Letters to the Editor
-
There's the ideal,
and then there's the real.
I was married when I had my daughter and despite all the birth preparation I ended up having a labor in which drugs were used. I don't know if it was the drugs or the pain but I had a hallucinatory few moments in which I actually thought I walked down a tree-lined street and through a picket fence into a door with a fanlight overhead and entered an extremely homelike place that was nothing like where I really lived. There was wall paper with rosettes and ribbons and a voice told me that I was in Heaventown. For a moment, I thought that I might be dead.
Although I planned my daughter and looked forward to her birth, my marriage did not work out. It was not ideal. There were rocky times ahead. Single motherhood was tough because we were poor, but I doubt that there was ever a really serious moment when my daughter doubted my love. I also have never lived in a house with rosette wallpaper and a white picket fence.
I confess to being old-fashioned. I still think the perfect family is one with a Mom and a Dad and who have plenty of time to spend with their children. However, when I worked as a Court-Appointed Special Advocate for children and saw kids who were neglected and/or abused and got acquainted with their own great yearnings for the ideal, I realized that for every single child the ideal is to be loved and wanted. Louise Sloan's little boy is loved and wanted. That is enough.
-
Me, me, me, me, me.....it's all about me
Why consider at all the questions your child will have later in life? Why consider at all the feelings your child will have about the absent parent, "absent" by your choice?
Having a child should primarily be about the child, not just about the needs of the mother.
This is a social experiment that puts children at risk, and is not a phenomenon to celebrate.
-
@ Parson Jim
Just exactly what is Sloan's child at risk of?
-
Trollette question for the Nth time
http://www.civitas.org.uk/pdf/Experiments.pdf
-
Nice work if you can get it
You know, what really struck me about this interview was the utter lack of discusssion of economic considerations.
Ms. Sloan must be fairly wealthy, or at least have an extended and selflessly giving social network in order to be able to find the financial cushion to have a child this way. Good for her!
Unfortunately, reading this interview left me with a strange sensation of unreality, as if having a child single is no more difficult than other lifestyle choices such as getting a dog or moving to Seattle. If you can afford a nanny, childcare and a nice house, as well as have the aforementioned extensive social network to fall back on, I'm sure it must be an attractive choice. Not for most people -- I am married with a baby, managing a lower-middle class career, and am terrified when I think of how to provide for my son in the future.
When I hear people like Ms. Sloan talk about their dreams, I feel conflicted. I want to congratulate them on fulfilling their what they "want" (a word that seems to come up a lot in these types of interviews), and simultaneously shake them, screaming "What planet do you live on? Can I move there?"
I think gay marriage is to be championed. I think gay adoption/birth is to be celebrated. Single mothers should not be stigmatized (well, except for maybe after the 4th or so rugrat), and hey if you're a single lesbian woman who can afford it, go ahead and have that sperm shipped to your door for easy processing! Seriously -- I have no problem with it.
The fact that the lifestyle "choice" championed in this interview is applicable to such a tiny, insignificant fraction of America as wealthy, single lesbians speaks volumes about its relevance. It's a faux-cause; it is certainly admirable that she is so happy with her choice, but to attempt to link it to fundamental issues such as sexual identity or single motherhood sounds like narcissism to me. I think this is why books and polemics of this type are always doomed to fail. So a few right-wingers pooh pooh your choice -- I don't, and I still don't really think you're making some grand stand for womens' rights.
Start talking about affordable daycare, living wages or the working class and I might think otherwise.
-
Conflicted
I'm not sure how I feel about this article on balance, but I'm struck with a few thoughts at first:
- The author is still in the 'honeymoon' period... parenthood gets harder and harder the older a child grows. 15 months hardly seems to be the point at which to roll out a "Mission Accomplished" banner.
- There is definitely an element of narcissism here; I'm sure many comments in this thread will point out, perhaps rightly, that this is an upper-middle-class white woman pursuing her pregnancy fantasies.
- I'm more than a little worried about the author's seeming inability to maintain healthy, long-term intimate relationships. How will this mother/child relationship work when there's a surly teenager around?
I'm not one to go railing on people's life choices as being "wrong"; I'll leave that to the James Dobsons of the world.
But I'm still struggling with the image of a sullen, depressed teenage boy, struggling to find his place in the world, and his well-meaning but selfish single mother looking for answers in a book with "Who Needs Men?" on the cover, but not finding them.
(Full Disclosure: Straight, Married White Male, three biological children)
-
@ Parson Jim
Thanks for the link. It is interesting. However, I did notice something right away. It just does not examine the circumstances of families in which one parent has planned in advance for their choice to be "lone parents." It does not seem to make clear how many of these pregancies were even wanted and planned.
I am sure you see the problem. Many of the families that the link refers to may not have wanted to have children at all. Just because abortion is available does not mean all women are comfortable making that choice. Therefore I think we can assume that many of the studies about families that the link looks at were not eagerly desired.
Sloan on the other hand put thought into her decision and obviously went to considerable trouble to have her child. I also suspect that she took heed of her financial circumstances and the article does imply that she has a supportive family. Some of the link you mentioned was devoted to poverty, but it does not really examine, that I could see, whether or not these families were quite comfortable to begin with. I have known many poor people for whom a decline in income of a mere $2,000 annually would cause significant hardship, but for those who make $60,000 a year, not so much.
Don't you think it is a good thing that Sloan planned and very much wanted her child?