Sarah Palin: Republican Vice Presidential Nominee with Baby Mama Drama!

 

What a way to begin the Republican National Convention! We've got hurricanes, protests and now a Vice Presidential running mate that not even the Republican party has taken the time to get to know! The icing on the cake has now become Governor Sarah Palin's "Baby Mama Drama!" What a way to get those voters out the polls, especially those who were already disinterested or disenfranchised by the Republican National Convention! It's time to take into account the mental health issues regarding Governor Palin's 17 year old daughter Bristol, who now finds herself pregnant, unwed and outed to the nation by her own mother. And now she's marrying her high school senior of a boyfriend? You betcha!  

Barack proclaimed that we should leave the families of nominees alone.  As Ross Perot once stated, "Can’t do it, can’t be done."  So, let's make a checklist and check it twice. After all, Christmas 2008 is still ahead.

1.) Governor Palin does not believe in teaching sex education. Instead, she believes America’s teens should merely abstain.  How’s that working in your home, Sarah?

2.) 60% of all teen marriages end within the first five years, while only 33% of Americans have been divorced.

3.) Guess where these young divorced parents end up? Right back on Mom and Dad’s doorsteps. These parents, like Governor Palin, can barely afford their lifestyles now and will have to take on second jobs in order to help their pregnant teens, reducing the funds set aside for their other children, delaying retirement and rising their cost of living as they help care for their children's babies.

4.) In 2005 alone, we spent $9.1 billion on teen pregnancies, paying for things such as child care, parenting classes, hospital bills, pre-natal vitamins, medication, housing, food and on...and on.

5.) Governor Palin, how do you propose to take care of your five children, particularly an infant with special needs, while preparing your daughter (who is a child herself) for motherhood, nurturing your own marriage and life while you RUN our country?  Additionally, what is the message you and your family are sending to the young women of the U.S.? Are you saying that teenage pregnancy is okay?

6.) Yes, mistakes and accidents happen. However, that should be when parents put their own PROFESSIONAL interests aside to spend as much quality time with their children as possible, rather than placing them on a national platform to humiliate, embarrass and undermine them. Pressure or not, encouraging your daughter to become a child bride does not exempt you from the personal responsibility of being fully emotionally present.

This is a perfect example of ideology meeting reality.  What message are you passing on to young women when you encourage them to use no protection, have no education, and offer no alternative or options other than the ones you see fit?  One size does not fit all.  In the end, as I have seen time and time again in my own private practice during my years working with adolescents and college bound students, these parents have not only permanently changed their own lives, but those of the child being raised by a child. Many of these young mothers wind up in my office feeling overly parentified and depressed. Many of the children come to me as they act out as a result of growing up with parental relationships more like siblings than that of parent and child. All too often the young teen mother or father abandons their child once the harsh reality of life's daily responsibilities associated with marriage, finances, childbearing and growing up themselves becomes too much to bear.

Thank you, Governor Sarah Palin, for showing the nation that ignorance is not always bliss.

God bless your daughter in her time of need.

Make it an “Excuse Free Life” and always remember “It’s not the size of the problem, but the size of the feeling.”  

Until tomorrow,
Dr. Leslie