I'm a freelance writer and I am trying to find instances related to the letter of inquiry below I sent to a Virginia magazine. This is a real-life situation of an acquaintence in the state of Utah. I'm looking for contacts, primary sources and attributable anecdotes. I've left calls with appropriate offices and have received no response. Meanwhile, my deadline is looming. Any help would be appreciated.
Dear Publication:
Real-life mother and daughter Cora and Jayne have issues. Jayne, who turned sixteen in October, has a six month old, meaning Jayne got pregnant at fourteen. Cora, as a single, full-time mother, has tried to raise her daughter right. But in the heat of adolescence, Jayne now defies her mother in every way she can think of, to include issues of chastity.
Cora couldn’t control Jayne's behavior before her pregnancy. But it seemed after the baby was born, my state government made that control even more difficult to assume. As the mother, Jayne has authority over her baby. But since she herself is still a minor, the courts in my state say that Cora was ultimately responsible for the infant. So the mother's dilemma is she can't control her daughter, she has no rights over her granddaughter, but in the eyes of the law, she is ultimately responsible for them both.
In fact, during an incident when Cora and Jayne got into a shouting match, the daughter called the police who told the mother that she was in danger of being arrested for abuse to both daughter and granddaughter.
According to the Guttmacher Institute, 750,000 females between 15 and 19 become pregnant each year with 57% of them eventually giving birth. And the U.S. Census Bureau says that in 1970, 2.2 million or 3.2 percent of American children lived in a household maintained by a grandparent. By 1997, this number had risen to 3.9 million or 5.5 percent, representing a 76 percent increase over the 27 year period. The number of grandchildren living in households maintained by grandparents with just their mothers present increased by 118 percent from 1970 to 1997.
This in itself can cause enormous strain on older parents who were preparing for retirement and probably thought their child-rearing years were over. But how to deal with confusing and contradictory state laws that seem to undermine parental authority in the midst of trying to deal with it all? I’d like to write a story about that for your publication. Are grandparents in your state who care for grandchildren while trying to manage their own minor children supported or hindered by the state? And how do issues of authority, autonomy and responsibility, as seen through the eyes of the state, affect those turbulent families?
I’m a freelance writer who has written for commercial, non-profit and governmental publications for many years. If you would like to see my work, please visit my website. Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
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posted by desuetude at 4:04 PM on April 2