Search Results for: blog pregnant and in prison

Marriage Laws – Delaware & The Age of Consent

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As you know I’ve been writing a series on Marriage Laws in the 50 United States and I’ve discovered that the laws are changing all the time, even on pieces that I wrote just a couple of weeks ago. So what’s happening in Delaware? Because the state’s laws allowing under-age pregnant brides to marry without consent conflicts with laws governing statutory rape – a new law now requires all minors under the age of 18 to petition Family Court for permission to marry. Until recently, pregnancy offered minors an exclusion and reason to marry under the state’s laws, but no … Continue reading →

Babies Produced by the Drug Culture

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At the close of a recent blog about child abuse, I was asked an interesting question. Why do women, who do not want to take care of their children, keep having them? I am by no means an expert on a question like this, but I can make some comments based upon what I have seen and heard. The birth mother of our five adopted children had seven children in ten years. I have not seen her in some time so she may have had more. All of the children that I know of have been taken away from her … Continue reading →

A New Kind Of Family Cell Plan

There’s a new family cell plan and it’s not being offered by Verizon, Cingular or any of the other major providers. No, this cell plan places toddlers behind bars so that they can bond with their inmate parents. Family cells are being used in Spain and they are the only ones being used in the world. The units have cribs, Disney characters adorning the walls and access to a playground. The idea is to allow kids and parents to bond before the children truly understand the “reality of prison”. The Spanish prison currently has 32 kids, basically, incarcerated. The units … Continue reading →

Trying to Rescue Disadvantaged Kids

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Nancy and I had worked with disadvantaged young people who lived near our church for some time. We were determined to give at least some of them a chance to be successful. At best, it was always a “three steps forward, two steps back” proposition. Most of the kids lived in cramped apartments characterized by poor living conditions. Many of their parents had substance abuse problems and the kids had very little supervision. Crack dealers operated openly where they lived, no one seemed to care. The young people were quick to get angry and were always one smart remark away … Continue reading →

Author Review — Maya Angelou

Called “America’s Poet Laureate,” Maya Angelou has done more to forward African American literature than quite possibly any author we’ve had to date. Her words are powerful, earthy, moving and inspirational, but there was a time when she didn’t feel that way. She was abused by her mother’s boyfriend as a child, and when she told what had happened, her uncle beat the abuser to death. Maya became convinced that her words had killed a man, and from the age of eight, when the incident happened, until she was thirteen, she would not speak. Sent to live with her grandmother … Continue reading →

Our First Meeting With the Birth Mother

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This is the story of the first visit with our boys’ birth mother. We were pretty nervous. We had no idea what to expect, plus we were getting our first chance to meet our new baby’s three older brothers. We met two of the boys, ages four and eighteen months, in the lobby. The older one looked scared and the younger was shell-shocked. We already had an inkling that we would eventually adopt all of them. We were then escorted to the “playroom.” It was a fairly small room with no toys and some old office furniture. It was definitely … Continue reading →

Birth Parents Love Their Kids

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Yes, I have over generalized the title. I’m sure there are birth parents out there that do not feel love for their children. As you read bulletins of waiting children you may be left wondering if many of these parents really cared about their kids. Who would want to harm a child that they love? In learning of the stories behind my children’s entrance into state care, I wondered what kind of love their birth mothers especially had. Both had substance abuse issues while they were pregnant and both were in relationships that involved domestic violence at some point. Both … Continue reading →