ANYONE WANT TO CRITICISE ME???? (Teenage Pregnancy)

Member Name: emmahumphries

Product:	Teenage Pregnancy
Date:	23/02/01 (294 review reads)
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So many people... so many different opinions. Well here's one that won't be 1 sided!!!!

I fell pregnant at 17, just before I got married; OK so now you're all thinking I'm stupid getting married at 17 but this is my life and it's exactly how I want it to be. I had my baby one week after my 18th birthday.

I had a difficult pregnancy and a very difficult birth, but my husband was beside me every step of the way. He lost his job when I was 8 weeks pregnant so it meant the pressure was on me a bit to carry on working just to bring in enough money to pay the bills and put food on the table. I won't go into much more detail about me as I have already written an opinion on this under 'kids and family'. So I will now say what I want to.....

Teenage parenting is hard, and it can be a financial struggle, but does this mean that all teenage parents scrounge off the government?! No it doesn't, a lot do though which is why we all get a bad name.

A lot of teenage mothers do get pregnant just so they get a house, get all their bills paid, but believe it or not so do others. The emphasis is just always on teenagers. A hell of a lot of people 'scrounge,' and I bet most of them live down the road from me!! They even get free holidays and spending money, their children have the best clothes, the best shoes, the most pocket money and the most recent computer on the market.

I work for a living; the only thing we claim is Working Families Tax Credit. I earn only £10,000 (incl. tax credit) and I was told "I earn too much money to get help with my rent" SO IT'S NO WONDER THERE ARE SO MANY TEENAGE PREGNANCIES, AND SO MANY PEOPLE SCROUNGING INSTEAD OF WORKING. The government are not willing to help the people who really need it.

Why don't they cut down on all these hand-outs and give it to people who really need it, or better still put it into sex education.

I never had a very good sex education but I did get to know ev
erything, but it shouldn't be a case of playground talk. There are so many unnecessary pregnancies. We really do need some money putting into this.

I know what most of you are thinking now.....I'm only a teenage mum because I didn't have a very good sex education. Well that's not true. We ALWAYS used contraception; we were never stupid. BUT there is always that 1%, and we just happened to be that 1% that contraception failed for.

I have read opinions that say the only choice for me now would be to:

a) abort
b) keep the baby and not have an education
c) have it adopted

None of these are true for us. I work, I am gaining more qualifications than ever, and my husband loves staying at home with our son.

I also read an opinion that said "All teenage mothers are stupid" and "they don't know who the father is". If the person who wrote this was in the same situation as me I'm sure they would feel just as upset as I did when I read this.

Teenagers should say 'no' if there is no contraception. They shouldn't feel pressured. Having a baby is a huge responsibility at any age. To fall pregnant because you couldn't say no is so sad as there are a lot of people who may not want the baby, but can't go through with abortion. I know I could never have gone through with it even if I had wanted to.

At the end of the day I may be a teenage mum BUT I am married, I have a house of my own, I have a job, and we have a very close relationship, we all love and care for each other so I don't care what anyone thinks.

People can think I'm stupid, they can slag me off, but I have tried to put forward both sides. I am not promoting teenage pregnancy - it is hard, and I know it is but a lot of teenage parents are VERY GOOD parents.

This is all I have to say so, this is where I go and a lot of you will critise me. Thankyou for reading.

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