I never knew where babies came from until it happened to me- Loretta Lynn

Loretta Lynn was born in Butcher Hollow, Kentucky on April 14, 1932, and was the second child of eight siblings. She lost her father when he was 52 years old to lung disease.

Loretta had a tough childhood as they were poor.

Loretta explained, ”The winters were cold, so my mommy glued newspapers and pages from old Sears Roebuck catalogs to the wall to help keep the cold out. We didn’t have money for wallpaper, but my mommy made that old house stay warm and beautiful.”

At the age of 16 she got married to Oliver Lynn who was 21 as of then and worked as a logger to make ends meet.

Loretta was a full time housewife and stayed at home while Oliver provided for the family. They moved from Kentucky to the logging community of Custer, Washington where Loretta started noticing something was wrong with her body, but didn’t know what. She went on to see a doctor.

”I just pulled the sheet over my head, like an ostrich. When he was done, Doc told me I could get dressed again. After that, he put his arm around my waist, and he said, ’Honey, your trouble is, you’re pregnant,” Loretta explained in her book “Loretta Lynn: Coal Miner’s Daughter”.

It was quite confusing to the innocent Loretta and didn’t understand what the doctor meant and where the baby was going to come from.

According to her, she never knew where babies were coming from until it happened to her.

In December 1949, she had her first son Jack and couldn’t stay overnight at the hospital because of the bills.

After her second pregnancy, she had miscarriages and couldn’t afford to go to the hospital, that was how poor they were living.

During her third pregnancy, she was to get a C-section, but her husband was out working in the woods and no one could get to him.

Loretta needed someone to sign through the procedure as she couldn’t sign for herself as she was a minor.

Her early years of marriage was very complicated as her husband, Doo was a hard worker, an alcoholic and also met different women behind her back.

The heartaches and complications inspired her songwriting and ended up as a country legend.

Doolittle passed away at the age of 69 and Loretta moved to Nashville. She was able to pick up the pieces of her life and now focused on her career and supporting her 6 children.