TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/110890/1108583.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 5.4 KB | 107 lines

                                                                                THE CHANGING FAMILY, Page 76

LIVING

Last Call for Motherhood


More and more single women are choosing to be unmarried . . .
with children

By JILL SMOLOWE -- Reported by Melissa Ludtke/Boston and Jeanne
McDowell/Los Angeles


    At monthly meetings of Single Mothers by Choice in New York
City, coded name tags speak volumes about the complexities of
modern-day parenthood. The letter T indicates the woman is
thinking about having a baby on her own. A signals that she is
attempting to get pregnant. P announces that she has succeeded.
M is for mother. The second letter on the tag flags her method
of choice. I means donor insemination. N specifies a sex
partner. A stands for adoption.

    The women who wear the tags are pioneering the way -- by
choice -- toward yet another permutation of the American family.
They have made a calculated and intentional decision to raise
a child single-handedly, despite a tangle of cultural,
biological and sometimes legal complications. Virtually all
either have tired of waiting for Mr. Right or have no interest
in finding him. Most are women who have achieved a measure of
economic self-sufficiency but have delayed childbearing to the
point where they hear their biological clocks approaching
midnight. "I could imagine going through life without a man,"
explains Paula Van Ness, 39, executive director of the National
Community AIDS Partnership in Washington, "but I couldn't
imagine going through life without a child. My biological clock
started sounding like a time bomb."

    Though the numbers of single mothers remain small, the ranks
are rapidly rising. The National Center for Health Statistics
reports that from 1980 to 1988 the birthrate among unmarried
white women between the ages of 30 and 34 surged 68%, and 69%
for those 35 to 39. Merle Bombardieri, a Boston-area
psychotherapist, says that of the almost 1,000 women
contemplating single motherhood whom she has counseled, about
two-thirds are heterosexual and one-third lesbian.

    Gail, a 38-year-old Los Angeles accountant, had been through
a divorce and several failed romances when she began
contemplating her decision. "My relationships were not
developing along the course I had hoped," she says. "I really
love kids and feel I have a lot to offer." She discussed the
idea of single motherhood with her own mother, friends and a
psychotherapist. But it was concern about encountering
fertility problems as she grew older that convinced her that
"the time had come." She was impregnated by donor insemination,
and was expecting a baby in late October.

    While such a choice is unconventional, it is also natural,
argues Dr. Robert Nachtigall, a reproductive endocrinologist in
San Francisco. Because women have a monthly hormonal cycle,
"they can't escape the fact that their bodies are telling them
to do something," he says. "The biological drive to reproduce
may be stronger than the cultural yen to get married."

    Once a single woman has decided to follow that drive, she
faces a choice of methods. Each option presents its own perils.
For adoption, there are long waits, deals that fall through, no
control over genes. Intercourse with a selected partner or
insemination by a known donor can open the door to future
wrangles over custodial rights. Hence many women opt for
insemination with the sperm of a faceless donor. The amount of
information about the donor varies from clinic to clinic; a few
provide detailed medical histories and personal profiles.

    Anonymous insemination does raise a touchy issue: what to
say when the child yearns to know who his or her father is.
"They are not going to be happy being told their dad is No.
456," says Dr. Cappy Rothman, who heads the California Cryobank
in Los Angeles. Some single mothers, sensitized by the related
debate regarding adoption, want to carve out an option for their
children now. The Sperm Bank of California in Oakland offers a
new contract that, if signed by both sperm donor and mother,
would allow a child access to his father's name upon turning 18.
Lawyers warn, however, that such contracts are largely untested
in the courts.

    Women who embark on single motherhood cannot overestimate
what "a tremendous undertaking" it is, says Suzanne Bates, 42,
a Manhattan certified public accountant who has adopted a
Paraguayan baby girl. Every parental concern, from finding child
care to coping with illness, weighs more heavily on the single
parent. As for the children, no one can yet say what the
psychological consequences will be. Will these families be any
different from the countless American households in which a
father is missing through divorce or death? Many single mothers
argue that the truly wanted child of a single mother is better
off than a child who must contend with constant conflict
between divorced or unhappily married parents. Jane Mattes, a
New York City psychotherapist and director of Single Mothers by
Choice, advises her fellow single mothers to "stress the
positive" with their children and emphasize how loved they are.
She tells how her son, age 10, once commented, "Wasn't my dad
silly not to want to be a dad? He is missing out on all this
fun." Little did that youngster know it is precisely the desire
not to miss out that is propelling women like his mom to take
the bold, unconventional step of becoming a single mother.