Well I guess it’s official now since the NY Times has said it. 51% of women in the US are living without a husband now. Between later marriages and a higher divorce rate, longer intervals before remarrying for women then men (if ever remarrying, let’s face it, many women never do), we’ve quite simply spending more time on our own then married.
Actually if I had known in my own situation how long I would be single versus the short duration of my marriage, I would have ordered my life very differently. First of all I would never have dropped out of college or had children so early. Instead I would have focused on graduating and paid more attention to my career then I did. Planning my whole life around the expectation of being a married woman and making my home, husband and family my career was a critical error. It led me to being a young single mother very early with few opportunities after my divorce. Actually I had to wait until my children were teenagers before I could go back to school and establish myself.
So that one false expectation formed my whole life.
Thus it’s a good thing that young women are being informed of these changes today. We should be working to get public policies and laws reformed to reflect these changes as well. Especially the laws negatively impacting single motherhood. These changes in adoption laws trying to exclude single women as well as the attempts to stop women from using anonymous sperm donors and create families invitro should be rescinded.
After all, if women are going to be spending so much time alone, they are going to need these other options available to them to start families with, if they so chose. As what do we want so many women to not be able to be mothers if they wish? Many changes must begin to follow in the wake of this new found information about how we are living our lives today.
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