09 Dec Shame Instead of Support: The voice of Teenage Mothers
A SPECIAL INVESTIGATION: Teenage pregnancy in the UK is the highest in Western Europe, which makes the trend no longer taboo but the representations of young mothers in the media are still shameful.
Photograph: Giles Moberly /PYMCA/Rex Feature
“Live in a council house?- I can’t live without my mum!” the fifteen year old mother, laughs off my question to which I posed following conservatives’ pressure group ‘group 40’ claim that teenage mothers and other young mothers are encouraged and encourage each other to have children to get council houses and other benefits. “I’m more concerned about finishing education so I can have the best future for my son; I need as much help as possible”. I can hardly believe that this young girl is mature beyond her age, she looks at me with a distinctive baby face, her eyes are filled with the innocence of the world, yet with hope, her sixth month old looks like her brother yet her son never leaves her side.
This is the kind of scenario that has led me to investigate further into the stereotypes and image portrayed by media and government.
Teen mom, 16 and pregnant, Underage and Pregnant, My Big Decision with all these teenage documentaries out there about teenage mothers it is easy to believe we know everything there is to know about teen mothers.
Teen mothers are stereotyped to be promiscuous, ambitionless, lazy, foolish and just in it for the council house. Yet with these entire stereotypes, we forget that these young adults are mothers and with that they have birthed the feeling that comes with having a child.
To start my investigation, I wanted to see the public’s perception on teen mums; I went to the streets of south London. I asked passersby that were willing to participate, “what is the first thing that comes to your head when you think of teen mums”, I had a range of answers from “I cannot judge them, over reported, too young, wrong and Doncaster”.
With the different points of views observed, I began watching pass episodes, USA teen mom intrigued me the most. It is here I saw what MTV producers are calling everyday life of after birth life for teen mums. Two in particular characters stood out to me, you yourself have probably seen then splashed across teen magazines glamourizing their wild lifestyles.
Farrah and Janelle appeared in magazines glamourizing their wild lifestyles. Farrah is now a porn star and Janelle aver a turbulent battle with drugs has lost custody to of her son to her mother and is expecting her second child. As I had my first child as a teenager I know there are so much more to teen mothers and that’s what I found when I attended a mother and baby group in Hayes, West London called ‘prams and teens’ a local authority-run project for pregnant schoolgirls.
It is here where I met Amy. There were other girls Amy’s age, ten in total this morning the oldest being 16. I watched them interact with each other and play with their toddlers and gave them my success story so they could warm up to and answer my questions. At the end of their meeting, Tara Joseph organizer of “Teens and Prams” welcomed the girls to come and speak with me. Along with Amy, there were three other girls that wanted to tell me their story. Jasmine aged 16, Rachel 15, and Leanne also 15 all in their own admission said that “getting pregnant calmed me down” Jasmine says the loudest of the three. She continues “If I didn’t have Tia, I wouldn’t know what to do with my life, to be honest I don’t think I would be doing my A levels”.
After talking awhile I inquire deeper, I asked the girls how they feel about the stereotypes about teenage mothers and asked them if the stereotypes have directly affected them. Rachel is the first to answer, her tone lowers and she says “Yes I feel judged, people think I’m a bad mum, they don’t even know me, they don’t know how I love and care for my baby. That’s the hardest thing about being a teen mum- being judged”. Leanne has her input “For me it’s annoying when I drop daisy to nursery and anything the keyworker says is directed at my mum, I just wanna scream and say Hello! I am the mother we are in 2013 get over it!”
For these girls, their future looks bright. I have seen firsthand how they attend and nurture their babies, yet they are constantly reminded of ones opinions and made aware of the statistics stacked against them. Amy shared that a female teacher at her school said that ‘statistics show that children born to teenage parents are twice as likely not to go to university compared to those not.’
But why is this? It is because, as girls as soon as we get the ‘ok’ from our parents to date or our parents get a whiff of the idea we are it is drilled into our “whatever you do – do not come home with no baby!” And in conjunction with the scary realties shown on Teen mom this could be working. The idea that teenage pregnancy ruins your life has been passed down from generations to generations and still make young girls nauseous. Despite the financial support and the help available while in education.
Teenage pregnancy is at its lowest and has been since 2002, according to the most recent research by office for national statistics. Yet Teenage pregnancies and abortions in England is still the highest in Western Europe. Correspondingly the rate of sexually transmitted diseases among the age of 14 year olds and younger is rising.
Nonetheless, there have been talks in the recent months to lower the age of consent to 14, which we contradict to conservatives claim that girls are encourage to have children because of benefits. This would suggest that a fourteen year old is ready to engage in sexual relationships, when it would just add to the problem of both the teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.
Dr Jam Macvarish, author of book Teenage parenthood; what’s the problem says “The disproportionate political attention given to teenage parenthood has produced a number of unhelpful outcomes for young parents” she continues to say “rather than society respecting young people who have chosen to grow up through parenthood they are treated as dysfunctional, destined to fail in need of special treatment.
I also spoke to Shola Liverpool, a local midwife that attends “Teens and Prams” to give advice and help the young mums. I asked her if she believes there is a negative stigma behind teenage mothers, to which she responds “Yes, there will always be like most things we as a society will only focus on the negative and unfortunately there are teenage mothers out there that live up to the stereotypes. But the teen mothers I have worked with I have found to be better than older mums; they are open to learn infect young mums breastfeed longer than older mothers too”.
During the interview with Mrs. Liverpool she shares that there more to be done, especially with as there not enough midwives. “ There is no book to be a parent it is hard, so we as a society need to focus and work on young mothers, to ensure the give the child the best start possible, because the statistics we are so readily to throw in their face will cause an even bigger problem in unemployment”.
The work that there are doing at “teens and prams” is really amazing, these young girls are brave, intelligent young women and are walking examples that the negative stigma doesn’t apply to them.
To conclude I feel that government use teenage mothers as there scape goat in the media to deflect the wider issues the tax payer has. At this point I want to note that I tried to obtain the percentage of teenage mothers that receive housing benefits and income support and there is no public document published.
One thing is for sure, time has evolved it is no longer the end of the world for young girls to get pregnant. There is help available so that teen mums have the same opportunity as everyone else.
Teenage pregnancy is limited to a particular class, ethnicity or culture. It could happen to your daughter, your niece or even you! Let’s hope it doesn’t take for it to happen to you to change your viewpoint because Teenage mothers need, education, stability, financial help and love.
*some names have been changed
By Bianca Clarke
