She starts the thread with this: “I’ve never regretted not having children but with my parents suddenly gone, I’m feeling like an orphan. Most of my siblings have children and so the beat goes on for them. But my very elderly parents were the heart of the family, the planet we all circled, and with them “gone” I’m wondering if I made wrong choices back then, not having produced my own family. Of course, having kids doesn’t mean they will turn out well or be living near you when you are older. I’m not even talking about them taking care of you when you are feeble. Anyone ever be hit with this realization?”

The comments that follow are a refreshing array of thoughts and forthcoming feelings by parents and not.  My take–

1. Regret not–the fear of being alone is not a reason to have children.  Just because you are a parent does not mean you will not end up “alone,” or at least feeling that way, even if your children are alive.

2. To help grieve and heal, now is the time to seek out and learn wider definitions of “family” beyond blood offspring.  Elder childfree with high levels of well-being have developed strong support networks that include people their age and younger, some from extended family, some not.

3. Like she describes her closeness with her parents, it is not the size of the support network, but the quality. Research tells us that it is not how many people make up our support network in our later years as much as it is the closeness we feel with those in our support network.

It seems natural, whether people have children or not, to fear being alone when we are in our later years. I say the time is never too soon to take responsibility for how we want our lives to look when we are old, including what we want “family” to mean.  If we have grown a long-term support network who will be there for us in times of grief (like the loss of our parents),  odds are strong we will not feel alone.

What do you think?

Continuing my interview with producer, Kristen Grieco Elworthy on the teen pregnancy story that made international headlines and is now a documentary:

Why did those who got pregnant want to get pregnant as a teen?

What was my own observation, as a woman about 10 years older than these girls who personally put college/career above having kids? I saw some level of girls who did not have an identity or maybe did not feel that they were “good” at anything, and motherhood was an answer for them. As women, we are told that we all have the capability to be a good mother. Imagine the draw of that…

…if you are feeling that you have no other purpose in life. This type of theory is supported by research. I should add that no statement I’m making describes all the girls, but I personally felt that some fell into this category.

Those who became mothers, what are their lives like now?

This question brings up a good point. Not all 18 girls did end up having their children. The exact numbers are still a bit sketchy and we’re not sure of why some babies were not delivered due to medical privacy laws.

The girls who did have their children have very varied lives. Some still live with their parents. Others live with boyfriends (either the fathers of their children or new men). Some are alone. They all struggle day to day with being parents at such a young age, most have not pursued higher education and they work retail, etc. to make ends meet.

For the most part, these girls live for their kids. They seem to truly be trying to do the right thing–but it’s easy to see that they have it far rougher than someone in a more traditional situation, or someone who at least had the chance to finish their education and start earning some sort of income before being thrust into parenthood.

The occurrence of second and even third children among these girls is FAR higher than the national average of 25%. We are taping some updates now and may recut the film to include why this might be the case.  We also want to update to show what has happened to these girls once the cameras went away. By revisiting them, we give them another chance to complete their stories, which I think are really important to understanding the psyche of teen mothers.

What does the film tell us about teen pregnancy today?

Every girl in our film told a different story, but there are some universal truths that we saw about teen pregnancy. First, it’s so important to give girls self-confidence and a vision for the future. They can be moms, and great ones at that, but that should not be looked at as the “default” necessarily. Give them the confidence to pursue education and a career, because all of us should have the ability to support ourselves–and our children.

Having open, honest conversations about teen pregnancy is so important. Twenty percent of all teen pregnancies ARE intentional–that number is huge! And with 750,000 girls getting pregnant in the U.S. each year, that percentage is particularly significant. But teen pregnancy affects more than just the mom. The child is the biggest collateral; kids of teen parents just don’t do as well in school, aren’t as healthy, are more likely to face teen pregnancy, poverty, and even incarceration, studies show.

And for the rest of us? The effects of teen pregnancy cost billions of dollars of taxpayer money a year. It’s a problem that we should all be interested in facing and fixing.

Thanks, Kristen!

To her idea of sending the message that motherhood should not be looked at as the “default,” I say amen to that.  My post interview musings on this topic to come…

Check out the film at prescreen.com and the film’s facebook page.

What are your thoughts about teen pregnancy today?

Give readers a brief summary of the story.

In the summer of 2008, news broke nationwide that 18 high school girls from the fishing village of Gloucester, Mass. had made a pact to become pregnant. The story was never much more specific, and it origins were humble; I know because I was a local reporter in Gloucester and worked on the story. But when TIME picked up on the story after the resignation of Dr. Brian Orr and Nurse Practitioner Kim Daly of the school’s in-school health clinic, it became a national sensation.

The in-school clinic was a general health clinic (administered meds, diagnosed the flu, etc.) that also did pregnancy tests, and Kim counseled some of the girls on birth control. She was a really trusted source for them. When she noticed a spike in pregnancy tests–she had done nearly 200 tests halfway through the year—and that these girls were coming in repeatedly for tests, she and Dr. Orr went to the hospital that oversaw the clinic to get permission to prescribe them birth control.

They believed that if she could have immediate access to the girls and prescribe birth control instead of them having to go to their doctor (likely with a parent in tow), she might prevent some pregnancies. However, Orr and Daly got into a prolonged battle with the overseeing clinic, and when they felt that they could no longer do the best thing as medical professionals, they resigned. Their story was the lightning rod for the national coverage.

There was a spike in pregnancies at the school. The school principal, for reasons to this day known only to him, used the words “clique” and “pact” to describe the pregnancies. However, no one talked to the girls themselves, so we really did not know if the crux of the story–that the pregnancies were intentional–was actually true or not.

Why did you decide to make the story into a film?

When the story broke nationally, the rumor mill spun completely out of control. As journalists, the film’s Director John Williams and I saw how these girls’ stories had been told by rumors and assumptions from often irresponsible reporters. We and associate producer Joe Provenzano knew something was not right.

We are the only people who spoke directly with the majority of these girls, and got real insight into their minds and motivations. Whether you agree with the girls or not, we felt that they should have a chance to be heard, and that people would be interested in their stories.

Is the “pact” rumor true?

I won’t tell you here but it is answered in the film. But I will tell you that the actual story told from the girls themselves, is far more interesting than what was portrayed in the media or by Lifetime in a fictional film.

Why did those who got pregnant want to get pregnant as a teen?

We heard one recurring theme: many of the girls came from unstable backgrounds and were looking to create their own family as means of stability and/or love. We also heard from girls who had dated men a bit older (e.g., one girl was 16 and the guy 21) who told us that the “older” guys were “mature” and ready for families. (Side note: the guys in these cases did NOT stick around.) In some cases, there was an element of seeking or wanting attention.

What was my own observation, as a woman about 10 years older than these girls who personally put college/career above having kids?

Kristen will tell you in Part II ~ and talk more on their motivations, what happened to these girls, and what the film tells us about teen pregnancy today…

Meanwhile, you can check out the film at prescreen.com and the film’s facebook page.

What have your read or heard about this story?

Cover-New York Magazine

Take the time to read this troubling article in the New York Times Magazine, “Parents of a Certain Age: Is There Anything Wrong with Being 53 and Pregnant?” by Lisa Miller.  She lays out with detailed evidence why she thinks the answer is no. 

I think the better question is, Why is the “baby-having drive” of some people at midlife so strong?  Part of the answer is related to a quote early in the article; 54 year old John says to 47 year old Ann: “You have the body of a young girl. You need a baby.” First, a few numbers…

According to Miller, the number of first time moms at midlife is not only rising but “booming.” In 2008 the number of first time mothers ages 45 and over was double what it was in 1997.  

Women end up “circumstantially infertile”  for any number of reasons, including not having found the right co-parent in their more fertile years, or they weren’t ready given their careers. So like Ann in the article, they reach midlife and finally they are ready. But now their body is not.   

This does not mean, however, they can’t have the experience of parenthood. Many midlife couples adopt; according to Miller, nearly 25% of adopted children have adoptive parents 45 and older.

But many more at later ages, want to have their “own” child. They are intent on carrying a child, and will put their bodies through a lot to do it. IVF with donor eggs are virtually always how pregnancy is going to happen if it is going to happen. Thanks to medical technology, it is even possible for women who have already gone through menopause to do intense hormone therapy to be able to carry a child.  

Why are so many women so intent on having to carry their “own” baby? A most powerful component: being under the spell of our youth-crazed culture.  If you are able to get pregnant it means you are fertile, and if you are fertile, you are still young, still virile. Even if it is not the woman’s egg (because it is too old) but a younger women’s donor egg, if she can carry and deliver a child, it must mean she is not aging, but still youthful, still part of that youth revered set.

It is a certain kind of denial–not a “denial of decrepitude,” necessarily, as many people in midlife and later these days are far from decrepid. But it is a denial of the fact that they are aging. Their body is the first to remind them, but the booming botox and beyond, and fertility treatment industries can fool them into believing it is just not so.

What would happen if we revered the aging process–would so many women have to go the mat to have to carry “their” own child?  What would middle aged people do if they had wanted to become parents but for one reason or another had not had them?  My guess is that women would not feel they have to fool their body into being younger again so they could carry a child.

If we revered the aging process, I’d like to believe that those in midlife would wisely face the reality that their “organic deadline” had passed (even for guys–older men have higher chances of having biological children with problems), and wisely ask themselves how they could get the experience of parenthood another way.  Maybe more would adopt children at all ages, not just infants.  And if that was difficult, they would use their energies to improve the adoption system to make this easier. Maybe more would find ways to be involved with infants, children, and young people in a myriad of ways to support them in growing up.  

If we revered the aging process, at midlife I bet we’d see far fewer women fighting biology and more plugging in to how they can use their parental needs and energies with the children who are already here. They would wisely find ways to get their needs met in ways that help the larger context of the world. They would not need avenues like midlife pregnancy to support the illusion of youth.  

What do you think? When you read Miller’s piece, what strikes you most?

experience lower emotional well-being have unhappier marriages and suffer more from depression, that they insist that..a life without children is a life unfulfilled.” The phenom at work? It boils down to a psychological phenomenon called “cognitive dissonance.” Defined, it is a psychological defense we create to justify our choices and beliefs. In the case of parenthood, it can explain why parents create the “myth of parental joy because otherwise <they> would have a hard time justifying the huge investment that kids require” (and all the other negatives).

Research exploring the role of self-justification in parent beliefs supports the idea that cognitive dissonance is at play. For example, an article in Psychological Science, talks about a study that looked at how the high costs of kids and parents’ predictions of leisure time with them.

When parents have the high costs of children in mind they were much more likely to say that they enjoyed spending time with their children, and they also anticipated spending more leisure time with their kids. As Herbert says, “In other words, being aware of parenthood’s price tag made them idealize the time they spent with their kids, and this idealized image of family life led them to foresee more shared time in the future.”

Beyond parenthood, we all use cognitive dissonance as a way to justify our choices and feel good about them after the fact. It shows up in irreversible choices like parenthood, but also in much more simple situations. For example, after we buy that new whatever the car is, we tend to start seeing that car everywhere, and like that car even more.

But back to the kid thing—I have been pondering, how is cognitive dissonance at work with the childfree? Unlike parents, we have not made a choice we can’t take back that we might secretly regret and then have to idealize it to justify that choice. 

But we have made a choice that if cognitive dissonance is at work, after we made it, we will find ways to confirm its “rightness.” This could include focusing on all the positives that go along with a life with no kids, and not the negatives or the positives that can come along with parenthood. 

In my case, I more easily focus on all the things I love about being childfree, which looking through a cognitive dissonance lens, makes it easier to not slip into that tiny slice of me that sees her mom friends have this amazing emotional connectedness with their kids, which I have thought could be very cool. Then I snap out of it (it could be cool but not That cool), and once again revel in the joy of the freedoms that a childfree life gives me.

Going further, though I wonder if the ranting and “breeder bashing” out there is another form of self-justification, which of course can come from both directions, parents and not. I also wonder if those who are deep down not settled in their own mind and heart (whether conscious or not) about not having kids are the ones to have to do the most criticizing of parents or justifying of the choice not to have them… 

How do you see cognitive dissonance working with the childfree, or in other areas of your life for that matter?