Parenting options for singles
Parenting is a combination of joy and responsibility. In 1970, there were 3 million single parenting mothers and 393,000 single parenting fathers; in 2006, there are 10 million single parenting mothers and 2.3 million single parenting fathers (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 2005).
Earlier, the term single parenting was largely used for couples who had legally separated or divorced, and seek to take care of their babies on their own. But with the change of time, many people do not consider that they should have a family to have their baby. Advancement of medical science had fulfilled this wish through the advent of ART. This has given an equal opportunity to both male and female to become a single parent through ART facility.
Contents
- Why single parenting become popular in females?
- Are males interested to become a single parent?
- How child-parent bonding develops in single-parent families?
- What is the role of social support system in single parenting?
- What is Assisted reproductive technology (ART)?
- What factors need to consider before single parenting?
- Decision making.
- Age factor for females
- Selection of single parenting options
- Single Motherhood Options
- Fertility Treatment with Donor Sperm.
- Single Fatherhood Options
- Egg donation.
- Intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI)
- Surrogacy for single parenting.
- Conclusion.
Why single parenting become popular in females?
The number of females seeking to be a single parent is larger than males. There are several reasons to support this. One of the primary reason is the limited biological time period for female fertility. There are many females who want to be economically independent and are more focused to settle their career first. At a time, settling career and searching for Mr. Perfect become tough and often the career becomes the priority. This frequently results in the decision to become a single mother, as their biological clock are ticking. This may not be very much socially accepted, but the number of single mothers is increasing in Western countries. In other situations, where a female gets separated or divorced from her partner before her pregnancy. This also results in the decision to become a single parent to overcome the loneliness and to get the joy of parenting. An article published in Pew Research center stated that in earlier days, only 5% of females opted for single parenting by their own choice, which later raised up to 41% in 2008.
Are males interested to become a single parent?
In recent days, not only females but also males are interested to become a single dad. The interested males know the pros and cons of single parenting. The single intended dads normally experience the equivalent parenting stress, face the same challenges, and also enjoy the same happiness as the couples pursuing families. In 1960, the rate of a single father is only 1% which raise up to 4.35% in 2017. The increasing trend is more common in white, educated, and older males.
How child-parent bonding develops in single-parent families?
Parenting is not an easy task. Therefore, a single parent often faces many challenges in their day to day life, which include child care, parenting, work responsibilities, economical drops, and even reduced social engagements. These challenges may hamper the quality of life at an initial stage of single parenting. People who usually decide to become a single parent are mostly aware of the cost involvements. The experts always suggest looking for economic stability before opting for single parenting.
There are a few kinds of research conducted on single parenting families, especially for single male parenting families. However, the study result of single parenting is not very insensitive as we may often think. An article published in European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology on 5th July 20117, reported that there is no difference in terms of parent-child bonding for children raised by single-mother-by-choice in comparison to the heterosexual two-parent families.
Research findings also supported that children in single-father families lead a fare lifestyle. White, educated and matured fathers usually taking care of negative inward focused behaviors of a child and also help to boost their academic performance.
What is the role of social support system in single parenting?
Parenting is a long-term job and single parenting may become difficult in a certain phase. Social supports have different roles in single parenting. These include physically help to a single parent to reduce the workload, offer an economical help to sort out financial scarcity, provide emotional support to ease the parenting stress and generate collective support to give a single parent a short break. A single parent may ask for help from their friends, local people, colleagues and counselors for assistance. Even online counseling services are also available to provide emotional support to the single parent. Some countries also provide socio-legal support to a single parent to raise their children. However, surrogacy related legal issues may hamper single parenting in some countries like the United Kingdom, India etc.
What is Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART)?
Assisted reproductive technology is a combination of advanced medical fertility treatment. Accurate ART can solve infertility issues. There are different types of ARTs which are clinically efficacious and safe to become a single parent. A doctor will recommend appropriate ART for the individuals who intend to be a single parent.
What factors need to consider before single parenting?
To become a single parent is not an easy task, so one should consider some significant factors before making a righteous decision.
Decision making
A firm decision making by an emotionally stable mind is very important before anyone opt for single parenting option. Single parenting is not very socially acceptable option in the current scenario. Therefore, emotional strength and economic stability are two important aspects required to drive this decision.
Age factor for females
Female reproductive ability declines with aging. Generally, a slow decline starts to happen in between the age of 28 to 35 years, but after 39 years of age, it declines rapidly and may be exhausted after 42 years of age. In most of the cases, the natural conceiving ability of a female gets terminated approximately ten years before menopause.
Through the process of intrauterine insemination with donor sperm (IUI), a woman under 35 years of age may be able to become pregnant. For women above 35 years of age, may seek the help of IVF treatment with donor sperm. In case a woman is 40 or older may want to consider donor eggs to increase their chance of having a baby. It is always better to seek a reproductive endocrinologist and get a counseling on fertility status at any age. This is helpful to get an overview of the options based on the quality and quantity of the eggs and other factors that affect your fertility.
Depending on the results and age, the most appropriate treatment is decided, which can be either intrauterine insemination using semen from a donor (IAD), in vitro fertilization (IVF), donation of both the male and female gametes or the transfer of pre-embryos donated by other couples.
As such, the success rate depends on the treatment and can vary, in general terms, from 20% in the case of insemination to 70% in the case of donation of both gametes. Age may be not a barrier for males to opt single parenting decision, though aging can reduce fertility ability.
Selection of single parenting options
There are multiple options for singles to become a parent, which broadly classified as assisted reproductive technology (ART) and child adoption. The type of ART selection depends upon infertility issue present in the intended parent.
Single Motherhood Options
Fertility Treatment with Donor Sperm
In case of a woman who wants to be a single parent, then first and foremost requirement is donor sperm. A familiar male person can be a sperm donor, but it requires legal consideration. Reproductive law and regulation related to parental rights, legal aspects of the relationship need to verify before using sperm donation option from a known person. If every aspect is legally finalized, then donor need to go for thorough medical testing to identify genetic diseases and/or sexually transmitted infections if any. Otherwise, one can take support from the sperm bank. Medical doctor recommended the right option of fertility treatment depending upon the reproductive health of the woman. Following are possible fertility treatment options for single motherhood after completion of donor sperm aspects.
Intrauterine insemination (IUI)
Woman with a healthy reproductive health condition, that means she has a normal uterus, normal functioning of fallopian tubes, standard ovarian reserve, then IUI can be a fertility option for intending single motherhood by using donor sperm.
In vitro fertilization (IVF)
This fertility treatment usually recommended for women who have diminished ovarian reserve or blockage in fallopian tubes. However, both egg and sperm donation can require in cases of women having a very low ovarian reserve. This type of clinical cases can be resolved also by using an egg donor to pursue IVF process. It is important to mention that in such cases, the intended mother does not have the same biological relationship with the born child.
At the initial phase of the IVF process, fertility hormonal medicine is injected to stimulate egg production and egg maturation. After a certain period, the matured eggs are extracted from the patient’s ovaries by using a syringe. The eggs are fertilized with donor sperm in an embryology laboratory and after 3-5 days period, one or two best-formed embryos are selected and transferred to the intended mother womb for further development.
Fertility preservation
Some women avoid taking the risk of a very low ovarian reserve. Ovarian reserve usually diminishes with increasing of age or extreme stress. Women can take the opportunity to preserve their fertility at their early age for the future use purpose. Egg freezing, embryo freezing, and ovarian tissue freezing are three different fertility preservation options open for women to preserve their fertility.
Embryo Adoption
In the clinical specialized laboratory, the collected sperms and eggs are fertilized in the Petri dish (outside the body) in the IVF process. To continue the IVF process, the fresh embryo is transferred to the mother womb for further development and some of the best remaining embryos are preserved for future use. If the intended mothers/couples feel that they completed their family. Then they can anonymously donate the extra embryos to treat other infertile patients. The single infertile intended mother can opt embryo donation option to accomplish their wish.
Single Fatherhood Options
This is a slightly complicated process than single motherhood, as it requires both egg donor and surrogate mother for carrying the full term of pregnancy.
Egg donation
After selection of the egg donor according to the intended father’s criteria. The same IVF process is followed by an egg donor to collect the eggs and then sperm is collected from the intended father. Then, artificially fertilization process is conducted in the laboratory. The best quality 1or 2 embryos transferred to the surrogate mother’s womb for further fetus development. In the case of male infertility issues, donor sperm is used for fertilization. But in this case, the intended father will not be a biological relationship with the born child.
Intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI)
Many intended fathers have poor quality sperm in terms of sperm’s shape and mobility. Then intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) can be a solution for them and opting this process gives the opportunity to become used to become a biological father with the born child. In the ICSI process, the best sperm is collected from the sample through injection and directly insert the sperm into the egg to facilitate fertilization.
Surrogacy for single parenting
Surrogacy is not only fulfilling the dream of a single male to be a parent, but this is an option for infertile women also to accomplish their motherhood. Generally, the same surrogacy process is followed for both single parents as well as other intended parents. The surrogate mother carries the whole gestational period by following the IVF process. But egg donor or sperm donor must require in case of the single intended parent. However, both egg donor and sperm donor may require in some infertile single parent in addition of gestational carrier (surrogate).
Conclusion
Parenting is a dream for every individual human being at a certain point of life, which may match with circumstances or may not be. Advancement of medical technology provides other than the adoption option, where one single person, both male and female can be a biological parent of his/her own child without the involvement of their partners. This is one of the clinical wonders.
