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Staff Pick: Having & Raising Children
When you're young, the threat of pregnancy makes you feel like having a baby is just the easiest thing in the world — something that could happen in a split second if you're not very, very careful. While that isn't necessarily the wrong message, with age, however, comes the understanding that having a child isn't always so simple. Today's show explores some of the unique circumstances around having and raising children.
We begin with part of our program on the Ethics of Egg Donation. In this segment you'll hear from Catherine Meyer, a Portland resident, who talks about her experience as an egg donor. She says:
It is hard to put a dollar amount on it. For me it was that $5,000 mark was enough to make it worth the risks. Since I didn’t only decide to do it for the money it was a little easier to make the decision knowing I was helping someone out.
Have you ever considered donating your eggs? Do you have a child conceived through egg donation? Or are you someone who has adopted a child? If so, you might be interested in the second part of our show where we explore how adoption affects peoples lives.
On the original show post, Think Out Loud's senior producer, Allison Frost, wrote about her personal experience with adoption.
Ten years ago, my sister became a single mom at age 18. Her son was a beautiful, strong-willed boy, adored by his six aunts and uncles and the entire extended family. She was a great mom at first, but by the time he was 18 months she decided she was not cut out for motherhood and could not give him the life she wanted for him.
I lived in another state, and didn't suspect any of this from our previous visits. Then, I got a phone call out of the blue one sunny summer afternoon. My reaction was shock, disbelief, anger, desperation, and intense grief. Though we were told the adoption would be "open" and that we would be able to see him again, I couldn't imagine how this would ever, ever be OK. The pain was worse than anything I had ever experienced. And I was just the aunt.
The rest of her post (and the full show) is available here.
After exploring adoption we'll move on to what happens when you actually have, and have to raise, a child — especially a teen! In her new book, My Teenage Werewolf, author Lauren Kessler explores the life of teenagers — specifically her daughter Lizzie. When Lizzie was on the cusp of teenagedom, Kessler realized their relationship was going into terrible territory. She wrote:
Who is this girl I live with, this twelve-year-old, this daughter I wanted so badly and now don’t know how to connect with? And who do I turn into when we lock horns, as we do most days, on…well, on just about everything. We fight about taking showers, choosing appropriate clothing (flip flops in December?), food and nutrition (she recognizes only two food groups: cheese and deep-fried), table manners, chores, homework, screen time. We fight over everything, and nothing. Most mornings we eye each other warily, waiting to see who will cast the first stone – neither of us free of sin, both of us well armed.
Do you have a teenager? Does Kessler's experience ring true for you?
From having children — to making sure your teen doesn't become pregnant (!) — a few of the highs and lows of having and raising children are on this special compilation show. What other parenting shows would you like to hear from us?
Photo credit: John A. Ryan / Creative Commons
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This sound pretty much like a post I left way back in May regarding the old and new depression and the purpose of family.
This is one lesson the flood of aliens coming in will teach the native born..clan, family, religion and language are the glue that hold people together in tough times. If the native born majority are not already too fractured by our culture of total tolerance, some may just reassemble into extended families and survive the coming chaos.
But half of all babies are born out of wedlock, while marriage as an ideal appears to be dying as fast as national prosperity. There isn't even agreement on what constitutes a 'family' among native born Americans Therefore, I think the native born are doomed as a tribe within the ethnically diverse nation we've created. Other more traditionally minded groups will prove stronger and more resiliant.
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This is my original comment that occurred on the Kessler interview, the week before 19-yo Muhamed Mohamud attempted the Christmas Tree bombing in Pioneer Square in Portland on Black Friday:
"If there was one launch button to destroy the world and a sign that says "DO NOT PRESS", THEN a teen ager probably will press it. Just because.
Like the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle and all Religions, there are unknowables like the teen brain, that are mysterious and will remain so."
jacob — Wed Nov. 24th 9:13a.m.
And a more distant remote comment of mine from 7Oct2010 on Politics and Religion:
"If a passenger plane is hijacked and blown up today, if a building explodes from a car bomb, if an airport or stadium is underseige by gunman sniping innocent civilians, if a train track is blown up derailing and killing dozens, or if a church is explodes in your community killing dozens.....who would YOU suspect?
We have to use basic logic. It probably is not the Pennsylvania Amish Community. Or the IRA. Is it possible that virulent extremist Islamic terrorist groups are attempting to advance broader goals of Islam? We have to live with the effects of terrorism in the New Millenium. We do NOT have to accept victimhood.
Not all Muslims are Terrorists. But in our time, All Terrorists are Muslim. We have to combine with our Muslim brothers to make this fact no longer true. Jihad, or Holy War, is being waged violently in our time. This is a secret that is hidden in plain sight. We should wage a war agaist Violent Jihad. Spiritual Jihad is something we can live with.
Read the international front page headlines for today. Then go to the library and read it one year ago. And 5 years ago. And 10 years ago. And 20 years ago. Middle East violent struggle and Radical Islamic Terrorism is the persistent headline. We cannot keep living in denial; we have to confront violence today, not cover it up. OR it will be chronic worldwide terrorism that will be passed on to our children and their children.
DENIAL IS NOT JUST A RIVER IN EGYPT."
jacob — Thu Oct. 7th 8:48a.m.
Keeping abreast of history keeps us honest and may also lend insight to the future. May the New Year Keep You Safe and Happy.
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I'm going to touch the Third Rail of discussion in America and say that it is our connection to Israel that promoted and encouraged the return of militaristic Islam and aimed it at us.
Us because Israel is a much harder target. Everyone in high office in the US knows this fact. Most seasoned journalists know it as well. But Ms Helen Thomas recently said this in a public forum and her freedom of speech sailed out the nearest window on its ear along with her job. Thus proving the accuracy of what she said about the power of Zionism in America.
If terrorism is a modern day disease, read any objective history of the founding of Israel and you'll see who brought terrorism to the Mideast and as it is now pandemic as the preferred tactic of the poor and hateful, it is everywhere and we should all just get used to it because it isn't going to disappear or be defeated. We don't have that much money to invest in explosives or blood to let.
What is going to disappear is liberty and freedom in America.
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Adopting in Africa -
I can't find the comment online, but I heard it on the radio ["why would you adopt all the wway over in Africa when there are plenty of family-less white babies in The US.]
Maybe I misheard it. I hope I did. the question was responded to in one way, but how I would respond is: is it a question of why black and not white, or why african and not US American? Think about it. Some people have a knee jerk reaction, which is a race question, not a child in need question.
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This may be what you're looking for - a comment from the blog during the original airing of the show. There are responses to that specifically further down in the thread.
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I spent 4 yrs working in Belize and another 6 1/2 yrs in Africa-Liberia, Uganda and Somalia. I worked variously in education, health and agricultural and forestry projects. My 10 yrs working with blacks from high govt officials to village tribals while not making me an expert on race, certainly would make me extremely reluctent to adopt an African child. DNA/environment, nurture/nature...etc. While the science is still imperfect regarding such issues. My position is, on something this imprtant to family happiness...why take chances?
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My wife and I reared four kids. Happily none proved a menace to society. Two were born outside the USA. A third was born in the USA when it became obvious a difficult birth couldn't be handled safely in Uganda in 1984.
The one great advantage of rearing kids outsude the USA is continuous parental control. That is because the countries we lived in were generally dangerous and the kids were never left on their own anywhere. Their mother or I took then everyplace and picked them up after the event or remained with them, if necessary. Almost all our activities were family affairs.
We knew the families of their friends, what kind of people they were and we knew their kids. We made the choices of who our kids made friends with. We knew what our kids were doing...always. As a result..no trouble ever with them, even after they were here and in college their behavior remained exemplary. They married well and wisely, no divorces and all three that are married are enjoying the fruit of successful marriages. They have produced 7 children and one great grand child and one has yet to marry.
Getting married too young as kids do today is a major cause of failure...economic and in child rearing. These teenage parents are themselves still not fully adult. Getting married with no means of supporting a family is another cause of problems. When I was a boy, it wasn't expected that everyone was going to be married and everyone that married wasn't required to have children. My folks had several childless friends, couples who chose not to have kids. I was an only child. It wasn't a sin or indicator of failure not to have children. Between my father and his four siblings there were only five children plus one adoption later in life for one uncle and aunt.
Sensible people in those hard scrable years (30s and 40s) were reluctent to have children when the times were bleak and the future uncertain. Now, no such concerns enter into the decision to have kids. They have them come hell or high water.
In fact, this whole business of woman having kids with out nmrriage and husbands is madness. It rararely turns out well for either mom or the kids. There is a Darwinian element involved as well. The various social and economic safety nets supported with our taxes enable people unsuited to be parents, to have kids anyway. The various social services are clogged with millions of these unfortunate kids. They will be subsidized to breeding age on tax money and later, far too many of these same kids will become once more, public charges in prison or in some kind of institution or on the dole.
In brief, too many poorly prepared people are having kids under circumstances that guarantee a bad outcome, the negative consequences of which will be borne by the public.
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Comments are now closed.
I was looking at the OPB staff picks for this Christmas series and want to propose a unified theme and subsequently a solution or a destiny.
Before 1930, American families lived in Multi-Generational Households. It enabled families to care for small children and babies, sick members, busy adults, and the elderly without government programs.
But since then, we have moved away from caring for the elderly and sharing households. Parents no longer can be dependent on their children to provide a small subsistence, pension or care in their old age. Children think they should get their independence at age 18, move to an apartment, move out of state, go to a farway college and start a job and family maybe in an entirely different part of the country, possibly a continent away.
Young people can no longer afford to maintain their own households after completing their education. Parents cannot afford childcare. The elderly cannot afford nursing homes. No one can afford to get sick.
Time is too short to prepare homecooked meals, do household chores, care for small children, keep up the yard and vegetable garden and maintain a romantic relationship. Instead of being a single mother with 3 small children living in an apartment--being part of a nuclear family and couple is better. Being part of a Four generational household with 10 adults pooling resources would offer even more benefits.
The answer may come from the Great Depression. Multigenerational Households to economize, share tasks, and create work. If you cannot find a job, find domestic work: help with babysitting your nephews, care for your invalid grandfather, cook a roast, rake the leaves, do laundry.
As in European guilds, maybe a child can learn a family business like plumbing or electrical, help run a business, stay and help with labor and share profits. Run a family Waffle house. Run a small farm or work a self sustaining vegetable garden. Elders are also a source of wisdom in everything from cooking and shopping to parenting.
But we have to live civilly with our relatives. Give up on space and privacy. Forgoe the dreams of home ownership. Refuse great jobs that are farway. Refuse studies at a great but farway university or even an in-state university. Be more of a villager than a cosmopolitan. And deal with that crazy uncle and a mother-in-law on a daily basis. Enduring both affections and afflictions. We may be better off as The Waltons instead of Seinfeld.
But it is is living in a family compound rather than a house. It may not a solution we seek, but a destiny imposed on us by economic necessity and survival.