Recent family related news included a look at couples who live apart — in order to stay together, and tips on how to successfully “break up.” An incarcerated journalist takes us deep into the world of prisoner intimacy and a novelist gives us a sanguine view of divorce and life afterwards. Lastly, we learn of the devastating effect on families with limited means, of a Federal law that requires parents to pay for some costs when their children are in foster care.
John J. Lennon, Esquire, December 5, 2022
What are conjugal visits really like? Incarcerated journalist John J. Lennon takes us inside one of the last bastions of prisoner intimacy in America: trailers of New York.
Kelly Coyne, The New York Times, December 10, 2022
After a pandemic-induced dip, the number of American couples who are “living apart together,” as sociologists call the arrangement, or L.A.T., has started to grow again. And women, in search of their own space, are driving the increase. Living apart can be a way for women to reap the benefits of marriage — love, commitment, support — while avoiding the burdens that traditionally come with being a wife, including the disproportionate amount of work that tends to fall on them at home.
Damona Hoffman and Andre Tagle, NPR, Updated December 21, 2022 Relationships can be complicated, but when the pain of staying is greater than the pain of leaving, you know it's time to go — and eventually you can build your life anew and hopefully find love once more. If you're considering a breakup, the author shares, that there are the five major steps that you are likely to encounter as you move through the process.
Shahidha Bari, The Guardian, January 6, 2023
Of the 43 most stressful events that an average adult might contend with in their lifetime, “divorce” and “marital separation” are often ranked at numbers 2 and 3 respectively, grimly sandwiched between “spousal death” and “imprisonment”. Really Good, Actually, a sardonic story of divorce, depression and the road to recovery is authored by Monica Heisey, the Schitt’s Creek screenwriter.
Joseph Shapiro, NPR, January 19, 2023 North Carolina is one of at least 12 states, according to an NPR survey, in which mothers and fathers can lose the rights to parent their children forever if they don't pay a little-known and controversial debt to the government. Federal law requires states to bill parents, in order to reimburse some of what Washington pays states for foster care. But because the federal underwriting of foster care applies only to families eligible for welfare, the bill to collect that money targets the poorest families.