Nebraska had no age limit for a bit. Guy dropped off 9 of his 10 kids(1 was 18) cause he felt overwhelmed after his wife died a year earlier.
"I think there's a misperception that we just inadvertently left an age cap out. But the reality was we wanted to save lives of older kids who might be at risk," said Amanda McGill Johnson, a Nebraska state senator at the time.
That actually kind of makes sense? I mean, dropping off teens is excessive, but maybe it highlights an issue? Overwhelmed parents of teenagers isn't something I had on my list of people that need more help, at least.
That is surprisingly kind for a Nebraskan legislator. Isn't NE one of the states where they'd rather let women die than abort a fetus?
10 kids jfc
I'm more concerned how he had ten kids and then felt overwhelmed when his wife left him. Like what the fuck?!
Grieving for a partner definitely doesn't make it easier to raise your children?!
And I've not met many men with 10 kids who are super into doing the whole "dividing the labor of parenting evenly" thing, and I went to catholic schools, I knew some big families. And even if he had been the type to do that, you aren't winding up being the breadwinner for a family with 10 kids and having both low stress finances and a low stress job. So adding in lots of extra home duties and possibly reduced financial capabilities and mourning will probably wreck you.
That said, I've never met a family that large where the parents kept actually parenting beyond number 3 or 4. Some of the most horrifically parentified people I ever met were middle daughters of large families. Also the kids are struggling too, and each of them is likely to have taken some lasting psychic damage from being abandoned by their dad, even temporarily, shortly after their mom died.
Because he didn't do Jack raising them probably
Died, not left.
And likely yeah, someone would get overwhelmed doing two peoples' jobs.
I guess it highlights why there should be no age limit… the response to introduce an age limit of 30 days certainly is not the right one.
Wtf! That is insane 🤣 good read!
Most fire stations in the US have at least one person trained as a paramedic/EMT and in many places all of them have at least some medical training. Because in a lot of places fire trucks arrive, there's people who need immediate medical help.
So they have the basic skills to keep a newborn baby alive until they can get it to a hospital. And if it's older and healthy, they can just play with it and feed it and clean it as needed until Child Services arrives or it grows up and joins the crew.
All 50 states of what?
It starts solid, but then there liquid, gaseous…. Scientists will need to help me with the 47 others here…
Micronesia
A while back I fell into the rabbit hole of people dropping off the baby without informing the other parent. turns out it's really hard to get the kid back
Omg, that is insane! Imagine coming home from work like
“Honey, I dropped the baby off at the fire station today and the fireman yelled ‘BACK BACK NO TRADE BACK’ when I handed it over, so I’m pretty sure the decision is final. I hope you weren’t too attached to the babe.”
Reasonable. Now who's gonna bet that some dip shit in Washington makes it illegal because "mothers should face the consequences of their decisions" or some bullshit.
Call me a cynical old bitch but when the US does something reasonable I always think "how they gonna fuck it up this time?"
Can you pick them up again at the end of the day? Free daycare would be nice.
TIL the US has free child care.
Where did you think firemen come from?
Toddlers are perfect for getting in all the small fiery caverns which the grown firemen can't fit into.
Yeah, but when I drop a teenager off at the fire station, they just bring her back home and tell me I can't do that because it's considered "child abandonment."
Shoulda been in Nebraska smh
Have you tried screaming “back back no trade back no trade back” when you drop them?
Sorry you missed the easy return window!
Can I legally drop someone else's baby off at the fire station? 🤣
Yeah my mom always brought that up when I got in trouble
There is something similar called "baby hatch" in Germany, but those are usually located at hospitals. Why the fire station? It makes no sense to me.
Fire stations are everywhere, staffed by trustworthy people, who inevitably also have medical training. Additionally they aren't scary like the police are.
They're the people you call if you need help.
You can surrender an infant at a hospital too, as well as a police station, but fire stations are just more frequent.
Hospitals in the US are kind of scattered, largely as a result of private equity tomfoolery. A lot of communities don't have one nearby. But pretty much every community has at least a volunteer fire station, and I believe all firefighters are required to be trained in at least first aid, if not be fully-qualified EMTs.
You know, a flight from overseas is expensive to do this, but you got to look at the long term savings...
It's better than leaving them in some men's room baby changing station with the sign "Place sacrifice here" sign taped to it.
Is there an age limit? Cause I know a 15 year old the can have…..the little shit.
I feel like this woold lead to confusion amongst firemen. Like they go to pull out of the firehouse to respond to a fire, but they have to stop before they start because a random baby is just there for no reason.
I could be wrong, but I doubt most firefighters even know the proceedure for "Baby randomly dropped off without a name".
My first instinct would be to call child services. Like what else would you do?
Nah they're made aware.
I mean, I guess a state could've passed the law, saying "hey, leave newborns at fire stations" and not informed the fire house, but it seems far more likely that they are informed.
But States either have designated boxes, or you hand the child over to them directly. You don't just leave it in front of the firehouse door.
Yeah, I think my state of NC requires there to be a designated baby receiver on call at all times just in case someone pulls up with one that they need to get rid of.
I feel like if we know about this, they would too. Or at least a supervisor.
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