Written By: Halimah Sanusi
So, She’s Sixteen and pregnant!!! What’s next? We all know Parenting experiences aren’t as rosy and fun filled as the picture perfect images we see on the internet or as family portraits makes them out to be. It is in fact a roller coaster drive down the slope of doubts confusion and hope that one is doing a right job at what comes with neither a manual nor description to put you through. When the pressure gets doubled is mostly during their teenage years especially when raising a female child.
During this awareness year as I like to call it, a female teen is just beginning to understand the changes going on in her body as puberty kicks in, she starts to notice boys looking at her differently and at the same time trying to figure out her feelings, like why she feels queasy when a guy looks at her or why her heart beats faster when a particular guy walks by, all this and more are things female teens go through but find difficult to tell their parents either out of fear of being scolded or thoughts that they will be disappointed they feel that way. In this state of confusion and self-discovery a female teen confides in her peers who are mostly going through the same thing as she is, then they advise each other based on things they see in movies, or seen their elder ones do. Without a well-rounded knowledge of pros and cons of having a relationship they wade through the endless sea of love in the spirit of adventure, and for some who are not too lucky they dive too deep and eventually being put in the family way (getting Pregnant).
Now, here comes every parent’s nightmare, when a teen gets pregnant the first reaction she gets from her parents is disappointment, mostly followed by beatings and several verbal abuse, a typical African child can attest to this, after the beatings shouting and verbal abuse must have lasted for a while, the next line of action most parents take is either to disown the teenage mother, abandon her with a grandparent to avoid disgrace, dump her at her baby daddy’s parents’ house or on rare cases drag her to the hospital for an abortion. All these methods may seem logical but are totally inappropriate, as there are better ways to handle the situation. It’s okay to feel disappointed and letting the child know how deep you hurt, but after that support should be the next line of action not rejection. Some years ago my sweet little cousin got pregnant at the age of sixteen, she obviously wasn’t ready and her baby daddy who was also a few years older, didn’t have enough resource to cater for both mother and child. So they decided she go for an abortion, unfortunately for them the doctor they met knew her parents, put a call through to them and explained the procedure their daughter was about to go through, her mother rushed to the hospital to pick her up, both parents gave her their full support by letting her have the child and giving her the opportunity to complete her education at the tertiary institution.
She is a graduate today with a degree and a child who sees her as a hero. She is forever grateful for the choice her parent’s made by supporting her through her difficult times. Rejecting a teenage mother makes her feel worthless which is really bad for her self-esteem. The feel of being abandoned by the only people she had come to know as her first line of support is very traumatizing and often times the girl is left with no choice than to either go back to her baby daddy and feel indebted to him for sticking with her while giving in to making more babies without a plan for her own future or falls prey to anyone willing to give her a listening ear and comfort, which often leads to her being exposed to human trafficking or prostitution. From my cousin’s experience I realized support goes a long way in securing a promising future for a pregnant teenager.
Therefore parents are advised to show compassion towards their pregnant teens, it’s OK to let them know how disappointed you are in their action but always remember she needs your support to pull through the mess she has gotten herself into.
