Paper needed on Single Parenting//ATTACHED FILES AND ASSIGMENT

Single parent households refers to the practice of raising a family or building a home without a spouse or a partner or households that have one parent taking care of the children and the household property. Over the past two decades single parent households have become very common than the nuclear family set up consisting of a father, mother and children (Yarber, A. D., & Sharp, 2010). In the current societies we can see that most households are headed by either a father, mother or grandparent raising the children. Such family set up are faced by many challenges since the children cannot get full parental support. There are several factors that have contributed to the increased numbers of single parent households as discussed below:

Divorce.

Single parenting due to divorce means that the single parent will take a full obligation of taking care of the children and the whole households. Its normally the mother who takes the bigger responsibility of taking care of the household after a divorce. Divorce of spouses has resulted from increased and continued family conflicts, issues of infidelity of the partners, unfaithfulness to just mention a few.

Early pregnancies

Teenage parents have faced a lot of challenges and stress in raising their children with their tender age. There are faced with rough experiences because of their young age and inability to prepare for the future. This happens normally to the children who are rebellious to their parents and they end up living in single households which has influenced the increase in single parent households.

Death

Single parent households may result from cases of death of one of the partner. For instance chronic illnesses like cancers, pandemics such as Ebola or other terminal diseases such as HIV/AIDS. Over the past several years families have been destabilized as a result of such losses. Many at times the families who have been swept by the terrible wave of misfortune of the disease leave behind orphaned children to be taken care of old grandparent (Dowd, 1997). If one of the parents still survives, he or she is left alone to take care of the children.

Donor insemination

Single parenting due to donor insemination is the most controversial option for building a family today. Donor insemination is the process of getting pregnancy through injection of semen into the female reproductive (Yarber, A. D., & Sharp, 2010). Single mothers who choose to have their children in this option include single ladies who wish to bear children. They choose sperm donor from friends, relatives, acquaintances, or an unknown donor. If the sperm donor is known to the parent or child-bearer, a parent may take parental or avuncular roles relative to children conceived through donor insemination or may not.

Adoption.

Adoption has led to increased single parent households. It happens to those single individuals who feel incomplete in their lives thus ending up adopting children and living with them in their single parent households. In this case, they act as the bread winners to the children and provide them with their daily needs such as schooling, food and health needs.

Breakdown of morals and culture.

In most societies today there is rampant moral breakdown which has led to many people perceiving marriage as of any importance (Dowd, 1997). This has increased breakdown of families and splitting of partners thus increasing single parent households in the society today

References

Dowd, N. E. (1997). In defense of single-parent families. New York and London: New York University Press.

Settersten, R. A. (2011). Handbook of sociology of aging. New York [u.a.: Springer.

Yarber, A. D., & Sharp, P. M. (2010). Focus on single-parent families: Past, present, and future. Santa Barbara, Calif: Praeger.