38-year-old Satu Nordling Gonzalez was born and raised in Sweden, and she always wanted to be a mother. Although at first it seemed like her wish would never come true, she now has ten children, all under the age of 14, and says she couldn’t be happier.
Her husband, Andres, was born in Uruguay, but his family moved to Sweden when he was still a child. The couple married in 2008 and have ten children to date – six girls and four boys: Nicole 14, Vanessa 13, twins Danilo and Jonathan 12, Olivia 9, Kevin 8, Celina 7, Isabelle 4, Melanie 2, Benjamin and 1 year old.
Satu feels blessed and says his family was worth the long wait and struggle. Now she devotes all her time to raising her children.
However, the road leading to this point was not easy, in fact, at one time Satu was sure that his dream would never come true. “Unfortunately, when we decided to start a family, I had a hard time getting pregnant. Then I got pregnant but miscarried and I had to operate. After that, I had ᴄᴏᴍᴘʟɪᴄᴀᴛɪᴏɴs and it seemed like I wouldn’t get pregnant at all,” explained the mother.
Although Satu continued to try her best, the situation seemed hopeless and she felt like she was stuck in a nightmare while everyone around her started families. “My biggest dream in life was to be a mother to many children,” she explained.
After 2 and a half years of trying, she finally got pregnant again. Although she was very happy, the pregnancy took a toll on her – she suffered from ʜʏᴘᴇʀᴇᴍᴇsɪs ɢʀᴀᴠɪᴅᴀʀᴜᴍ. Nevertheless, she tried to keep the end goal in mind and to maintain her optimism.
“I knew what was waiting for me at the end. Then my first born arrived, it made my dreams come true and it was worth the wait,” she said.
In the following years, she became pregnant more easily and recovered more quickly after giving birth. Parental duties have multiplied with each new baby, but Satu does not mind this at all and enjoys the busy everyday life.
She is up by 7:30 in the morning, changing diapers, making breakfast, and helping the older children get ready for school. After that, she spends the day at home with the younger ones, doing all the housework – washing, cleaning, cooking – and when the older ones get home, she helps them with their homework, supervises the play, prepares dinner, and finally puts the children to bed.
Although she does most of the housework, the children also have their own tasks. “I’m meticulous, I organize everything around me, and the children have tasks according to their age, so they all help. Someone takes out the trash, someone else empties the dishwasher, vacuums, and so on,” the mother explained her method.
At the same time, they also hold regular family meetings to discuss their problems and help each other.
“I listen to my heart and try to raise them to be loving, kind-hearted, kind people who care about each other and the people around them,” said Satu about his educational principles.
“I feel so blessed to have these amazing kids in my life, to see them grow and learn new skills, to be able to follow their lives from the front row, all that they do and all that is ahead of them. Their unconditional love is worth everything. Motherhood is the biggest, most important and sometimes the hardest thing that has happened to me,” said Satu, who is now expecting her eleventh child.
The mother also shares details about her family’s life on her Instagram page, but she is aware that not everyone thinks about having a big family the way she and her husband do.
“When you get past that magic number of 4 or 5 kids, people start frowning,” she said, but she’s confident her family is perfect the way it is.