TEEN PREGNANCY your opinions

Great Debates
81

The piece of paper thing is getting a little ridiculous. I’m sorry if I missed parts of the thread - am new here and skimmed to catch up. Psycat90 stated quite truthfully that a piece of paper proving paternity doesn’t guarantee that the father turns up for soccer games etc. Very true. Lots of posts ago Notthemama said something about the piece of paper (marriage certificate) making sure that the couple stayed together when the chips were down. Ummm really? Cause last time I checked those divorce statistics, they were still going up.

I am going to take my usual stance of neutrality, but it seems to me that alot of the problems inherant in teen pregnancy, as stated through this thread - come about with ‘mature’ pregnancy’s also.

In fact - I’ll share a story.

I know a family, mother (37yo) and daughter (16 yo) and step father (40yo). Someone in the family gets pregnant. Not the stepfather despite the obvious twist in the tale it could provide. It was the mother. (Okay, I built that up way too much) Anyway, the story basically goes that the stepfather was so thrilled to be having a child of his own, he tried to convince the mother to let the 16 yo daughter move in with her 22 yo boyfriend. She didn’t want to - close mother/daughter relationship. The boyfriend loved her, but knew she’d be miserable not living with the mother, it was this guy pushing. Bad things happened, the mother and stepfather then file for divorce.

Now, I don’t know what child support laws are like in the States, but here in Australia (the reason why I type with an accent) he could pretty much get away with not paying any child maintenance because he quit his job and - get this - went back to high school. He received huge amounts of student welfare (he had dependants) he was not however required to share any with his family.

So here is a 37 yo woman in huge predicaments, one teenage (not pregnant) daughter in grade 10 (trans: sophomore year) of high school, one infant, no job, no support.

The thing is, this isn’t uncommon. Marriage is no longer what it once was and people don’t have any respect for commitment these days. Very general statement, but whoa … 6 months seems to be viewed as a long term relationship in todays society.

The point I am trying to make (very neutral) is that circumstances dictate how things will be - not the age of the mother.

While in part I support the argument that a 16 year old isn’t emotionally mature enough to be a parent, that is a generalisation, because some are. But to be fair, a 16 year old might be emotionally mature, but do they have all the life experiences to support that. That’s my only neg. thought about teen pregnancy - there is so much out there to do first.

82

Last time I saw the stats on unwed teen pregnancies a really quite amazing number were believed to be the result of copulation with adult (+18) males not fellow teens. Did i miss the discussion of that aspect?

83

My only opinion is why does the public has to pay for most teen mother’s babies by them getting free doctor visits, social security benefits, free housing, free food, etc.

Also, why do they call the clinic Planned Parenthood, shouldn’t it be called Unplanned Parenthood since most couples who actually plan to have a child the right way can get the benefit since they earn money?

84

Boy, you people sure have one heck of a debate going on here. Might as well throw my two cents worth into the conversation. :slight_smile:

This one is a rather hard question. There are many different factors to consider when deciding if it is “wrong”. On the whole, however, I think that most teen pregnancy is wrong because it stems from the fact that most teenagers are ignorant to the facts about having a child. Not all of them, of course, but I would say that probably about sixty to seventy percent of teens don’t realize what happens when you become pregnant.

I think the fault lies more with the teens than the parents because the teens were the ones who decided to have sex in the first place. I’m not saying that some of the fault isn’t the parents, because it is, but, more or less, the teenagers didn’t stop to think what the consequences were beforehand.

The teens(I’m saying this because it isn’t just the girls responsibility. It does take two people to get pregnant) should keep the baby if they are willing and able to take care of the baby. If not, there are other options for them.

juliettsmommy- I think would say that maybe you should have said do teens get pregnant on purpose at all. Most of the time, no, I don’t think teens get pregnant on purpose. There are some that do for various reasons, but, for almost all, I would have to say no.

And Doctor J, as to your question about asking about a teenagers sex life and trying to help them with birth control, I feel that honestly you should try to help in any way you can. And I have a little story about this that comes from personal experience. About six months ago, I went to a doctor because I had the flu very bad. I had never before been to this doctor, but she did ask me if I was sexually active, and if I needed birth control. Some people have said this would be a little creepy and I think part of the reason is because you are a male. I know it was different for me because the doctor I had seen was a female so I naturally felt a little more comfortable. I don’t think you would really have a problem talking with the boys, but, I understand why people would say you asking the girls those questions would be a little weird.

85

Is teen pregnancy wrong? I wouldn’t classing it as wrong or right. It’s not generally a wise choise, but it’s not really my business.

whose fault is it? The Parents or the Teen? I don’t think “fault” is a correct term to describe pregnancy.

Do you think that teens get pregnant on purpose most of the time? Yes. 99.9% of the time they get pregnant on purpose or just don’t care either way. FWIW I think adults get pregnant the same way.

I really don’t think we have a teen pregnancy problem. 16 year old girls have been getting pregnant for thousands of years. I think it was jocylyn (sp) Elders who said something similar to this, " We do not have a teen pregnancy problem. We do have a problem with a lack of teenage marriages."

86

Well guess what? A teen does have a right to privacy in my state anyway. When my child is over 13, as a parent I cannot have my child tested for drugs without a court order. I would imagine that applies to pregnancy tests too. She can also obtain birth control from the city health department without my consent. The truth is that after a child is 13 even though you may be legally responsible for their upkeep, teens develop their own “rights” and a parent cannot force certain violations of privacy upon them. I also cannot kick my child under 18 out of my house, I am responsible for their care. I can turn them over to the state, but I can’t just throw them out. I would imagine this isn’t some abitrary rule and it might apply in many other states too.

Need2know

87

Just wanna point out one of the hazards of bringing up old threads is that sometimes the OP isn’t around anymore. AFAIK, Juliettesmommy never posted anywhere else on the board, she got her questions answered for her school report back in April, and I think she left.

Just so folks don’t get discouraged when they don’t get a response from her.

:slight_smile:

88

I still cannot for the life of me understand why the one question that NEVER gets brought up in discussions on teen pregnancy (especially younger teens) is why wasn’t the girl being supervised? I have read statistics that show that a large percentage of sex partners of teenaged girls are men–not boys their own age. Also that most conceptions occur in the after school hours. So why don’t parents know where their daughters are after school? So why do they allow them to have old boyfriends? Is it sheer ineptitude? Have to work all day? More important to spend time having fun yourself? Don’t want to be bothered? Want to let your daughter or son be independent?

If we as a society really wanted to cut down teen pregnancy, I think the best way to start would be to start junior hi and high school at 9:30 and make it last till 5:30. Teenagers need to sleep late anyway. Also, year round schools would help or work–even subsidised work. Then I think we need to provide supervised social activities on the weekends–as parents, as churches, as YMCAs or Girls clubs, boys clubs, etc. I’ve seen enough kids out on the streets at 11:30 and 12:00 on weeknights to think that city curfews wouldn’t be so bad either.
Sure there would be the hard-core kids who wouldn’t respond but most kids would be much better off. Lots of parents already do this with constant sports/church activities.

Then we need lots of education–not just on sex but on poverty. Daniel Monyihan (sp?) wrote years ago on the impact of unwed childbearing has on poverty. Let’s tell kids the truth–you have a kid when you’re a teenager and you will in all liklihood live in poverty the rest of your life. Your kid won’t have the Gap clothes, the nice house, the new car–he’ll be lucky to have 5 different sets of clothes from WalMart and live in subsidised housing and eat reduced price lunches at school.

Even if you escape poverty later, the child of this teen mom will do without the first few years of life. And the daddy will most likely never marry the mother, have little to do with her in later years and probably won’t pay child support consistently or spend the time a father in the house would with a child. Tell the truth to kids about birth control that fails–what’s the failure rate of condoms–about 18%? Pills aren’t failsafe–we’ve heard the testimony.

Emphasize not the teenage mom–but the poor kid who will probably never have the chance to have HER daddy in her home. Put the emphasis on doing what’s best for the baby–adoption by a mature, loving married couple carefully screened. Adoptive parents are out there–but the teen mom is socialized NOT to give up her baby to a better life. Nothing personal to the single moms here, but kids do need a dad and a mom. I know–I’m divorced and I’ve had to deal with my daughter’s ultimate rejection by her father. If I had had one iota of sense (or just a little bit of experience or even parental advice), I would not have married the man I did and would have never chosen him to father my child.

That’s another way we fail teenagers–we give kids lessons in sex ed but don’t give them lessons in picking life partners. When’s the last time someone talked to a high school class about what a person’s lifestyle says about their character? What percentage of people actually talk to their child about the desirable traits of a husband/wife? Common sense traits like–has a job and can keep one, no criminal record, decent family background, not an alcohol abuser, not a illegal drug user, reasonably clean, respectable, presentable, etc. A lonely, horny, naive youngster can be so misled out of pure innocence–that’s why those older males are so attracted to younger women–older women have enough experience to spurn the losers.

As far as the Dr.'s ? My daughter had a physical when she was 14. Her pediatrician (a woman) asked me to leave so she could talk to my daughter alone. My daughter was pretty disgusted and embarassed over being asked about sexual questions by her doctor, but I guess it didn’t hurt her and it might have been useful if she had been having sex. It also might have been more useful if it had been a doctor she actually knew instead of a stranger in the practice.

I don’t see why the nurse can’t ask if the girl is sexually active, and if the reply is affirmative, then the doctor can take it up from there. I can say that I would not have a male doctor alone with a young girl asking these questions, just for the doctor’s protection–having a female nurse there just as you do in the gyn. exam would be a prudent thing to do.

89

So please forgive me if I reiterate a bit.

I just thought I’d tell you all about my situation (well, the situation where I live, anyway). My county in Illinois has the highest teen birthrate in the state. It is larger (per capita) than CHICAGO. That is bad. I am a 16 year old male and therefore have a somewhat better view of the situation than many adults who are above it (read: I experience what teens experience, so I think I’m qualified to interpret it).

Education is NOT the problem. In my school (a public school), we did have sex education and a representative from the county board of health came in to the classroom and talked about birth control and how to use it and prices and stuff like that. She also informed us that it is available free or close to free at the health dept. building. This was only ONE day’s worth of the class, they also educated us on different STD’s (nasty pictures!!!) and the actual process and other stuff. So education is NOT the problem.

The problem here (or at least what many teenagers are using as their excuse) is that “there is nothing else to do.” Sadly, their excuse is a valid one (well, not a valid one to go out and have sex, but there really isn’t much to do here).

Any questions you people have about things teens face today, I would be happy to answer.

90

Mr. Garfield,
Thanks for the offer–it would be nice to hear from a teen what kinds of things a community could do to help keep kids from getting into trouble from lack of things to do. Do most of your friends work? What do they do for fun? Are church activities popular? What about parties and get-togethers–are they supervised?
From the parent of a teen in a small town–I’d have to agree–there’s not much to do around here. Lots of the parties involve alcohol and parents know and don’t care and sometimes even supply the booze. Churches are real active but lots of kids aren’t interested in church. Any suggestions?

91

Well, sadly, I don’t have MANY suggestions. A lot of my friends work, but you can’t work 24 hours a day. Even during school, there is too much time when we aren’t doing anything. For fun, I’d guess most of them go to parties. I really don’t go to many, but I’d assume they do because I hear about them at school every Monday, and that’s about all there is to do. Are they supervised? The ones (few and far between) I go to are. Keep in mind, though, that “supervised” means merely that the parents are in the HOUSE. Most don’t come near the room we’re in. Churches aren’t really popular, but there are kids who do go. Most of the activities are on Sunday, though, so that’s only 1/7 of the time.

Suggestions. . . well, I don’t know. Maybe if we had a decent MALL around (within 15-20 mins) or a paintball field. Even a mini golf course or an ARCADE! I don’t know how well a job works, because I don’t have one yet, but that’s always a good Idea ($$$). Actually, the Internet isn’t really bad at alleviating boredom (no, not in a bad way). It lets you talk to your friends, post intelligent thoughts on message boards, meet new people, stuff like that. I seriously think that if there WERE more fun things to do, the rate would be lower.

Any more questions relating to this topic, post here.

Any questions regarding teenagers in general, go to my Ask the Teenager thread.

92

Every once in a while I will hear about some community banning or severly restricting the local teens favorite public activity, whatever the activity may be. It may be cruising around the mall parking lot in cars, rollerblading, walking around in malls, skateboarding, etc. Sometimes saftey is cited as the reason, sometimes it is because teens do harrass others in the area, but usually it is just done because someone wants to play party pooper. The more public the teen activity the more likely it is to be banned. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

93

Smilingjaws, I’m amazed anyone doesn’t have a nurse present for the exams. When I have physical(with a female doctor) they call a nurse into the room for the turn-your-head-and cough part.(Not like I really want an audience, the room is always really cold.)

Many of my friends have been the “guy trying to do the right thing” and never made it very far. The biggest problem they had was the lots of responsibility, no rights part. It was the girls choice if the guy was to be told, whether it was going to be adopted, aborted, or kept, but If the girl decided to raise it they were on the hook.(I’m not saying there’s a better way to do it, but to the guy it seemed unfair.) The other problem main problem was usually the girl’s parents. They always blamed the guy for getting their angel pregnant. Whether explicitly, or subliminally, they always drove the guy away, cause he got tired of them making both the girl, and the kid, think he was a horrible evil person.

94

Wolfman, sorry I wasn’t clear–this was a pediatrician so I, as mom, was present during the physical exam, which was a very thorough exam but did not include a pelvic exam. The Dr. asked me to leave while she talked to my daughter. When I asked about it, the doctor said she needed to talk to my daughter in private in case my daughter wanted to discuss something private with her. I was rather surprised.

95

One facet of the teen pregnancy issue that is rarely discussed is the teenaged girls who know all about birth control but choose not to use it. Why? Because if they planned ahead and used birth control they would be admitting that they want to have sex. Many older people will probably be surprised to hear it, but even today there are lots of girls who are ashamed to admit this to themselves or anyone else.

96

Handy: I believe it is thought that if you have one kind of HPV you might have others. So if you have the genital wart kind, you may also have #16 or #18. hence the risk.

Other general comments: Teens get conflicting information. Adults will tell you you can get pregnant at ANY TIME. Open any woman’s magazine and you’ll see ads for ovulation predictors that tell you that you can get pregnant for a mere 12 hours out of every month. As a teen, I believed the thing that was easier to act upon, and figured the “any time” was scare tactics. Also, young people tend to think that statistics can’t happen to them. That’s true for car wrecks, AIDS, pregnancy…

And yes, I think there is something to the idea that protection = planning = being naughty. When I finally went on the pill at 18, I actually felt weird about it for a long while. I felt that I was committing to being sexually active, that there was something very wanton about taking a pill that made it safe to have sex at any time. Stupid to feel that way, given the alternatives? Yes, but I’m being honest.

I loathe it when anyone says a dad is “babysitting” when he has time alone with the child. Saying that says a lot about our expectations of fathers (of any age).

I think it does “take a village.” Because folks, we’ve had a real hands-off attitude in this country for a generation, and I don’t think it’s served us well. It’s hard to articulate all th ways I think this manifests itself, but I am keenly aware of it because I used to be someone who thought other people should keep their bratty kids to themselves, not annoy me in public with them, not expect me to subsidize their care, not expect me to cover for you at work when you have to leave early to go see Johnny play a tooth in the school play. Then I became a mom (hello change of heart!), found out how hard it is to be a good parent, and had more time to reflect on those attitudes.

But that’s another thread.

97

Wrong? Yes, and a ghastly mistake. No, don’t keep the kid.

As a teenager, I babysat for a gal who was maybe four years older than I. She definitely got pregnant on purpose, she told me the reason was that the father of her kids was exciting because ‘he drove a fast car’.

She had two kids by age 20. Her life was one sorry mess. Not only was she always short on money, she spent every spare minute in bars, looking for a man who wanted a ready made family.

She didn’t get many takers. Poor kid, her life was over.
On top of that she hated the kids.

My opinion, getting pregnant so young is to be avoided.