Dating Singles with Babies

Every once in a while, there is a recurring theme that pops up in regular everyday conversation. For the past couple of days the single man with no kids or baby mama drama seemed to rear its head in a few. As Belini would say before I commence this conversation with you guys, here is my disclaimer “I believe there is a quite a few single brothers out there without children, which means there are quite a bit of baby mamas out there with babies.” Therefore I am always pleasantly surprised to find a brother without a crazy baby mama (leaving this statement for you Rum Punch…chuckle).

Last week on my way home, my neighborhood RayRay was screaming at the top of his lungs “No way ma’. I ain’t going to have another man raising my baby… that is my blood. My blood! You can’t make me feel good about that!”

Okay! RayRay… but you live at home with your mama. (chuckle)

Now I could go on and on about RayRay’s situation but that is not my chosen topic of discussion today. My topic of discussion is single folks with children and dating. I have dated men with children and it is always a touchy situation when the baby moms hear about you in the presence of the children. And likewise for the single mothers I know in serious relationships with men other than their baby daddies.

With that said, back to my disclaimer, in this day in age, as single mamas and papis set out to find their life partners and become serious with their partner. Should this new potential life mate not assist with the raising of you child, RayRay? Why are you so threatened? Are you not doing all that you can do to provide for your child? Hmm…

Listen, I know a man with two mothers. Two mothers he loves very dearly. I also know a single lady who met the love of her life while she was raising a two-year old little boy by another man. She was the one that told me, if you are serious about being with someone you love all of them. If you really want to make a life with them, you will work to be apart of there life. So RayRay when D’Angelo brings his woman dinner after a long day at the office, he is going to bring enough to feed junior.

I am going to serve this shot to you straight brother, if you doing your job, Jr. will have two pops. No chaser, check my disclaimer, this is the state we live in… you know what you have to do.

And on that note, I will conclude with a clip from one of my favorite movies.

Much luv until next week... peace :)

P.S. Courvoisier doesn’t condone the introduction of people you dating to your children unless it is serious. But it is what it is, let a him/her help out once in a while… this is a team we are building.

love don't live here anymore

5 And A Possible Presents a Possible: Bahama Mama

Why do we say one thing and mean another? The father of my children (he hates to be called my baby’s daddy) and I have developed a new relationship. I think that we are friends committed to raising our children together for the next seventeen years. He on the other hand refuses to label anything and always brings up the fact that we are not together. N@#ga please! Don’t you think I know that? Every time our girls ask about daddy, or I look through the “family” photo album I am reminded that we are not together. Or better yet, every time I look at another tall, well-built man that she is attracted to (the “she” I speak of is my female equivalent of the other male brain), and approach him, I am blissfully aware of my new found freedom.

Yes, I know that we are not together, but does he? I found myself wondering why he brings up the subject when we are so far from the topic that even mentioning our current predicament seems a bit insane and desperate on his part. At one point I thought that he was off doing his thing, and simply wanted to make sure that we were on the same page. But come on! You got to remind me of this during every conversation? Nah, he has to remind himself. It’s cool that like most men, that his actions don’t run parallel with his words. Somewhere in there he is missing the connection, so typically male.

So, I listen, at times calling him on his BS, but never blurring the lines of our friendship. I don’t sit around waiting for him to come crawling back to us. He goes out, so do I. He gets his, so do I. He admits that he hasn’t explored the sexual world lately leading me to believe that he’s up to his old games again. When I met him he thought that he was saying all the right things and that he got me. If truth be told, I would say I was laughing at all the right moments, inserting my usual smart comments to capture his attention, and let’s face it I knew I was going to sleep with him when I shook his hand and introduced myself. So who got who?

I think what men don’t know and what women forget is that we are rarely coerced into doing something. Many women have an inkling of what they are going to do before they do it. What’s that called? Oh yeah, our intuition. Trust it. If you have a feeling he’s cheating, he probably is. If your gut tells you he ain’t the one, he probably isn’t. Don’t let you’re that intuition tell you one thing, and you do another. It almost always ends up in a disaster. As for me and the father of my children I let his words stand we ain't together. So don’t be mad, labeling me as your main (even though you don’t want to label our relationship) when you feel like you might wanna be with me again. I ain’t his main nothing right now. I am the mother of his children. That’s what I said and that’s what I mean.

until next time,

Bahama Mama

asleep in Sunday School

One of my favorite movies (at the moment) is Kno.cked Up. Me loves it! It’s funny and full of moments that are so true to life. And while I was watching it over the weekend for the 50-eleventh time (cause I’m a loser with no cable), I had an ah-ha moment.

Eureka….eu—freakin-reka! © Seth Cohen. This whole movie is like last week’s post come to live. Made possible by white movie actors, of course. For those of y’all who haven’t seen it, slacker Ben meets on-the-come-up Alison randomly one night at the club. They head to her place for a little naked goodness but right before the deed is done, their wires get crossed such that Ben goes it raw dog, and Alison ends up preggers. The scene where Alison breaks the news to Ben that she is with child is classic. Missed sex education much, kids?

Alison: I'm pregnant.
Ben: Fuck off!
Alison: What?
Ben: What?
Alison: I'm pregnant.
Ben: Pregnant... with emotion?
Alison: Pregnant with a baby.
[Then they talk about how Alison thought Ben had on a condom and he tells her that in fact he did not, leading him to ask her how come she didn’t realize he didn’t use protection.]
Alison: I was drunk!
Ben: Was your vagina drunk? You think I'm an inventor? "He created a dick-skin condom, He hollowed out a penis and put it on", what the fuck?

I die laughing every time I watch that scene. Alison and Ben try to make a go of the relationship since they will be tied together by this baby for the next 18+ years. Despite some rough (and wildly hilarious) patches, they end up happily ever after since it is a movie and they are white.

Folks I know who find themselves in this same predicament -- guy meets girl at club, they f*ck once or often like it’s goin out of style, somebody forgets their sex education 101 and girl ends up pregnant. That shit usually ends on a sour note. Because the two people are probably totally incompatible and just haven’t had enough time to figure that out because instead of getting to know each other they were just f*cking. NOTE: taint nothing wrong with sexual relations between two grown folks but when you slip up and create a life, shit gets complicated. Or even if they kinda sorta could possibly have been feeling each other, the stress and strain of an unwanted pregnancy can, I’d imagine, drive any normal person insane. In the movie, Ben hints at the shame of Alison's being an unwed mother but in real life I often wonder, WHERE WENT THE SHAME?

Cause young unwed women coming up pregnant happens a whole lot more amongst the young black crowd or more among folks that I know (which is the young black crowd). I remember the days when folks, especially church deacons and deaconesses looked at you crazy when you came strutting into the church with a bump under your shirt. Like oh hell no little Ms. Hot in the Pants did not walk up in my sanctuary pregnant and we know she aint been married by Pastornem. And you shore couldn’t come back to church till that baby was out. If ever. We’d whisper about them and speculate during Sunday School what the future held for them now that they had been ruined. Notwithstanding the inherent sexism in these judgments, I honestly believe that the shaming which these girls had to endure among their church community impacted not only that girl's future sexual behavior but also the behavior of younger onlooking girls. It engrained in me the idea that I should keep my legs together and if I so happened to open them, I should make sure not to come back with some visible evidence that I had opened them.

Nowadays, young unwed mothers get way too many congratulations. Of course, I’m not saying that we should bring out the scarlet "BM"and "BD" and brand folks foreheads so we all know that there is a baby running round which they created outside the bounds of marriage but I think that we have gotten way too comfortable with this situation to the community's detriment. Folks are so brazen and bold that not onlydo they have that one but then they continue to pop out another and another and another, as if to say MARRIAGE BE DAMNED.

And being a young unwed mother with a sometimes in the picture baby daddy is difficult and not ideal, especially if that becomes your norm. How does that affect your kids and their ideas about what a healthy love relationship should look like when it's time for them to get into one?

I know this may make some folks upset, in part because we ALL know someone who had a baby outside of marriage and therefore it is personal to us and we don’t want to judge people we know and love. But on a macro-level…ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.

“This isn't funny. This guy's got twelve kids, that's not funny. That's a lot of responsibility to just be... laughing about. This is sick.” –Ben