A Tennessee woman who returned her adopted child to Russia is causing a diplomatic crisis. We talk about how it feels to be rejected as an adopted child with Orlando Modeno, a man who lived through the experience when he was only a boy. We also talk with Lisa Belkin, Motherlod blogger for our partner the New York Times.
We started the conversation early on this, and want to know what you think: Should a parent be allowed to return a child?
The White House has issed an order to the Department of Health and Human Services that would stop hospitals from being able to deny same-sex partners visitation rights. The new rule changes a policy that has long wrangled gay rights groups, who say equal visitation rights are long-overdue. One case, where a Miami woman was denied visitation for more than eight hours to her partner, reportedly moved the president in his decision.
Last week, we were struck by the shocking story of a six-year-old girl in Oregon whose death has been labeled a suicide. We wondered: Is it really possible for a first-grader to suffer from suicidal tendencies? And to deliberately take her own life?
When we talk about bullying at school, we usually hear about it from the victim's perspective. But what is the role played by the parents of the bullying children? In the aftermath of the Phoebe Prince suicide in South Haldey, Mass., we find out how much parents can be responsible for their children's aggressive behavior.
Earlier, we asked you to start the conversation on this topic. Read those comments here.
From Jamie Oliver’s 'Food Revolution' to the first lady’s national crusade, it seems that the issue of child obesity is everywhere. Clearly a major health issue, it is also a major self-esteem issue for children, which leads us to wonder: Is it possible to help our kids take off the extra pounds without giving them a complex?
For this week’s family segment, we discuss a topic that’s on lots of teenagers’ and parents’ minds right now, as April 1st ticks closer: college acceptance. And how to balance hopes for a dream school versus the reality of what a family can afford.
When it comes to breast-feeding, the pendulum may be swinging back from "breast is best" to "formula is fine." Among the reasons: assertions that the health benefits of breast milk may be exaggerated, the perception by some that breastfeeding advocates are overly judgmental, and new research indicating that mothers who nurse may face negative economic consequences.
Since December 2007, seven million jobs have been lost in our country, and the majority of those who’ve lost their jobs have been men. At the same time, females have been returning to the workforce in higher numbers than their male counterparts, and more and more women have taken on the role of primary breadwinner for their families.
A lot of people set their children in front of the television to watch educational videos and programming — from "Sesame Street" to "Baby Einstein" — with the hope that these shows will help their children to learn. But a new study out last week in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, says these videos don’t actually make kids smarter, and may in fact impede their learning.
President Barack Obama does it, and according to a study by the AARP, so do 33 percent of all 18-to-49 year olds. Living with your parents or in-laws is sometimes done out of necessity, other times voluntarily, and in many other cultures, much more frequently.
On Tuesday night, New York Haitians gathered to exchange news, share information and watch TV together as they tried anxiously to get more news from home. Femi Oke spoke with Haitians in New York City.
A quadriplegic mother is at risk of losing her five-month-old son in a custody battle with the baby's father, who cites her quadriplegia as a reason to deny her custody. Should the courts be involved in such cases? If so, where does ADA regulation end and family law begin? Lisa Belkin introduces us to various custody cases involving parents with disabilities, and Dr. Corinne Vinopol, president of the Institute for Disabilities Research and Training and a hearing officer in disability disputes, shares her insights about parenting, disabilities, and the law.
Follow along with New York Times' readers at Lisa Belkin's blog post on this story.
Getting together with one's family during holidays is a pretty natural affair. But it’s also a time when you all get together and rediscover each other’s differences ... and this can be particularly true when it comes to religious beliefs.
How you do respectfully take on those differences, particularly when your kids may have become MORE religious than you? We talk with Lisa Belkin, who writes the family and parenting blog Motherlode for our partner The New York Times, and Laurie Dinerstein-Kurs, who has some of her ten grandchildren home at big holidays.
Recent studies have shown that parents with young kids can put a solid marriage on the rocks. So what happens when you add a national economic crisis to the mix? Yale psychology professor Susan Nolen-Hoeksema and Lamar Tyler, blogger at the parenting website BlackandMarriedwithKids.com, say that it's particularly hard for loving married couples to connect when times are tough.
There's only four days left until Thanksgiving, when most of us will gather around the dinner table for a much-anticipated meal. But conversation at that meal doesn't always turn out to be as harmonious as we predict. We're joined by Takeaway contributor Kate Dailey, health & lifestyle editor for Newsweek.com; and Rochelle Riley, columnist for The Detroit Free Press, who give us their tips for surviving your crazy family on the day we're supposed to be most thankful for them.
A third of men who take paternity tests end up finding out that they're not really the father. And just as stricter federal rules are holding baby daddies more accountable, the science of proving paternity is getting cheaper, easier and more reliable. It all combines for some awkward family talks, tough moral decisions and nasty legal battles. We hear from Tanner Pruitt, a father who took an unexpected route to gaining custody of a daughter that isn't his -- not genetically anyway. We also speak to Ruth Padawer, who writes about this in Sunday's New York Times magazine.
Read Ruth Padawer's story in this weekend's New York Times magazine
The stress of multiple deployments is taking its toll on many military families. In the aftermath of the shootings at Fort Hood, where hundreds of children live, and as we approach Veterans Day later this week, we look at the stress military families live with every day. Lucianne Buch's husband recently retired from the Army after three deployments; her 11-year-old stepson began showing the effects of stress on the day his father was first deployed. She says multiple deployments are trying on her family and many others at Fort Polk, Louisiana. New York Times Motherlode writer Lisa Belkin also joins us, along with Angela Huebner, a professor of Human Development in the Child and Family program at Virginia Tech, who says that this kind of stress is resting heavily on military families across the country.
Anthony D. Marshall was recently convicted of stealing from his mother, wealthy New York philanthropist Brooke Astor. In most families, questions of inheritance don't result in criminal activity, but families all across the country sometimes face lengthy squabbles over the family fortune — even if the family fortune isn't much. We speak to Lisa Belkin, Takeaway contributor and author of the "Motherlode" blog at The New York Times; and Eve Rachel Markewich, an estate lawyer and partner at Markewich and Rosenstock. They both say it's important to talk with your family, early on, about what you want to happen after you die.
"From the parents' perspective, it is absolutely the best thing that you can do. Don't present it as this is a choice, 'we want to get your input.' But just, 'look, this is what we've decided to do and we want you to be able to talk to us about it while we're still here. Yell at me, don't yell at your brother.'"
—Eve Rachel Markewich, an estate lawyer, on parents talking to their kids about what's in their will before they die
How far back in your family tree can you go? Most people draw blanks if asked to go farther back than their great-grandparents. Our two guests, Rachel Swarns, Washington correspondent for The New York Times, and Megan Smolenyak, a genealogist, were able to discover details about Michelle Obama's ancestry that even the first lady didn't know.
For more, read Rachel Swarns' and Jodi Kantor's article, "In First Lady’s Roots, a Complex Path From Slavery," in The New York Times.
New Movie Releases: 'Men in Black 3' and 'Moonrise Kingdom'
Is the Private Era in Space Officially Upon Us?
Why Increased Immigration is the Solution for America's Ailing Economy
The show is a co-production of WNYC Radio and Public Radio International, in collaboration with The BBC World Service, New York Times Radio and WGBH Boston.
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