Ingrid Rivera: Welfare Made a Difference
I am a lesbian, I am a mother, and I was a welfare recipient for about eight years. Because I was on welfare, I was able to give birth to my daughter in a hospital. I was able to obtain an apartment. I was able to feed my daughter more than just breast milk. I was able to clothe my family, get childcare, and an education. I was able to lift myself out of poverty.
I did not plan on going on welfare. In my voyage to escape the home life I felt (at the time) was miserable and unfulfilling, I searched for the only way I knew how to escape. I found an older man who could marry me and take me away; and soon became pregnant. I later found out he was a substance abuser and I became entangled in an abusive relationship. I was 17.
Throughout my pregnancy I tried desperately to hold everything together. I refused to be a single teenage mother, but inevitability seeped in and I left him when I was eight months pregnant. Finally understanding that I needed to deal with some internal, long overdue issues, almost a year later, I came out as a lesbian. I was young, a mother, a woman of color, homeless, single, and uneducated. I had no means of supporting my daughter or myself. I was appreciative that there existed a safety net to help me in my time of need.
The fact that I was a lesbian was one of the reasons I needed welfare. I was not able to get support from family members. I was not able to secure a well paying job because I was a high school drop-out and I feared being outed. In 1989, the concept of lesbian mothers was not as visible as it is today. I concealed my lesbianism because I was terrified that as both a lesbian and a poor person I would have my child taken away from me. In order to gain some control in my life, I used welfare to my advantage and went to school. I got my GED, my associates in Liberal Arts, my Bachelors in Human Studies, and my masters in Sociology.
I have seen the harsh changes that occurred with welfare reform. Under the current regulations I would not have been able to go to school. Thousands of welfare recipients have dropped out of school due to mandatory work provisions. Quick-fix "trainings" are encouraged and education is not emphasized. If getting people off of welfare and into a secure job is the true goal of reform, then the welfare system needs to be revamped to make education a priority.
Ingrid G. Rivera is an Activist, Artist, and Consultant living in New York City.
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