The director, Yvette, and son Tristan

Having grown up in the United States, my own fantastical dreams of marriage and family were somewhat swept away by the birth of my son, out of wedlock, at the age of 28.

I realized that I had a lot of jumbled feelings about why I had not followed the traditional pathway and perhaps I wanted to explore some of these feelings by examining other people's lives.

When I began production on "Just Mom and Me" in 1995, I felt that single motherhood was stigmatized and that situation was getting worse. On the level of public policy in 1995 thru 1996, the misconceptions about single mothers were abundant, leading to an extreme "blame the victim" ideology. When single mothers were talked about in public debate or in the press, they were inevitably represented as poor Black teenagers on welfare who had a callous disregard for the well being of their children, thereby justifying a punitive welfare system.

But contrary to the image of a population locked into welfare dependency, more than 75% of all African-American mothers hold jobs, reports the U.S. Census Bureau <http://www.census.gov>. Statistics from the Census Bureau show that two-thirds of all single parents are Caucasian, while only one-third consists of ethnic minorities. Meanwhile, the National Organization of Single Mothers reported in1996 that the fastest growing group of single mothers were white educated women who had good jobs. In fact the rate has nearly tripled in the last decade for women who are in managerial and professional jobs. The most dramatic increase of women having children outside of marriage is to women in their thirties, many of which are choosing donor insemination to start their families.

Truly part of the desire and impetus to make this film came from the fact that some of the myths surrounding single motherhood needed to be destroyed. In 1999, there are more than 25 million single mothers heading households in America. In the mid nineties, only 10 percent of all families in the U.S. consisted of both biological parents living in the same home with their children. (Current Population Reports, series P-20, #458). More than half of children growing up in America will spend some time in a single parent home before they reach adulthood. Thus, I believe we need a positive opinion about single mothers and I hope that "Just Mom and Me" can provide an honest and realistic version of what it's like to raise a child alone in America.

-yvette marie torell
1999