, your actual skin tone?

please tell me when she says she's a make up artist, she's not actually trained is she?! people don't pay her do they?! my 5 year old does better make up with her my little pony set and I never thought blue eyebrows and purple lips would ever be a improvement on something!!

 

[spilleroftea]

They do all look eerily similar. You’d think you’d get some variety with 22

Then again I’ve got three and they’re CLONES. My daughter is her brothers girl-twin and my youngest son literally IS my oldest. If I wasn’t worried about creeps I’d post a picture - it’s creepy how much they look alike. It makes me a little uneasy sometimes actually.

Personally I think Noel and Sue look eerily similar.
Both adopted, Sues mum had other kids before taken, hmmm I am probably reading too much into it.

in the eyes of the law anyone under 16 cannot give consent .. even if they actually do give consent, if that makes sense.
not that I agree, she defo wasn’t ‘raped’ and clearly agreed to it.

I completely disagree with this.
Innocent or not at 13 you are not developed enough mentally to make those choices.
She cant agree to it, because she didnt understand what she was agreeing to.

 

[yootubesuperstar2]

Social services don't take children away because they don't have a nice garden...there must be a lot more to this. Still, I can't believe Sue is telling everyone on the group all of this, I'm sure Chris or Nicole wouldn't appreciate it!

 

[Good Egg]

So Sue and Noel posted about missed appointments at Alder Hey on their stories and then go on to say how much this costs in wasted NHS time. Now surely those appointments are due to the Covid19 and I’m not being funny but pot kettle black no? How much drain has 23 kids had on NHS services or does that not count?

 

[emmawhu]

I haven't watched a vlog since the baby has been born...are they getting ANOTHER new playground? They only got one not so long ago? What exactly are they doing on them? Or I wonder is this a freebie and that's why they are getting another one?

Probably another freebie, especially as there's been such a focus on them building it. The old one was genuinely wrecked though, they showed how it was falling to bits in the last vlog. It really is no wonder when you see how the kids play though. They really are wild.

Tbh, the latest vlog was just a sea of noise most of the time (as are a lot of their vlogs). I don't know how anyone can concentrate in those conditions. I don't think Sue finished a single sentence in this one, before someone interrupted or caught her attention and she flitted on to something else. That included Heidie crying. "Oh that's Heidie, I better just... oh hi Archie, you have a dinosaur on your... where are your shoes Phoebe? You'd better go and... oh is your foot hurting darling? Look everyone he hurt his foot because... hi Bluebell! Oh thanks for sorting Heidie" (to one of the girls, Aimee I think, who had tended to her while Sue was distracted by 101 things other than her crying newborn). Obviously that wasn't an exact transcript but it wasn't far off, you get the gist!

I just don't know how anyone can live like that..

 

[emmawhu]

He was a child too.. Iam so sick of hearing this.. Iam the same age as sue and it was bloody common to go out with boys a few yrs older when we were 13 and 14..for gods sake.. It was different times.. So everyone I went to school with must also be a perv?

He is hardly Chris Ingram fgs! He has been married to the same woman and faithful as far as we know for 30 bloody yrs!

Or I could turn your romanticised view on their love story around and say he's been controlling the same woman for over 30 years now.

17 might still be a child in the eyes of the law but a 17 year old is above the age of consent, a 13 year old definitely isn't. A 17 year old know it is wrong to sleep with a 13 year old. More to the point, why would they want to? Despite the legalities, 17 year olds don't see themselves as children. They like to think of themselves as young adults. Whereas any 17 year old would tell you a 13 year old is still a kid. Noel definitely knew that what he was doing was wrong. He was sleeping with a child.

Unfortunately, because nothing was ever done about it at the time, Sue was never given the chance to get away from him and potentially lead a normal life. We all see how she comes across in the vlogs. She's still has the mentality of a teenager. She's never had the chance to grow up. We all know how their relationship isn't as rosey as she likes to make out on camera, and yet she knows she can never ever leave him with so many dependent children and no prospects. He has a complete hold over her.

We might all laugh whenever Sue says no more and think yeah right but actually I really have felt Sue has meant it after Archie and Bonnie, and probably this time too. She seems exhausted, her body has probably well and truly had enough of being pregnant. And yet Noel, who very much controls the family finances, knows how prosperous a new baby is for the family. The moment they stop reproducing the freebies and media interest will dry up instantly. So before you know it, Sue's pregnant again.

Don't get me wrong, I do truly believe that once she is pregnant again she's genuinely happy, because the never ending cycle of pregnancy and newborns is all she's ever known. It's comfortingly familiar to her. She's like a child with a new doll again dreaming of the new pram and baby clothes. But between each pregnancy I have seen a slight change in Sue, compared to when they first started filming, that really does make me think she's had enough. And over the years, the more we see/hear of them, I'm seeing a creepier more controlling side to Noel that makes me feel that sexual predator from 30 odd years ago is still there under the surface, relishing the hold he has over this woman.

So in summary no, the fact he stayed with her absolutely does not make it ok imo. The fact someone has had control of someone else for so long, someone who mentally doesn't appear to have moved on from that vulnerable barely teenager he first abused all those years ago, is deeply concerning imo.

Absolutely, Sue has always given me the vibe of being trapped.
Even when she was talking about leaving him a few years back, she knew she couldnt cope with those kids on her own and had no way out. I remember being very shocked and worried for her for a couple of days, she was very unhappy with Noel at the time.
She did say about leaving herself but I dont think she could ever have brought herself to leave the kids. And then a few days later she was back and everything was happy in RadfordLand.

Couldn't agree more. Trapped is definitely the right word for it.

I often wonder how different Sue's life would have been if someone had stepped in when she first fell pregnant with Chris. If Noel had been charged and banned from seeing her, she would have been free of his control and allowed to grow up to eventually see how wrong it all was, in time. She was never allowed that as he's always been there, making the decisions for her and controlling every aspect of her life

 

[emmawhu]

It's so sad, I just watched the tillies birthday vlog and when Noel says "so do you like lol then do you tillie?". He genuinely has no idea about any of the kids.
The way he said it, you could tell it wasn't a sarcastic comment because she was getting lots of lol. It was a genuine question.

Really? I'd say it was pretty obvious it was a joke. A very dull non-funny one, but a joke nonetheless, based around the fact every single present was LOL themed.

Noel is the king of poor dad jokes.

 

[KateESJ]

I’d happily name 22 kids. I have so many names I wish I could use.

Theyre just so boring with their naming habits. There’s a few lovely names but most of them are so similar and just boring.

 

[MrOnions]

That's not official data, it's just a list of the most viewed names on their website so far this year.

I'm a name freak and it irritates me when the tabloids pick up on stuff like this and try to claim they're the most popular names as it just confuses people. I saw this particular list on fb several times in the week and all links were worded to suggest it was official data, and most of the comments took assumed it to be because of this. Officially, Luna and Asher are nowhere near being the number 1 names! Besides, 2020 has only just begun so there definitely won't be data like this readily available, they haven't even published the 2019 data yet.

Ophelia isn't even in the top 100, but I wouldn't say it's unique either. It's definitely on the rise.

If anyone is interested in official name data check out the Office for National Statistics. I always find name trends fascinating.

Baby names for boys in England and Wales - Office for National Statistics

Rank and count of the top names for baby boys, changes in rank since the previous year and breakdown by country, region and month of birth.

www.ons.gov.uk

Baby names for girls in England and Wales - Office for National Statistics

Rank and count of the top names for baby girls, changes in rank since the previous year and breakdown by country, region and month of birth.

www.ons.gov.uk

You can download the spreadsheets from the following links, table 6 on each file to view the full list. You can use the search function to search for where a particular name came.

Ophelia was 161st in 2018 with 335 of them born. Relatively unusual still but definitely not unique.

Jesus it’s not that deep.

 

[KateESJ]

There were no Ashley or Jessica when I was a kid. We are not all the same age, you know!

Yes I know, it was just an example to make a point...

 

[Milmum]

I hate the new feathered eyebrow thing everyone’s doing. However I won’t bitch about a teenagers makeup skills - pretty sure I was wearing blue mascara at her age

 

[gloriouscheesecake]

So i was going through some old pics, i think its phoebe, on their insta and saw this! I know kids do silly things but I wouldn't take a picture. that would the last thing in my mind. the first thing would be getting her the hell off their. Also I was seeing they went to discovery cove when they went to florida and universal studios. i know its been talked about before and was a while ago. But how the fuck did they ever afford them. it cost $300 a person for discovery cove! its less for universal studios but theres no way they could ever afford it realistically! I mean it cost us 6k for 3 weeks for 4 of us and thats without park tickets, which probably cost a least another 1k!

 

[spilleroftea]

This has gone well off topic.

We can all see that Millie is not in a position to financially or emotionally support a child right now, sorry if that sounds harsh.
The relationship with the baby daddy seams very strained, and not as amicable as first claimed in the sun.

The way that Millie has recently acted on social media is rather worrying and shows a lack of maturity.
The posts about clothes and not being able to go shopping or see her baby on scans shows she really has no grip with reality and that shes treating it like a dolly. Its so strange to have a pram set up in your bedroom for so long.
She bragged recently she lasted 2 weeks in collage, its just sad really that they have no aspirations apart from breeding and posting on social media.


As for the feckless parents after the most recent vlog I feel that you can see the coldness between them, its the same coldness that Sue shows her kids. So shes either just not a very emotional person unless its about baby clothes or she really is deep don so unhappy.

 

[Wellthen]

I didn’t say all teen parents are the same but let’s be real at 15 you can’t even get a job where I live it might be different where u live your parents obviously helped out a lot financially and your parents didn’t sign up to help pay for their grandchildren or for them to live in their house

15 when pregnant, 16 when she was born.
my parents didn’t help out ‘a lot’ financially. My husband worked full time, I worked part time whilst at college. Yes we lived with them but we paid our way and went 50/50 on all the bills.
I have friends now in their near 30’s still living at home with their kids and husband why they’re saving up to buy a house.
no my parents didn’t sign up for a pregnant teenager but it didn’t impact their life in a negative way on the whole. I’m proud of my life and my choices, not every teenage pregnancy is ‘the worlds worst thing’

 

[KateESJ]

Lots of married couples end up divorcing, it actually doesn’t matter a lot of the time if you have one parent or two!

Yep. I was with my husband for years but we split and now he chooses to rarely see his kids. It’s better that way. I wish he’d make the effort to see his kids but I can’t force it. Even when he is around the kids it’s obvious he’d rather be anywhere else. My 4 year old has picked up on it and last time I took them to see him she begged me not to. I’d rather them have an absent father than one who is around and has it written all over his face that he doesn’t care.
I’ll admit - I’m 30 and struggling financially to provide for my kids. Age doesn’t really mean as much as people think it does.