Selfish Parenting 101

As a child of the eighties, I have watched my generation and the generation that followed spiral down into an abyss of no morals, values, self -worth or self esteem. Sex and selfish behaviors took the place of all else and I often wonder if I am the last of a dying breed.

An issue that came to me recently was that of young women and men who want to have children, but don't want to be in a relationship with the parent of the child.
Well, excuse me for giving a damn about the well - being of the future black Bajan generation whose young people are so broken, angry and bitter, yet no one wants to admit to seeing the connection between broken homes and jail sentences.

I have had a male "friend" who wanted to have a child. He didn't want to be married, he didn't care if the mother came around or not. All he knew was that HE wanted a child.
Perhaps his desire to love and nurture a child the way his father did not love and nurture him was admirable, but I wish he could have had a uterus, vagina and breast so he could also conceive, bear the contractions, deliver and breast feed, for the only way I could sum up his behavior was selfish and if you are that selfish as to only be thinking of what YOU want then you should be able to do everything for YOUR self. How can you want a baby and not "want" the mother? How can you lay with a woman and then disregard her opinion about the child that she waddled with for nine months?

And yes, likewise there are women out there seeking men with "good genes" to have babies for because good looking babies are what counts (sarcasm, people). Dad doesn't need to be in the life of a child -  mothers have been raising kids solo for years haven't they? If my child is good looking it will be okay.
Sometimes I wonder what alien aircraft these people were thrown off.

Children have parents because they need parents. Caught the S? Plural, as in more than ONE - work with me here. If we were made to have them alone and raise them alone we would have been asexual beings (google it if you don't know what asexual means).

I wish that the idea of raising kids together to our young people was more than just having a child together, where one parent visits on weekends and birthdays and you trade on Christmas.
Having children and thinking the child will be okay if it does not see it's mother or father.

Maybe it will! Maybe your child will grow to adult hood and be just fine never knowing or having interaction with it's sperm or womb donor. On the other hand, maybe it will be bitter, resentful, hateful and have a ton of issues stemming from not feeling the love of that parent.
I am no social worker, I don't have the stats. But I look around me every day and see children angry, bitter and confused. Acting up and acting out and being looked upon as social deviants raised in broken homes and dysfunctional families.

If a child of a two parent homes gets into a fight, ever notice there is less drama and emphasis placed on that child than a child of a single parent home? The child of the two parent home gets a pass for having a "bad day" but the first question the teacher or guidance counselor asks the single parent child is if it is having any issues stemming from the mother of father that is absent in their life?
More often than not the single parent child was just having a bad day too, but studies indicate single parent children are more likely to have behavior and emotional problems.

I am not bashing anyone. I know for a fact some relationships do not and cannot work out no matter how you twist it. I am simply concerned about the direction of our generation.
I wish I could see more families. And I mean more families together under one roof. I wish children could see their parents kissing and hugging instead of screaming and cursing each other in the street. I wish young people would stick out trying to make their relationships work the way they stick out that they can handle it alone.
I applaud you for having the courage and guts and strength to handle raising your kid alone, but it was not intended to be that way.

I think this generation has been "raised" to not take on any form of commitment, be it marriage or long term relationships. Men are running from the proverbial ball and chain and women have been brainwashed into being strong and independent. That way of thinking is ruining our society and destroying our future generation.

Food for thought.

The skinny of it...

I have always wondered why it is that when I am called skinny or bone bird I never take offence, yet to say the word fat in 2013 is like a criminal offence that will have hoards of big girls wanting to stampede your house and loved ones.
WHY are big women so offended by the term fat? Skinny is skinny and that is how you describe it (I remember a few skinny women being insisted on called petite due to their own self-esteem issues, but I never cared either way what I was called). Yet there are a million other phrases I have to remember to use to describe a big woman as to not offend her. She is big boned, thick, heavy, chunky, large, thick set. She is even a curvy diva.

I have been told I do not understand the "struggle" as I have grown up in the era where it is acceptable to be rail thin thanks to the Victoria Secret lingerie models whose ribs can clearly be counted from miles away.

I realize society has shed much negative light on big women, portraying them as unhealthy eaters who are prone to develop more diseases than a woman weighing significantly less. But there are two sides of the scale (no pun intended). There will be harmful effects on the body if you are a three hundred pound plus adult female the same as there will be if you are an adult female weighing seventy pounds.
Those are the extremes.

When we focus on weight, fat or thin, we have to focus on HEALTH. The rate of metabolism of a woman, her genetics, DNA, etc... determines the weight and the control of the weight of a woman. Which is often something one often does not have much control over.
I could not gain fifteen pounds in any one year no matter how much I ate. Likewise some people find it difficult to loose fifteen pounds no matter how much they exercise or cease to eat.


I have never had a "problem" with thick women. I have never had the urge to call anyone a fat bitch. Yet it seems the "thick revolution" wishes to shed a negative light on women who are thin with their slogans of REAL WOMEN HAVE CURVES.
Spare me the B.S. Real women can cook, are employed, have goals and don't go around trash talking people because they don't WEIGH the same as they do.

Dove's REAL BEAUTY campaign sought to assure women that ALL women of ALL sizes and colors and shapes are beautiful.
On it's own I think the poster stood out quite well and the message was successfully delivered and I agreed one hundred percent. But when run alongside a Victoria Secret ad it what did it suggest?
Real women have curves. You don't need to be skinny to be beautiful. And even though, again, I believe that is true, thick women are throwing it all out on the flip by attempting to make thin women seem like the inferior.

It is not the skinny women that have been making you feel inferior all these years. It is not even the model industry or the media, as much as they were the ones who have held the reins and guided the horse. IT WAS YOU who made yourself feel worthless minding what society said was beautiful.

I have not heard ONE single skinny woman complain or bitch how the thick woman campaign insults them.  I have not seen one skinny woman get upset when the Plus sized model revolution was stared. Not one skinny model complained that there would be less work for them or less money to go around in the industry of modelling. NOT ONE skinny woman batted an eye when the thick women said skinny was "out of style".
Yet, in spite of all of this curvy diva-tude, if I say the word fat, I am looked upon with disgust.

The media will always flow in the direction of the cash flow. If skinny makes the money, or fat or natural hair or weaves - there will the media be, telling you this is what is beautiful and in and accepted. You will always be fighting the standards of "society" if you do not fit them.

I say to you ladies, fat or skinny, thick or thin, even black or white. We all have issues. We all worry about looks and body shape and hair and acne. We all face the time of wondering about our futures, should we have kids, get married, take that job or the next, invest in stock or have a life insurance policy.
YOUR WEIGHT DOES NOT MAKE YOU ANY MORE OR LESS OF A PERSON, but your attitude does.

You DO NOT have to bring someone else down to lift yourself up. Try to remember that.

The Real Self Hate.

Recently I was  accosted by a fat/thick/chunky/curvy/obese woman. It seems every form of the word fat is offensive so take your pick.
I was shopping for jeans in my size, which happens to be a 0 in a few Bridgetown stores. By now most people know that there is such a thing as Size 0 as well as double and triple 0 as well.
I am always highly annoyed when I ask for a 0 and the sales assistant insist I fit a 3, because it is cut small.
To them, a Size 3 already looks like no possible healthy human adult could fit into it.

I was at the umpteenth store unsuccessful so far in my mission, where a sales clerk brought down a Size 1 from the store room and insisted I try it. One look at the jeans and I knew it wouldn't fit. Still she insisted I try it. I insisted it was a waste of time.

A large woman in the store overheard my exchange with the sales assistant and said to her friend clearly and loudly enough for me to hear.
"I hate these stupid skinny bitches. Who the hell wants to be a Size 0? She thinks she a model or something? She better put on some weight before she blows away."
To which her not so fat friend replied, "She ain't even cute."

THAT, friends, is a prime example of self hate. And I don't mean the self hate natural women like to accuse weave wearing sisters of. Or the self hate that women who don't wear make-up accuse women who do of. Not even the kind of self hate you are said to have if you bleach your black as midnight skin. All those things people can do with their own money on their own time without offending a soul.
But THAT! that is the REAL self hate. The kind where you hate your self so much that you have to attempt to make strangers in a store feel bad about themselves.

Such comments never merit response from me. I simply sashayed from the store with a laugh and extra sway in my skinny little hips.

Lades, be aware of your attitudes. If you "hate" skinny women, thick women, black women, white women. Ask yourself a serious WHY. Hate usually stems from some sort of resentment or jealousy.
Address the real issue and deal with it. Your hate toward people is a refection of what you hate about your self.

Food for thought.