My mom got 11 kids. We struggled.

In the simple and haunting words of Young Thug, a voice of modern struggle and triumph, there resounds an ancient truth: “My mom got 11 kids. We struggled.” These few words, humble in sound yet vast in meaning, carry the weight of generations who have known hunger, love, and perseverance all at once. They speak not merely of poverty, but of endurance — the sacred fire that burns within those who, having little, give much. In them lives a story older than any empire: the story of the mother who holds her family together when the world would pull it apart, and of the child who rises from the ashes of hardship with gratitude instead of bitterness.

For in this quote, Young Thug does not speak to boast nor to lament; he speaks to honor. His words are a hymn for the unsung — for every mother who has faced the impossible and yet fed her children, for every home that trembled with want but refused to surrender to despair. When he says, “We struggled,” he is not confessing weakness but recalling the forge that shaped his spirit. For struggle, when endured with love, does not destroy — it refines. It teaches resilience, humility, and the sacred art of survival.

The ancients understood this well. The philosopher Epictetus, born into slavery, taught that hardship is the school of the soul. He said, “Difficulties show what men are.” And so it was for Young Thug and the home that raised him — a crowded house, perhaps loud and weary, yet filled with life, laughter, and the fierce will of a mother who refused to yield. Eleven children, one woman, and the invisible hand of faith binding them together — this is not a tale of defeat, but of strength in its rawest form.

Consider the story of Sojourner Truth, born into bondage, who bore her own children under the shadow of cruelty and yet rose to become one of the great voices of freedom. Her words, like Young Thug’s, came from the heart of suffering, yet they burned with dignity. “Ain’t I a woman?” she asked, defying the world that denied her worth. She, too, knew the struggle of motherhood amid scarcity. But like his mother, she did not bend; she lifted others through her endurance. Both women — one in chains, one in poverty — remind us that the measure of a mother’s greatness is not her comfort, but her sacrifice.

And what of the children who grow in such soil? They learn early that nothing is given freely, that love must be proven through labor, that dreams must be wrestled from reality’s grasp. Yet this knowledge, though hard, is holy. From hardship is born hunger — not for food alone, but for purpose, for meaning, for greatness. Many who have walked such paths, from Frederick Douglass to Oprah Winfrey, began in the wilderness of struggle. And yet they rose not despite it, but because of it. Hardship, when met with courage, becomes the sacred anvil of destiny.

There is also tenderness in Young Thug’s remembrance. When he says, “My mom got 11 kids,” he honors her not for what she had, but for what she gave — her strength, her patience, her faith. The ancient poets would have sung of such a woman as a heroine, like Penelope of Ithaca, who kept her home in order through long years of waiting. For the mother who feeds many mouths with little bread is no less heroic than the soldier who wins a war. Her battlefield is the kitchen table, her weapon the will to endure another day.

The lesson, then, is this: struggle is not shame. It is the soil from which greatness grows. Do not curse the days of scarcity, for they teach you what abundance cannot. Honor those who stood before you — the mothers, the fathers, the elders — who bore hunger so that you might have hope. When you succeed, remember their labor. And when you fail, remember their perseverance. The true measure of worth is not how easily one rises, but how faithfully one endures.

So let the listener take these words to heart: “My mom got 11 kids. We struggled.” These are not words of despair — they are the psalm of survival. In them lies a truth the ancients would have revered: that strength is not born in palaces, but in humble homes where love fights hunger and wins, day after day. Carry that truth with you. Let your struggle make you compassionate, your hardship make you wise, and your gratitude make you radiant. For those who come from struggle carry within them the oldest light — the light that says, “We endured, and therefore, we are strong.”