Signs of the Times - Baby Manufacturing/Grandparents/ Crips - 12/13/09

[Smartmarriages]

Signs of the times on this cold Sunday night....about: manufacturing babies;
grandparents who have to parent; and gangs in our high schools.  All of them
about marriage and family breakdown. We'll address them all ­ directly ­
come hot July/2010 in Orlando at Smart Marriages.

- HEART OF STONE: DOCUMENTARY
- BUILDING BABIES: 21st Century Babies Made to Order
- GRANDPA DOES MORE THAN BABY-SIT

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- HEART OF STONE: DOCUMENTARY

I went to see Heart of Stone today and was blown away.  It's about marital
breakdown, absent fathers, solutions, and hope. Truly great.  You'll be able
to see it at the Smart Marriages Film Festival in Orlando and meet the
producers, but don't wait.  Contact Hal Braff and find out how you can see
it and use it as a fund raiser in your CHMI.  hib at MWHLawfirm.com

Watch the trailier here on YouTube: http://tinyurl.com/y8nnto6

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- BUILDING BABIES: 21st Century Babies Made to Order

This one is depressing.  But the Sunday New York Times thought it of such
importance that it is the lead story on today's front page - top of the
fold, with a huge color photo of the surrogate mom, her husband, and the
twins they decided to keep.  Long piece about the complications for everyone
involved.  We'll address some of this in a keynote: Amanda's 39th Birthday
by Miriam Grossman, MD.

> Unable to have a baby of her own, Amy Kehoe became her own general contractor
> to manufacture one. For Ms. Kehoe and her husband, Scott, the idea seemed like
> their best hope after years of infertility.
> 
> Working mostly over the Internet, Ms. Kehoe handpicked the egg donor, a
> pre-med student at the University of Michigan. From the Web site of California
> Cryobank, she chose the anonymous sperm donor, an athletic man with a 4.0 high
> school grade-point average.
> 
> On another Web site, surromomsonline.com, Ms. Kehoe found a gestational
> carrier who would deliver her baby.
> 
> Finally, she hired the fertility clinic, IVF Michigan, which put together her
> creation last December.
> 
> ³We paid for the egg, the sperm, the in vitro fertilization,² Ms. Kehoe said
> as she showed off baby pictures at her home near Grand Rapids, Mich. ³They
> wouldn¹t be here if it weren¹t for us.²
> 
> On July 28, the Kehoes announced the arrival of twins, Ethan and Bridget, at
> University Hospital in Ann Arbor. Overjoyed, they took the babies home on Aug.
> 3 and prepared for a welcoming by their large extended family.
> 
> A month later, a police officer supervised as the Kehoes relinquished the
> swaddled infants in the driveway. . . .

For full article: http://tinyurl.com/ydvcq2t

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- GRANDPA DOES MORE THAN BABY-SIT

Another great Michael Winerip/ Generation B piece in today's New York Times
Style section.  Gordon and Cari Taylor presented a workshop in Orlando/2009
on Grandparents who Parent.

> Typically there¹s heartache ‹ an adult child unable or unwilling to be a
> parent ‹ so it¹s not an issue much discussed publicly.
> 
> According to Census data, 4.5 million children live in households headed by a
> grandparent. Seventy-one percent of those grandparents are under 60 and most
> are working, said Amy Goyer, who has analyzed the data for AARP. This is not a
> poverty issue ‹ 82 percent are middle class or above. Indeed, the national
> spokeswoman for the grandparent group that helped Mr. Kust is Patti Page, the
> singer. Twelve years ago, Ms. Page said in an interview, she took custody of
> her two granddaughters, now 16 and 14, because their mother ‹ her daughter ‹
> had drug problems. ³It had to be done,² Ms. Page said.


http://tinyurl.com/yc4zho6

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