To keep this thread from going too far off topic, I decided to start another thread about my views on single parenting. Remember. This is only my opinion. I cannot force anyone else to see things my way. My views on this topic tend to come from my own experiences, both as the oldest child of a single mother and as a single mother (widowed when my daughter was nine years old). So, if you disagree with me, that's fine. Just don't expect me to turn around and change my mind just because you offer what, in your opinion, is a better argument.
Thunder's Muse said:
As an unmarried mother, I need to ask why you believe that unmarried people shouldn't have children. Are you referring to those who have casual, unprotected sex and find themselves pregnant, or are you including adults in a committed relationship who choose to become parents?
Why should my marital status be a qualification for me to become a mother?
Okay, TM, I am an unmarried mother too. I became a widow in 1999. I had been married to Steve for six years when he passed away, leaving me with a nine year old daughter. Yes. If you do the math, you will see that I was a single mother before I married Steve. My first husband left me for someone else when my daughter was ten months old. I married Steve because I needed a steady father figure in my daughter's life. Yes. Steve knew that I wasn't in love with him when we married. But, I don't believe in marrying someone because you "fall in love" anyway (But, that's an entirely different topic.).
I grew up, the oldest of three girls. My mom and dad divorced when my mom was pregnant with second child. I was about two years old then. I don't remember anything from that time period at all. My mom married my step-father when I was three and had my second sister about a year later. She and Richard were married until I was about ten years old. I don't know why they divorced, nor do I really care. I can only tell you how my life was from ten years old to eighteen years old in order to make my point.
My mom had a steady stream of boyfriends coming in and out of our lives until I was about sixteen years old. I think that the longest relationship she had, without marriage, was about two years. The guy moved in with us. In fact, if I remember correctly, all of my mom's boyfriends moved in with us. I never had a steady father figure in my life. We never stayed in one location for more than six months in all of that time. All of that moving around really screwed up my high school credits. If I hadn't moved in with my dad my senior year of high school, I wouldn't have graduated high school according to California's graduation standards at the time. I said something to my mom about it and she said, "You don't need to graduate high school." Anyway, most, if not all, of the men my mom had move in with us were alcoholics and/or drug addicts. And, they were all very physically abusive to me. Until I was fifteen, I had my grandmother to stand up for me (She passed away when I was fifteen.). When I was sixteen, my mom met Louie. He was a truck driver who lived about two or three houses down the road from us. Within two weeks of meeting Louie, my mom moved all of her stuff from our house to his. She would come by once a week to drop off ten pounds of pinto beans, a gallon of milk, a bag of cereal, a bag of corn meal, and a twenty pound bag of potatoes. I had to make sure that lasted us a week because my mom wouldn't buy anymore food for us if we ran out. My sister, R, ended up reporting my mom to child protective services for abandoning her. CPS removed my sister from our home and moved her in with my aunt and uncle about two miles away. My mom lowered the amount of food she brought by every week for me and my other sister, L. I moved in with my dad when I was 17. Just before my 18th birthday, I got a letter from my mom, asking me to take the form she got from the welfare office to my high school and have them sign it and then send it back to her so that she could continue receiving assistance for me. Instead, I called her case worker and told her that I had been living with my dad, in Illinois, for the last three months and wouldn't be going back to California until after I graduated high school. My mom had to "repay" three months worth of welfare benefits she had received for me by not getting any food stamps at all for the next six months. She and Louie were extremely mad at me for that. After graduating, I went back to California. Mom and Louie said that I could stay with them for two weeks while looking for a job and my own place to live. Of course, there's no way that a freshly graduated 18 year old girl can get a job that will support her (unless she goes into the sex trade, of course). So, I went to Job Corps. Basically, I went from welfare program to welfare program. Job Corps trained me to be a book keeper in eleven months. They supplied room and board, medical insurance, and $50 a month to buy my personal necessities. While there, I met my first husband.
After leaving Job Corps, I moved in with James' mother and father. I stayed there until he completed Job Corps. We moved into an apartment together and I got pregnant. James and I got married about two months later. Our marriage was pretty volatile. But, I was stubborn and wouldn't leave the marriage because I didn't want my daughter to grow up without a father, like I had. That didn't work out the way I wanted it to because James left us before we had been married a year. Our divorce was finalized on our second wedding anniversary. He would file for custody of my daughter about every three months because he wanted to control my life still. I refused to date at all because James had ruined my trust in men. My mom introduced me to Steve about two years later because I needed a ride from central to southern California because James had filed for custody, yet again. Steve and I talked the whole ride there and back. We found that we pretty much agreed on everything political and religious (The only thing we didn't agree on was baptism of infants. I don't believe in it. He did.). A week later, he told me that he loved me and wanted to marry me. I thought he was nuts! And I told him so. Nevertheless, we were married about six months later. Things were so much better for me and for my daughter with a stable home and a Christian man to back me up when I needed him to. Things have been very hard since he died. But, I've been able to maintain the same house for nine years. I just miss the companionship of having a husband.
My sisters, L and R, have had varied successes and failures in their lives. L had a son about a year and a half after my daughter was born. She then moved in with a man and had three more children before marrying him. Their marriage lasted about a year. He now has custody of their three children and she's chosen not to pay child support or see them for about the last five years. R moved in with a guy when she was 16. She stayed with him until she was 24 and married him. They had a daughter. They got divorced about five years later. She moved in with another guy and had a son with him. They got married about two years ago.
You see? I've never met a single parent who has had an easier time than a married couple with kids. And, although I stayed single after Steve died, I had a terrible time raising my daughter by myself. And, I didn't have the best example in watching my mom raise me and my sisters.
When I say that single people shouldn't have children, I say it more from the viewpoint of a child who was raised by a single mother than anything else. I guess my bad experiences as a child far outweigh anything else in this matter for me. I don't want the government to step in on this matter, though. But, I think that pregnancy without marriage shouldn't be looked at as an honor, either. I've seen too many teenage girls who look at it as some kind of badge of honor the last few years. It should be more stigmatized by society in general. Adoption should be greatly encouraged in these cases. The kids would be much better off, in my opinion, if they had two loving parents who actually went through all the rigamarole involved in adoption. To me, the couple involved in the adoption would make much better parents than a single girl who decides that she doesn't want to give up her baby because "it's hers."
