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Eric E. Jenkins |
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The Truth About “Baby Mama Drama” Often times, in our society, children are born to couples who are not married. I know this fact all too well because not only am I the father of a child from unwed parents, I am the grandfather of a child from unwed parents. It is not uncommon for two people to get along one minute and to hate each other the next. However, when there is a child involved, the relationship between the couple can become even more volatile. This is especially true in instances where the couple breaks up and the man takes up with another woman. While it doesn’t happen every time, sometimes, the woman comes to resent everything about the situation; the fact that the man left, the fact that he is seeing someone else, and the fact that she now has a child to raise and can only count on limited help from the father of the child. This resentment often manifests itself in acts designed to make the father’s life miserable as a result of his decision. This phenomenon is often referred to in the streets of the inner cities as “Baby Mama Drama”. It is because of BMD that many women are reluctant to take up with a man who has children by another woman. There are two forms of BMD, and they differ based on whether the child has a father who wants to spend lots of time with his child or wants to spend as little time as possible with his child. Fathers who want to take an active role in the raising of their child have restrictions placed, by the mother, on the time that they are allowed to spend with the child. The mother usually does this in an attempt to disrupt the father’s life and make it difficult for the father to schedule events and activities with his new love interest. This type of father has to keep an open schedule so that whenever his child is made available to him, he is able to spend time with the child and do whatever he can to be a part of this child’s life. The type of father who tries to distance himself from the woman and the child will often have the child forced into his life. The mother will create situations whereby the father is demanded by the mother to relieve her of the child so that she can accomplish whatever pressing task she is confronted with, or simply as a means to alleviate stress emanating from having to raise the child without the child’s father present. This father’s schedule is disrupted because he never knows when he will be spending time with the child and has therefore not made any preparations for having the child as a part of his existence. No matter which type of father the man is, the man has to understand the he, the woman and the child will all be connected until two of the three of them passes away. The obvious solution to this problem is abstinence. Without going into a sermon on the sins of unwed sex, it should be noted that the bible does speak out against fornication. Realizing that, in today’s society, abstinence is an unrealistic expectation, safe sex is the most responsible option. In the event that a child is born, there are things that the father of the child can do that would go a long way towards minimizing and possibly eliminating the effects of BMD. Being a parent, in particular being a mother, is as tough a job as any other profession that currently exists, and though the rewards are great, it is the only job that has no salary and actually costs as much money as it does time and energy. The father of the child must realize this, and whether or not he and the mother are together, must do whatever he can to share the responsibility of raising and caring for the child. If he steps in without having to be asked to or forced to, the mother might (and even then it is not a certainty) be inclined to not make the father’s life miserable. The new love interest of the father must also realize that she is not as important as the man’s child, and must be willing to take a backward step and allow the father to assume his responsibilities. Lastly, both the man and his new partner must realize that the mother will be under stress due to having to care for the child as well as the unhappiness of seeing the father of the child, someone that she gave all of herself to and created a child with, in the arms of another woman at a time when the mother of the child needs the man the most, even more than during the creation of the child. If both members of this new relationship are conscious of this fact, then the lives of all of the parties involved should be more harmonious. While it is true that there will still be some women who will create BMD out of spite over the man’s having left or because the woman is herself a miserable person, most often, the woman just wants to know that she is not on an island by herself at a time when she most needs some help and some understanding.
(Written August, 2008)
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