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First Years (0-2)

Solo act You CAN raise baby by yourself. By Caitlin AdamsPublished: November, 2009

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In any scenario, raising a child often proves more overwhelming than most parents ever anticipate. The majority of couples work in partnership to get it all done. The really lucky ones might even have an extended support system that includes parents, grandparents, neighbors and siblings, which can occasionally prove to be a mixed blessing. Now close your eyes and strip away all that help, and imagine raising a baby all by yourself.     Life doesn’t always go as planned. Not all partnerships pan out. For one reason or another, not all families have two parents.     Carolyn Schrank, a computer programmer living in Aliso Viejo, always imagined herself as part of a two-parent family.     “I was actually married at a young age, and it didn’t work out,” she says. “I thought I’d get married again, and I just never found the right person.”     In her 30s, with no Mr. Right in sight, Schrank had to consider her options if she ever wanted to realize her dream of having a child.     “My whole entire life, I’ve wanted to have children, and it took me probably a good seven or eight years to work up the courage to have a child on my own.”     Schrank decided to opt for the anonymous donor route, using donated sperm and artificial insemination, and gave birth to a healthy daughter in 2005.     Once she’d made up her mind to raise a child on her own, but before beginning the procedure, she joined a support group.     “I’d been going to a group called Single Mothers by Choice for probably a year before,” she says. “It’s exclusively for professional mothers who, whether through adoption or whatever method, choose to have a child on their own; it’s a support group that’s been a really big help for me.”     1  |  2  |  3

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