Anyone on here have your very 1st child as a young teenager? 14? 15? 16?

[Anonymous]

My good friend since childhood had her daughter at 16. We are not from the DC area so I guess “success” may be defined differently, but she has a successful career and her daughter is very bright too. My friend is a registered nurse, completed school, has had this career basically since finishing her schooling. Her daughter recently graduated from college where she was a cheerleader with excellent grades. Sure, my friend is not married to her daughter’s father, but everyone involved has gone on to be a productive member of society. No, they were not poor when it happened, and neither of them has lived “poor” since. No, we are not in a rural area, either.

[Anonymous]

I had a good friend in college who arrived with a 3 year-old. Honestly, she had a ton of support from her family and from the university, and she did really well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I had a good friend in college who arrived with a 3 year-old. Honestly, she had a ton of support from her family and from the university, and she did really well.

My husband had a friend in college with the same story. SLAC in NJ. She and her daughter are still great friends of ours.

[Anonymous]

My mom was a teen mom. I came along while she was in high school and basically set off a chain of bad decisions which I’m pretty sure she blamed on me. She went on to become successful and wealthy, even though I spent my early childhood below the poverty line.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of my childhood best friends got pregnant at 14 and had her baby just a month after turning 15. My parents had forbidden me from hanging out with her halfway through 6th grade when she became a "bad kid" in their eyes (got caught smoking and then got caught stealing from Icing in the mall). We still spoke but only at school and our friendship suffered because of this. She still invited me to her baby shower and I got her a gift on my own, but my parents wouldn't let me go. They thought it was appalling that her parents were carrying on as if it was a completely normal situation, throwing the showers, having a big 15th birthday party, the dad remodeling the basement to make an apartment for her and the baby's father to live in, etc. She switched to homeschool after the baby was born and we pretty much lost touch for years. She contacted me on Facebook about 3 years ago because it turned out we had another mutual friend through our kid's soccer team and FB suggested me as a friend. The baby she had in HS is turning 21 this year. That's crazy since we're both turning 36 this year. She has a 10 year old and a 6 year old now and is married (not to the HS baby daddy). It's funny because even though so much time has passed, we both still remember each others childhood secrets. I really wish my parents hadn't made me stop being her friend all those years ago.

Why the hostility from your parents?

Once the baby was born it should have been all about moving forward and not looking back.

Im a parent and I would never let my kid maintain a close relationship with a pregnant 14 year old. Or attend a shower. This is not normal or acceptable behavior. Its proven that more normalized this becomes the more likely girls are to get pregnant and think its cool. Its not.

[Anonymous]

Let this thread stand in eternity as that moment when THE RESPONDENTS ON A THREAD ON DCUM REPRESENTED THE GENERATIONAL AND DEMOGRAPHICAL SHIFT TOWARD THE BOTTOM SCRAPINGS OF THE FACEBOOK SPECTRUM ON THIS SITE.

[Anonymous]

I didn’t, but I live in an area where it’s normal. Most have pretty normal lives, a lot go on to get their college degree and get decent jobs. It just takes a bit longer.

[Anonymous]

Holy crap I didn’t even get my first period until I was 14

[Anonymous]

I guess the young age makes it easier for them to get pregnant right?

[Anonymous]

It's called "fast life history," as opposed to "slow life history."

It's also called "r/K selection theory."

r/K Theory says that an environment will either have limitless resources per individual, which will favor reproducing very fast, to out-reproduce peers (r-selection), or the environment will have limited resources, and only those who produce the fittest offspring survive (K-selection), since only those fitter offspring win the competition for resources.

We tend to be a K-selected species, so we tend to view things like promiscuity among the very young with a negative bias. Yet r-selected organisms, like rabbits carry no such bias, since the r-strategy favors early sexual actiivty beginning as young as possible.

[Anonymous]

I know someone who had her first child when she was 13, which means that, by definition, she was raped (since she was well below the age of consent when the baby was conceived). The family trauma that put her in a position to be raped at 13 and raise the baby with no support, and the mental health problems that followed (depression, anxiety) derailed her life.

[Anonymous]

A friend’s daughter had sex at 13. Luckily did not get pregnant. Her trauma was NOT from her family, though. Her parents are lovely people. Poor girl has been the victim of horrid bullying, though, and mom is pretty sure that self-esteem issues drove her to make such a poor decision. They are currently in therapy (I think they had been previously when the bullying was occurring).

Just tossing it out there that girls having sex at 13 are not necessarily the product of neglectful and/or abusive families.

[Anonymous]

I was two months shy of 15 for the first, and a month after I turned 18 for the second. I wouldn't recommend it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Holy crap I didn’t even get my first period until I was 14

I was thinking this too, although I was 16. And I didn't have my second period for another year and a half! They became regular when I was 19. Crazy.

[Anonymous]

I used to coach cheerleading at a local YMCA. One of my girls got pregnant at age 11 (dropped out if the squad) and gave birth at 12. I still think of her often. She’d be 27 now with a 15 yo.