Pregnant with Her Sixth Child, Jessa Duggar Reveals a Surprising Secret to Defeat Shocking Comments
Pregnant with Her Sixth Child, Jessa Duggar Reveals a Surprising Secret to Defeat Shocking Comments
Jessa Seewald (née Duggar) opened up about some of the “rude” comments aimed at her as she and her husband, Ben Seewald, get ready to welcome baby No. 6.
The former 19 Kids and Counting star, 32, said that while she’s never had someone “come up to her face and be nasty or rude,” she has experienced negativity from critics in the comments section of her YouTube videos.
“I have heard a lot of rude and unnecessary comments but generally those are just online,” Jessa said in a Q&A she posted on YouTube on Thursday, May 8. “You know people may comment under this YouTube video and be like, ‘Oh, you’re breeding like rabbits,’ or ‘You’re crazy,’ or ‘Are you trying to follow in your mom’s footsteps? Are you going to have 19 kids?’”
She continued, “But, honestly, my mom is my hero. I love her, I adore her, she is my role model in so many ways. Her patience, her love, her gentleness [and] her kind speech. She is the golden example of a mother, in my opinion. So, when people say, ‘Do you want to be like your mother?’ I’m like, ‘Yes, please, Lord, help me.’”
Jessa said that she was grateful that no one she was close to ever gave her “flak” or offered up unwanted advice and opinions. The former reality star then offered up some tips she’d received on how to handle naysayers on the internet.
“Some advice that I recently heard on this topic that was super helpful to me was somebody saying that oftentimes, we can set the tone for how people receive our news,” Jessa explained. “When we say something like, ‘Oh, we’re expecting,’ or ‘We’re so thankful for this baby. We’re so grateful,’ that definitely sets a different tone for how it’s received versus [saying], ‘We’re definitely done after this one.’”
She went on, “I don’t think it’s wrong to say certain things, but I know that sometimes we can cater to how we think other people might receive the news in the way that we present it. So, if we think people might judge me for having another baby, we might be quicker to present the information in a way that’s, like, backpedaling or apologizing for where we are in life.”
Jessa also admitted that it helps that she and Ben, 29, know that they can’t “fully control” opinions from other people and said that recognizing that helps them not stress about the negative comments.
“We don’t live for those,” she shared. “It’s not other people’s approval that we should want most, but I think that we can definitely influence in the way that we share information [and] maybe how other people will perceive and receive.”
Jessa and Ben first got engaged in August 2014 before marrying just three months later. They welcomed their first child, son Spurgeon, in 2015, and over the next several years, they continued to add to their growing family with Henry, Ivy, Fern and George. In March, the couple announced that she was pregnant with baby No. 6.
