Here in Texas, pregnant women with low incomes usually qualify for Medicaid. Probably the same or similar there.
This may be putting the cart before the horse, but when a child in the state where I live (FL) is born to unmarried parents, she who has the child owns the child. For example, I am the sole custodial parent of my son and his father has NO visitation rights but MUST pay child support. He CAN petition the court for custodial rights but he has to initiate it- something that is very very expensive. My boyfriend, who was married, was granted joint legal custody of his daughters as part of an arrangement made when his wife and he separated. There is also a law that married parents cannot legally move more that so many miles away without written consent from the other parent.
Obviously YMMV. Certainly my advice would be to contact a lawyer immediately.
Cuss me, but this is an abortion candidate. I say this because my friend’s sister was pregnant at 16, and they decided open adoption would be a great option. And then she got dramatic, and kept the baby. She couldn’t even graduate high school - how do you think the kid is going to turn out? She also had a drug problem, though.
OP, I knew a girl who got pregnant before she graduated high school. (Actually … she got pregnant, miscarried, then went on to get pregnant again. Ask me what I think of abstinence-only education. :rolleyes: Just ask me.) Anyway, her parents reacted roughly the same way you are now: shock, worry, etc. They eventually rallied, went on to help her raise him (she was still living w/her parents at the time anyway) and to spoil the hell out of their grandbaby, and she went on to get a good job once he was old enough to be in school, and he seems to be growing up into a decent, well-adjusted young man.
Anecdote time! 
My mom called me out of the blue one day while I was overseas, all worried.
Me: What’s wrong?
Mom: (nearly sobbing) You know PregnantGirl? The one who just had a baby?
Me: Yeah … ?
Mom: Well … her … her sister … <sob!> PregnantGirl’s sister is … a lesbian!!1!
Me: Uh, well, at least she won’t get knocked up!
(My mother was not amused. Don’t know which was worse in her bigoted eyes: a teenage unwed mother, or a lesbian. I, however, was highly amused by my own witty retort.)
Well I think the point is, “Here’s 40,000 pounds of lemons…”
Not to dismiss the OP’s health condition, but really this doesn’t have to be a problem although it very well could be if it’s only viewed as one. If she allows her 15 year old son to believe this is going to ruin his life then yeah, I’d say she’s right to feel like a failure. My brother did the same thing and had much worse prospects. He was a millionaire 15 years later just because he didn’t let it destroy him.
Well there you go. Drug addicts of any age tend to be shitty parents. I’d rather have a reasonably intelligent teen mom as my parent than a 40 year old drug addict.
I also feel obligated to link this essay from a girl who became a mom at the age of 15. Unfortunately the girl who wrote it later died (nothing related to drugs or anything like that, just an unfortunate seizure) but I found it to be a very moving account and a good reminder of the humanity behind teen mom stories:
When I Was Garbage
You’ve spoken of your son, and obviously he is your first priority, but you haven’t said much of the girl.
Remember that she is now the mother of your grandchild. I would suggest you maintain cordial relations. You don’t have to love her, but do be polite.
If she herself has a “horrible home situation” and has been “abandoned” by her own parents then she is in a far, far worse position than your son is… and now she is pregnant. If she decides to keep the baby then do make an effort to stay on good terms. No, you shouldn’t (and it sounds like you can’t) help raise that baby, but perhaps you can give that girl some advice, be a sounding board for her, and provide some small support which it sounds like she desperately needs. Don’t do more than you are able to do, but take the high ground and be an example to these two young people who are entering adult responsibilities very, very early in life and need role models and sage advice.
Sorry for the hijack, but this made my day.
**
limegreen, apart from the pregnancy, how is your son’s relationship with this girl?
Jesus T Christ, when did the 'dope become a Crisis Pregnancy Center? It’s not her grandchild, it’s a fetus. It’s a cluster of cells. With the potential to make her son’s life very, very difficult. Get over yourself; unless you’re offering to raise the child, you have no business using charged language like “it’s your grandchild” and other BS like that.
Are you kidding me? It’s especially disturbing that with all the poverty and desolation and hunger you’ve witnessed, that you think “birth is beautiful”. Sure, birth is great - to a stable family who planned the child. But it’s hell on earth to people who aren’t ready, and this theoretical unwanted child is sure to enter as just a number as the one in four children that lives below the poverty line.
Autolycus, mostly their relationship has been long distance. They’ve only spent time together maybe a dozen times in the last year. I really was hoping each time they didn’t see each other for a while that the relationship would die a natural death. But texting and Facebooking apparently have kept it alive and well.
Ya know, I’m as pro-choice as anyone, but there’s that bit about the choice. So far as we can tell, Teen Mom is still choosing to carry the child to term, and if that’s her decision, then the fetus will damned well become her grandchild at some point. And even if the girl changes her mind, there’s a good chance that she may well become a long-term or permanent part of the son’s life, so yes, it does pay for the OP to be polite.
Plus, if one would be cheering for the possibility of abortion or adoption, I doubt hostility on the part of the OP would help bring either of those situations about. It’s not oppressive to a teen girl’s reproductive rights and choices to counsel the guy’s mom to be polite. In fact, it’s to the girl’s benefit as well.
My sister, I am so sorry.
Babies are good things; children the age of your son and his baby-mother are designed by nature to want to breed; this is all a very natural thing.
And inconvenient. And self-indulgent. And probably stupid.
However, this is all very easy for me, beause I don’t believe life begins at fertilization.
Back when I was in high school, I worked at a video rental place. We had a regular customer, a young guy about my age, who came in to rent movies a couple times a week. Always the same thing - a current release or sci-fi flick for him, and a kid’s movie - princesses, ponies, something girly - for the little girl he usually brought in with him. She was a cute little thing, about 3 or 4 years old.
One night, one of my coworkers complimented him on what a good big brother he was, he just laughed and said she was his daughter, and he had full custody. Jaws dropped. This kid - not even 18, couldn’t rent R movies! - was forever after known to us as “Teen Dad” and all of us were dying to ask just how a 17 year old boy winds up with full custody of a toddler, but nobody was ever gutsy enough to ask.
Presumably he was getting some help from his parents, but he was really doing it, stepping up to the plate. Pretty incredible. I was in awe of that guy. Wish I knew how things worked out for them - I’d like to think that if he’d already made it to the point where his daughter was nearly ready for Kindergarten, he’d already done the hardest, hands-on phase of parenting for a single dad, and things only got easier from there. Optimistic, probably, but not inconceivable. He was a good kid, making the best of the hand he’d been dealt, I guess. I’m sure there were some horrified parents, rolling with the punches, but they made it work.
Your glee at the prospect of a potential abortion is disturbing.
mmm
As soon as someone posted about a crisis pregnancy.
Which in significantly less than 9 month may be the OP’s grandchild.
Look, I’d fully support an abortion here - but only if it’s the parents’ choice. Forcing an abortion is just as wrong as forcing as full term pregnancy. Being pro-choice means allowing others to make a choice you disagree with.
As it turns out, my mother and paternal grandmother loathed each other. Nonetheless, neither ever said a bad word about the other in front of us kids, and both of them took the high road in regards to dealing with the kids/grandkids and in public. In other words, they put the best interests of us kids ahead of their own animosity. I learned a valuable lesson from their example. Likewise, whether the OP likes this girl or not, she may well become a permanent family relation. It is probably best to set off on the right foot if that is the case.
Yeah - this kid MIGHT make the OP’s son’s life difficult. It has ALREADY made a difficult life more difficult for the girl! I mean, clearly she has problems but she’s been described as having a horrible home life, abandoned by her parents, and dependent on the kindness of a friend just to have a place to sleep - and now she’s pregnant on top of it! Pregnant by a man too young to help support her and the kid no matter how much he might want to do that. Her life is already in the shitter. By extending an olive branch rather than hostility the OP might be able to offer some advice to help this girl. This might be especially advantageous if she chooses to carry the fetus to term and keep the child. If the girl decides to abort, or put the kid up for adoption, it certainly won’t kill the OP be be polite and supportive even if she is angry about the situation (which would be understandable). Seriously - what would be gained by kicking this girl when she’s down?
I mean, really - the OP’s son clearly has a family that cares about him and is willing to help and support him. Sounds like this girl doesn’t. Which might have something to do with her having sex with a 15 year old and being pregnant and essentially homeless. She might be lookin’ for love in all the wrong places.
It’s a difficult situation all around. That doesn’t mean this is a disaster - five years from now everyone might be doing just fine. But there’s no mistaking it’s hard on everyone. Why should all the sympathy be for the boy?
You know, if MOST people were “planned” that might get more points, but most folks aren’t a planned birth, being a poor kid isn’t necessarily a living hell (not as nice as being rich in some respects, but not hell), and while it’s all very well to talk about ideals the fact is she’s pregnant, he’s underage, the aid the father’s parents can give is very limited, and her “parents” have apparently abandoned all responsibility. Saying “this is horrible!” won’t deal with the situation. The OP, her son, and this girl have to deal with the situation as it actually is, not how you want it to be.
Agreed.
Still beautiful. I’ve seen babies born on the floors of mud huts to illiterate teen mothers in forced marriages who can barely afford even the most basic grain, and for whom even a bowl of rice is a luxury.
The babies are beautiful. They smile and coo. The mothers love them. They show their kids to admiring neighbors, and beam as the babies fatten up on breast milk. The kids play. The play barefoot with sticks and rocks, but they play. The have clapping games and sing childhood ditties. The grandparents look on and remember their own youth. They scrimp and save so the kids can have a new set of clothes for the holidays- they deck out the whole family from one stretch of fabric. it’s adorable. At night, everyone beds down together, telling old stories and dreaming of the future.
Of course, it’s not always so ideal. Quite often the babies get sick. When they do, they stop cooing. Sometimes the kids get hungry, and sometimes they die. It’s just as tragic as it would be for an American to lose their child. But you know what? They still find beauty and love. Anyone who has been through hellish circumstances can tell you this. Beauty, love and life can flourish in the harshest of places, as it has for humanity’s millions of years (mind-boggling few of which were stable and financially secure for pretty much anyone on the planet.)
And whatever America has to offer, even the dingiest public housing you can imagine, is planets and planets away from the harshest of circumstances.
True as anything truthful ever said on the Dope.
Saying something is not as bad as it can be is rarely a ringing endorsement and generally just cold comfort. Charming as it is, your little scene from National Geographic isn’t going to pay the legal bill for the next neglected, out-of-wedlock American kid that sticks up a liquor store. I’m not saying the OP’s kid’s kid is heading that way. Hopefully, they can pull their shit together, but this cliched notion that every cloud has a silver lining is sort of obnoxious. It’s also really easy to say when it’s not your 15 year old whose life has just gone sideways.
The hell you say
You right. Slinging drugs and turning tricks on an American street corner is proabbly better than being a slave soldier in an army of children. [Louis Armstrong] What a wonderful world![/LA]
As for the OP, I can’t give you any advice that hasn’t already been given. One of life’s many ironies is that so many well-off couples wait to start a family and end up having to go to great lengths and spending great amounts of money to have kids while some pimple faced kid and his gangly girlfriend fuck like nuns and voila!