A look at the growing trend of women becoming single parents by choice
New York City — Up against her biological clock, Traci Kodeck faced a tough decision at age 39.
She says she remembered the moment she decided to have a baby on her own.
"I was with my best friend, and I said, 'I don't have a partner, I need to be a mom,'" Kodeck told CBS News.
She emptied her savings to cover fertility treatments, ultimately using sperm donated by a friend. After three years of trying, she had Zola.
"Then it was, 'Oh my gosh, I'm taking home a human.' And she was perfect," Kodeck said.
Kodeck belongs to the organization Single Mothers by Choice. Its 30,000 members are part of a growing trend of women having babies alone because they're tired of waiting for "the one," or they simply want to parent solo, like Emma Ramos, mother to 2-year-old Michael.
She describes her life as a single mother by choice as "beautiful chaos."
As a teenager, Ramos dreamed of having a child, not a partner. Modern attitudes have helped make that possible. According to a Pew Research Center survey from last year, 78% of Americans find single parenting acceptable. Although more, 93%, support a two-parent household.
"That speaks to the misconception...that we have somehow purposefully handicapped our children by…only bringing them into the world with one parent," Ramos said.
Ramos admits that the responsibility of shouldering the decision-making for her family does come with challenges.
"Decision-making, I would say, is a blessing," Ramos said. "But then, I suppose, if I make the wrong decision, I'm the only one…to blame, I guess."
Zola Kodeck recently turned 11, just in time for Mother's Day.
"Having a single mom by choice can be hard, like when you're first growing up, but then my mom just wanted me, nobody else," Zola said. "…Every day to me is like a Mother's Day."
"Everything I do, I do for her," Traci said of her daughter. "This house is for her. My job, it's all for her."
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- Children
Nikki Battiste is a CBS News national correspondent based in New York. She is an Emmy and Peabody-award winning journalist, and her reporting appears across all CBS News broadcasts and platforms.
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