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I think some of the problem is lack of love and affection from the family which draws them to want a baby who'll love them unconditionally while at the same time receiving attention from others because of the baby. If this is true,...get a dog or a cat. If you're not mature and responsible to care for a dog or a cat properly then don't even think about having a baby.
You would not believe me if I told you this to your face.
I used to know a girl who was my best friend. Pregnant at 15. Had her girl at 16. All the attention went from her "OMG HOW DID YOU GE PREGNANT SO EARLY?" to her entire family preparing and helping her.
When her daughter was born, it was obvious all the attention went the newborn. Even mine. I went over there and played with her, bought her toys every time. Her daughter became really attached to me and her family.
A few months ago I was sitting there with the girl in my lap, reading her a book. My friend gets up all angrily and asks me if I come over to see HER or the baby.
Dumbfounded, I said "Both..." and she goes off on this angry rage about how EVERYTHING is about the baby now and NO ONE comes over to see her or pays attention to her.
You would not believe me if I told you this to your face.
I used to know a girl who was my best friend. Pregnant at 15. Had her girl at 16. All the attention went from her "OMG HOW DID YOU GE PREGNANT SO EARLY?" to her entire family preparing and helping her.
When her daughter was born, it was obvious all the attention went the newborn. Even mine. I went over there and played with her, bought her toys every time. Her daughter became really attached to me and her family.
A few months ago I was sitting there with the girl in my lap, reading her a book. My friend gets up all angrily and asks me if I come over to see HER or the baby.
Dumbfounded, I said "Both..." and she goes off on this angry rage about how EVERYTHING is about the baby now and NO ONE comes over to see her or pays attention to her.
I felt horrible....
Don't. That's actually quite common no matter the age. What has happened is the mother feels marginalized. Whether that is case or not is irrelevant, but it is what she thinks.
We're kind of hard wired to be attracted to babies. We have to be or they wouldn't survive.
Fathers have the same issue, mom pays attention to the baby and not him. I would imagine that's magnified if the parents aren't married/don't live together.
I have 4 kids by the way.
That's what I tell them. I was a bit of a wild child in my youth - unsupervised, doing naughty things at her age.
My girls have no idea though and I will keep it that way. To them, I was a straight A student, a goody two shoes.
I don't want them coming to me and saying "you did it, why can't I"?
Hope they never find CDF by accident! lol I am laughing cause my soon to be gorgeous 26 yr old, i wish would of gotten in some trouble. just kidding, she has neve giving me a bit of trouble. Good things our daughters do as they are told, and not as we did!
I think this is a really worrying trend , and one which is also becoming quite prevalent in the UK.
There are so many factors involved though that I am not quite sure what the solution is. I suspect a lot of it is about young women who are desperately seeking attention of any kind and feel that a baby will provide them with something to fill the hole in their lives.
Most of these young women ( here in the UK anyway) are from more deprived backgrounds, with poor education, no skills and nil prospects in terms of getting a fulfilling job.
Most also come from severely broken families. Not just divorces but bad divorces, parents unemployed, absent fathers, mothers who also had babies too young, mothers who have no regular boyfriends etc... The lack of stability in the young women's lives basically send them adrift and babies become the focus of their lives as the holy grail which will solve all their problems.
Despite sex education we still seem to also have kids who despite being sexually active at an early age are still often quite hazy about the facts of life ( which I find unbelievable but I am told by professionals is true nonetheless) . We live in a highly sexualised society where almost everything is about sex rather love and stable relationships, where having sex really young is almost a badge of honour .
Kids are pressurised into being sexually active younger and younger and when a young woman becomes pregnant , the biological father is usually by then long gone and they end up with no support systems so the cycle continues into the next generation. Ill educated young women raise ill educated kids who themselves in turn have babies far too young etc...
I do think the root of all this though is wanting to have someone who will love you unconditionally and someone to love back. Someone who is yours and yours alone, something which cannnot be taken away. A lot of young women will have a romantic notion of what a baby is and will not even think for a moment about the heavy responsibilites and duties of being a parent. I think a lot of it comes down from terrible insecurities and feeling alone and with nowhere to go, nothing to aspire to or look forward to. A baby becomes a bandage to apply to a big gaping wound.
Our society is increasingly fractured and still not terribly socially mobile so in a way it is not surprising that some young women see babies as a cure all when it is of course nothing of the sort.
I find it terribly sad not only because of the great waste of potential from the mothers but because this cycle is then foisted upon their children and the cycle never breaks.
I don't know about the US but here in the UK it is almost exclusively a problem of the poorer people in society and I do feel that like many other social problems the better we are at redressing social inequalities and the quicker we will truly start making progress at solving a lot of our other problems like drugs, crime, vandalism , anti-social behaviour etc...
We need to improve education standards , lower poverty levels and raise people's expectations as well as give them a chance to realise their potential. A society where deep chasms exist between the poorest and the richest can never be a healthy one.
I say that as an upper middle class person who was brought up with all the advantages that life had to offer. Simply by being born in wealthy family I was given a huge headstart and those disparities of social possibilities must be reined down. Otherwise our entire society will eventually collapse.
Yes some people do make it out of the ghettos. The vast majority however do not. Not because they are stupid or even lazy but because we don't all battle the odds the same way. The odds have to be evened out a little bit before we can even consider ourselves a civilised society.
Education and trying to instill a sense of pride and awareness of true potential has got to be one of the keys to stopping young lives being wasted . Civic pride, and a sense of duty. And these are quite difficult to foster if you come from a broken home with no prospects of ever getting out of pointless life...
Every time I see a really young woman with a pram it makes me want to weep. Two generations almost certainly ruined. And what for ?
Kids are almost becoming a novelty and a pawn for some women. The novelty of having the kid without thinking "well, now that I have it.. oh my gosh.. I have to be RESPONSIBLE now "
The pawn is from the gold digging group that wants to make money from either the government or well off male. Of course, their are many irresponsible men out there so I am not picking on women here
Personally, I would rather adopt and will do so when I am ready (not now though... too busy traveling for mountain climbing and work)
I graudated from high school like 3 or 4 years ago. On my Facebook account, I know of not one or two or three but SIX girls who now have kids. WHAT about your future? WHAT about school? WHAT about the childs future?
It makes me sick. What are you in a rush for? NONE of them work. NONE of their boyfriends (no long gone-of course) pay support. Who is footing their bill? US.
And then they post pictures on there all proud. Yay! I am 16 and going to be a mommy! No, I am not joking. THAT is what they write.
Someone asked them what they are proud of and they get all angry saying "OMG DONT QUESTION ME! YOU DONT KNOW OK? I AM PROUD TO BE A YOUNG MOM!"
NONE OF YOU are married or even if you choose not to be married-you dont have any stability! Now what about the kids. Geez. I wonder how they will turn out.
I am SICK of this. Anyone else think that this "young girl being a mommy thing is cute" is STUPID?!
Sometimes I feel STUPID for NOT having a kid at 16.
Yep. I reckon I'm about your age and this is a pretty disturbing trend. It's amazing how many girls our age are already having/have had kids.
It's even more disturbing how often it's happening in kids younger than us. I have a younger brother who isn't even a year out of high school and it seems like every other week some girl he knows is getting knocked up.
I graudated from high school like 3 or 4 years ago. On my Facebook account, I know of not one or two or three but SIX girls who now have kids. WHAT about your future? WHAT about school? WHAT about the childs future?
It makes me sick. What are you in a rush for? NONE of them work. NONE of their boyfriends (no long gone-of course) pay support. Who is footing their bill? US.
And then they post pictures on there all proud. Yay! I am 16 and going to be a mommy! No, I am not joking. THAT is what they write.
Someone asked them what they are proud of and they get all angry saying "OMG DONT QUESTION ME! YOU DONT KNOW OK? I AM PROUD TO BE A YOUNG MOM!"
NONE OF YOU are married or even if you choose not to be married-you dont have any stability! Now what about the kids. Geez. I wonder how they will turn out.
I am SICK of this. Anyone else think that this "young girl being a mommy thing is cute" is STUPID?!
Sometimes I feel STUPID for NOT having a kid at 16.
My aren't we judgemental for being so young??
Of course most of us have trouble understanding the way some young people think, but you are not talking about 12 or 15 year olds, you are talking about young adults, in their early 20s. Or are you talking actually talking about 16 year olds? That is a totally different story. Women in thier 20s, even without college can support their young ones. Is it a good idea? In my mind no, but I am not the one who should be judging unless, as a tax payer I do have to support the kids. Some people do not want children period, that is a choice we all make, some believe in marriage first but many today, do not think marriage is that important. Are these gals on facebook saying the government is supporting the kids and daddy is not? Or is that how you see it?
And now they are all on welfare and posing with their babies like it is a fasion accessory. I am sure of that.
Oh my god. WhenI was 9 or 10, I only cared about Pokemon cards.....
They were not 9 or 10 years old, there was 9 or 10 of them. They were mostly seniors in high school.
Nita
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