With four children of her own, Marina Slayton can sympathize with Toya Graham, the “Baltimore Riot Mom,” recently made famous by a viral video on the Internet.
The wife of former U.S. Ambassador to Bermuda Gregory Slayton, Marina applauded the convictions of Graham who, during the recent incidents in Baltimore, chastised her son and kept him from participating further in the riots.
Graham’s obvious desire for her son to stay out of trouble only affirms a point Marina Slayton makes in her recent book, Be the Best Mom You Can Be: A Practical Guide to Raising Whole Children in a Broken Generation (Nelson Books). She truly feels for Graham and mothers like her and the challenges the face in today’s society.
“I commend her for having a vision for her child,” Slayton told Fox News. “She loves her child, and she doesn’t want her son to be a part of the pattern of her own past.
“I wrote a book called be a better mom, not a perfect mom. This book is about moms dealing with the reality of the 21st century. And whether we’re in Baltimore or in our own communities, we’re dealing with lot of issues with discipline.”
Gregory Slayton, who co-wrote the book with his wife and is also the author of Be a Better Dad Today: 10 Tools Every Father Needs, is also empathetic to the plight of not just mothers today, but all parents, especially single parents.
“It’s a huge problem, and what we see statistically is that children growing up in single-parent homes—and God bless single moms—have a much higher incidence of drug abuse, incarceration and suicide,” Gregory said. “Moms and dads are important. That’s why we wrote this book, to help moms be better.”
Be the Best Mom You Can Be not only stresses the importance of a united family, but chapters also deal with how to break generational curses, encouraging your children, the three C’s of motherhood (communication, collective wisdom and community), parenting in the age of busy, wisdom for single moms, working moms and how to help lead your children to healthy spiritual lives.
In one chapter titled “Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll: Answering Tough Questions,” Marina Slayton writes, “Counteracting today’s dominant cultural winds is an uphill battle, even for the strongest of families.”
The book also explores raising children in a Christian home in an age where society has become increasingly hostile to the teachings of Jesus.
“We are raising children in a world that mocks the concepts we are trying to teach them,” Marina writes. “Sadly, being a Christian is not seen as cool in many parts of our society. This makes it doubly important for our children to know that they are part of a vital, dynamic faith that has changed the world for good over the course of thousands of years. Do not underestimate the impact the culture elites’ disdain for our faith has on our children.”
Marina relates to her readers how to write a life-changing vision statement with your family and why you don’t have to measure up to society’s oftentimes impossible expectations because she has lived it with her family of six.
The Slaytons are a military family and are proud supporters of our troops. In an effort to help equip military families for success, they have implemented a Buy One Give One program for the book, where for every copy of Be the Best Mom You Can Be that is purchased between now and June 30, the Slaytons will donate a book to a military family through their HOME program Help our Military—Every Family). The hope is to give these families resources to help them grow and strengthen during or after deployment so they can go on to live healthy lives together.
Shawn A. Akers is the Online Managing Editor for Charisma Media.
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