So last night after my dinner with my lecturer, I was lying in bed scrolling through facebook on my phone when BOOM! Another person I went to secondary school with just gave birth!
To a beautiful bouncing boy!
So I started to think... Who do I know of that had a child during their teen years?
So I started a list! A list I won't mention but there's 5! 5 young adults who had a baby!
Some who were supported by their family and the father of the baby stuck by, and she's really happy.
Some however aren't as lucky... I went to primary and secondary with this one girl, whom I shall call Frankie, she was trouble since young, but a nice enough person. We spoke sometimes, she was adopted, but she hated her adoptive family because they wouldn't let her stay out late and they didn't like how she skipped school and slept around. She was still in contact with her birth mother who was on drugs and in rehab, and she would run away from home to see her mum and party with her!
Then one day she gets pregnant! The guy whom was supposedly "the love of her life" turns out is the baby daddy of 3 other babies... He started out young.
He left her as he did the other baby mama's and she cried, and now she tactfully posts instagram posts saying "how she don't need no man." That's great Frankie, please tell me more.
But then I also know this beautiful and sweet soul called Hanna, she was so lovely, and she had a baby at 19, she turned out to be one of the best single mothers, no.. Mothers full stop! She loves her child, she worked at a shop so she could support her child and went into college to learn to be a nanny, so she could earn a living doing that instead so she could spend all the time she could with her own daughter and other children seeing Hanna, made me change my whole perspective of teen pregnancy, before she partied and always came home drunk, but now she's got a career. She's happy and she is stable. She loves her life!
And although to me, a teenager myself, I think teen pregnancy is a rarity, it's actually not so odd anymore with figures such as 3 in 10 teen American girls will get pregnant at least once before age 20. That’s nearly 750,000 teen pregnancies every year. About 25% of teen moms have a 2nd child within 24 months of their first baby.
So what can I finalise on teen pregnancy? Well I think age doesn't really matter, I mean if you think about it about one hundred years ago, girls of 13 were becoming mothers! But we have supposedly moved on and become superior to those days. And we now have the right to an education, girls can now make a future for themselves. Having a child can stop that for a while, but you can still be a fucking great parent, you can love your child, nurture your child and go out and actually provide for that baby. I believe you know when your ready for a kid, I mean it's a huge responsibility that not everyone can handle! A life solely depending on you. I don't think age matters, but I do believe you have to be willing to give up everything for that baby. To be able to love it more than yourself, more than that idiot who knocked you up.
If you're a parent and your teen is having a baby, then I suggest you read this:
http://m.kidshealth.org/parent/positive/talk/teen_pregnancy.html
Or similarly if your a teen and your pregnant and scared, read this:
http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/pregnancy-and-baby/pages/teenager-pregnant.aspx
http://m.yourdailyscoop.com/10-celebs-who-were-teen-parents/
http://www.teenageparents.org.uk
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