I have nothing but sympathy for single moms -- but not those who became a single mom by choice!

That includes those who left their husband for no legitimate reason, and those who were never married/engaged/had a boyfriend -- they just decided to have themselves inseminated and "start a family" that way!

This is sick! This poor girl deserves a father as well as a mother, and by the will of her mother (not God's will -- big difference) she will be denied that basic human need.

This woman is to be criticized, because she is infected with liberalism to the highest degree. She thinks that a father isn't necessary, and that a family can be a family without one.


Money makeover: Single mom

Jacqui Sentmanat is trying to give her child the best of everything, but who's looking out for her financial future?

By Joe Light, Money Magazine staff reporter
Last Updated: August 29, 2008: 9:58 AM EDT

sentmanat_family.03.jpg
The Sentmanat Family: Franqui, 3, and Jacqui, 42.

(Money Magazine) -- When you're the single parent of an only child, you want only the best possible life for your kid. That's how Jacqui Sentmanat feels. But it's an expensive proposition.

It already cost the 42-year-old Houston accountant $20,000 to get pregnant through fertility treatments and to take time off work to be with her daughter early on. This nearly drained her emergency savings. She has since replenished the funds, but now she faces a quandary: how to invest for her retirement while tackling her daughter's long-term needs.

For starters, Sentmanat wants to send Franqui, 3, to private school. She has already paid the $8,200-a-year tuition for preschool. That's on top of the $5,500 a year she'll have to shell out for after-school and summer care. And when Franqui gets to high school, annual tuition costs will likely soar above $10,000. Then there's college to worry about. With public schools costing more than $16,000 a year, it's easy to see how saving for Franqui could eclipse any hope of a regular retirement for Sentmanat.

She knows her retirement is important, but she really wants Franqui to be able to graduate without student loans. "This isn't just about freedom for me in retirement," she says, "but freedom for her from debt."
Where she is now

Between her accounting job at an engineering firm and consulting work, Sentmanat earns $128,000 a year. So far she's saved $117,000 for retirement, split among multiple retirement plans. She also has $26,500 in taxable investments, which she is using as a college savings fund for Franqui, and around $12,400 in emergency savings. A mortgage on her $264,500 Houston home and a low-interest car loan make up Sentmanat's only debt.

She concedes that she should have more in savings given her salary. Part of the problem, she says, is that she lived in Los Angeles for 10 years. The high cost of living there kept her from maxing out her savings. But now that she's in Houston, where housing is much cheaper, and after getting a promotion, she's ready to set her sights on her long-term investing strategy.
What she should do

1. Get her investments in line. Since moving to Texas, Sentmanat has begun to sock away 10% of her salary in her employer-sponsored retirement plan. About 6% of her paycheck goes into a traditional 401(k) to take full advantage of her company match, while the other 4% goes into a Roth 401(k). Unlike with a traditional 401(k), her Roth contributions don't reduce her current taxes. But withdrawals at retirement will be tax-free.

Marc B. Schindler, a certified financial planner with Pivot Point Advisors in Bellaire, Texas, says that in the coming years Sentmanat should try to boost her Roth contributions to 6% to max out her 401(k). The real problem, though, is her investment mix. Virtually none of her investments are in bonds. With at least 20 years until retirement, Sentmanat says she's comfortable being all in stocks. But Schindler recommends a small weighting in fixed income - 18%, split between domestic and foreign bond funds - in part to safeguard against losses should she need to tap some of her money sooner than expected.

2. Another problem: Sentmanat has four leftover 401(k)s from old jobs. Schindler says she should roll those into a traditional IRA to get more investment choices with lower fees. Then, in 2010, when the income limit on Roth IRA conversions disappears, she can convert it into a Roth. She'll have to pay taxes at conversion. But as with the Roth 401(k) she funds at work, she can tap the money upon retirement tax-free.

3. Increase her life insurance. If something were to happen to Jacqui, Franqui would need much more than the $50,000 in life insurance that Sentmanat's employer provides. Jacqui wisely bought a supplemental $250,000 term policy. But Schindler recommends adding another $500,000 of coverage. It will cost $720 more per year, but it should be enough to pay off the house and cover Franqui's education, among other things. He also tells Sentmanat to draft a will and name a guardian for Franqui as soon as possible.

4. Set up a 529. Sentmanat has yet to open a 529 college savings account for Franqui. That's partly because she isn't sure which state's plan to choose. Since Texas has no state income tax, Sentmanat doesn't need to focus just on her home state's plan, as there would be no tax break for doing so. Instead she should pick the plan with the best options and lowest fees, Schindler says. He recommends the Arkansas plan, run by Barclays; the Nevada and Utah plans, which both use Vanguard funds; and Virginia's state-run 529.

To reach her goal of saving for Franqui's college, Sentmanat needs to start stuffing $450 a month into the 529, Schindler says. Sentmanat says she doesn't think she can afford that right away but $150 a month is doable. That might not be enough to pay for 100% of Franqui's college, but every little bit Sentmanat saves now will mean that much of a richer life for Franqui down the road.

We are all - ALL - most miserable and wretched.  Ponder that fact in your heart for a while.

Well said, my lady.  

Thanks, Dulcamara, for clarifying my position.

And yes, Gladius, I should have said it more clearly. I realize that there is God's POSITIVE will and his PERMISSIVE will. Anything that happens at all God has to at least PERMIT. All sin falls into the latter category.

I have said plenty of times on this forum that I feel truly sorry for everyone ravaged by the insanity of the modern world.

As Dulcamara said, when I see a clerk shot by a robber, or a poor woman with 2 kids whose husband left her, I feel genuine pity for them. But when I hear about a robber getting shot by cops, or a woman who had herself inseminated, and now has a child with psychological problems (because she never had a father in her life), I only feel pity for them in the broad sense I feel pity for ALL men in this valley of tears.

I suppose I should have said, "I still have sympathy for single moms who bring it upon themselves, but I will certainly not spare them the criticism they rightly deserve, for the sake of others who might be scandalized by their behavior -- which was contrary to both God's law AND the natural law."

But the modern world IS so messed up, that it convinces women that they are sufficient without a man, etc. so you always have to wonder how much of it is the poor woman's fault. The errors are SO pervasive, and present in the very air we breathe.

So perhaps even those who appear to be VERY foolish might be given some leeway, considering the ocean in which they swim...

Matthew

I suppose I should have said, "I still have sympathy for single moms who bring it upon themselves, but I will certainly not spare them the criticism they rightly deserve, for the sake of others who might be scandalized by their behavior -- which was contrary to both God's law AND the natural law."

When these single moms like the one in the article deliberately get pregnant through IVF THEN complain about being a single mother, it's a bit rich.

However, apart from those women (of which I'm sure there are not that many) EVERY single mother deserves respect. Why? Because rather than escape/hide the consequences of their actions through abortion, they have kept the child they conceived despite all the pressure put upon them in the public attitude towards "unwanted" or "unexpected" pregnancies. By definition, a single mother is a woman who has taken responsibility for her actions.

... Sometimes you people scare me.

I think there's a law firm somewhere that has missed a few employees.

Just that you can't say hardly two words on here without someone picking it apart and getting all bent out of shape about SOMETHING... and often something not really even on topic (whether or not that applies here).

The result is that someone posts something on one topic, and it quickly turns into a nit-picking verbal judo match that would do a lawyer proud, while the original topic is brushed under the rug after about the second or third response... if it takes even THAT long for someone to find fault with something in it.

Common sense: If you're Catholic, you pity everyone to some extent. It's called the spirit of charity. But half the posts here were basically accusing the main post of saying "we should have no pity at ALL, even in the fundamental Christian sense of the word."

I wasn't finding fault with your post, Adesto. I was just shaking my head at the fact that so many threads end up hopelessly off topic, because the minute someone writes a post longer than two lines, someone grabs onto something totally insignificant to the main topic, or else takes something in the worst possible way, and grabs onto it like a pit bull and the thread is more or less hijacked by quarreling over the minor points (often misunderstood or taken out of context) of the main subject.

Let's put it this way... it'd be like me starting a thread about "those darn people who hate Christmas so much they can't even stand hearing the word" and it turns into a fight over how Catholic present-giving is, or what color ornaments should go on a "proper Catholic tree". It's loosely related, yes... but really it's not the point.

I can't help but think that if people started new threads for new topics, there would be like ... a good dozen or so new threads a day.

Not that this thread is even a particularly bad "offender" on this point, but... after seeing it happen so much it's like, "oh brother... here we go again..." even if it's only a minor tangent. It's like Chinese water torture... it's not the little, barely offensive drop of water that's so awful. It's the never-ending succession of them and the inability to stop them that drives the victim insane.

But I remind you, I wouldn't have actually said any of the above (eg, complained) had you not asked about it explicitly. So now that you've asked and pried it out of me, try not to think me a griper. I'm impatient by nature, and the little things tend to get to me, but usually I try to keep it to myself.

It's simple, really.

When I see a foolish woman starting a "family" by having herself inseminated, I pity her because she is living in such darkness. But not because she's a single mom, per se.

But I pity Ted Turner for the same reason -- and he's not exactly deserving of pity humanly speaking. He doesn't elicit a natural motion of the guts, "Poor man! He only has several billion dollars!"

If a woman was trying to work 2 jobs to support 2 children after her husband ran away and abandoned them -- I'd pity her because she's a child of God, and ALSO because of her plight.

That covers your definition of charity (being for those who don't deserve it).

Matthew