27 year old Grandmother

[bongobaby]

Her 12 year old daughter has given birth last Sundayand the dad is 13. She fell pregnant in year 6 of primary school. They are totally in love and into each other and want to get married.
Why an earth would you want to be a grandmother at 27 with a daughter of 12 now a mother.

"I will continue to hold an openly expressed opinion that teenage pregnancy is something to be avoided at all costs, and that being a teenage Mum immediately removes most of the lifestyle choices you would have liked to make for yourself."

Exactly- so why not make sure the pregnancy doemst happen by making sure the condoms/pill are freely accessible? Even if that means before the magic 16?

I agree totally with silly precisely because my mother was just like you queen. No criticism as my mum did her absolute best that she could but it wasn't good enough your me.

Like Ruthless I too was pressured to have sex at 16. I had been in the pill since 15 as my periods were dreadful and I couldn't ask mum to sort it as she would have fainted at the though of a dd of hers on the pill under age.

I too was raped by the boyfriend at 17.

My parents and the school told he the mechanics of sex and of course I also got a lot of incorrect and dangerous info off friends.!!!

My parents also had high ambitions for me and boosted my self esteem but I knew that I really couldn't share inner most thoughts and experiences with my mum. She just couldn't do it.

She was so wrong. My dds come to me first. Not a friend, not a school nurse, not a councellor but me. Their mum.

That's my job.

Incidentally my dds too have huge ambitions and go well at school. Have great social lives and far far more important are empowered by us, dh and their older dss about how men should treat them and what is not acceptable.

queen if your dd was very mature and sensible and asked you to go with her to see the GP to access contraception would you go or not?

Obviously not at 11 but at 15?

I think the main thing is to educate your children, teach them that sex isn't shameful but neither is it something to rush into at an early age.

Raise a daughter with bags of self confidence and she'll be much more likely to say 'no' to premature or unwanted sexual pressure.

LaQ - please confirm you have talked about the social/psychological pressures and factors, and not just pregnancy. Two of us have told you it matters - I'm sure others agree.

It. Isn't. Just. About. Pregnancy.

No guarantees in this life. Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it. "It wont happen to me" has to be one of the most painful lines to hear trotted out.

Yes, squoosh! Exactly!

Laqueen- I lived rurally as a teen. Very much the way you describe with relying in parents to drive me everywhere. They always knew where I was.

You know what- it's a cliche but when I did escape them I massively rebelled, and ended up pregnant at Uni.

Good patenting is about balance. If you lock then away from the temptations of boys, sex, drugs, alcohol etc they may well go overboard trying all these things when the stakes are much higher when they are a little older.

But ... that's about pregnancy. What about the psychological factors of protected sex?

Not sure really. My dds and dss have bags of self confidence and yes I agree the original post was about an 11 year old having sex and that turns my stomach as I guess it would all of us with children.

However I am not sure that self esteem and doing well at school is really anything to do with feeling ready to have a sexual relationship at mid/late teens.

Who knows we all are just going our best.

For me crossing fingers and boosting confidence isn't enough. It wasn't for me anyway.

Lequeen- it's black and white attitudes like that teens rebel against.

Allowing teenagers to mix without adult supervision outside school will not turn them all into drug addicts- what a ridiculous thing to say- they will learn social skulls which will improve their risk assessment skills for later life.

laQueen my teen dds have older brothers who do lots of brooding menacing looks to the boyfriends so dh leaves it to them.

To be honest we are all doing our best as parents and all hoping to just get through it aren't we?

There is a fine line between being a parent and being a friend I agree but for me my main concern is that I would rather my children turned to me first to ask for help before issues arise not to mop up the aftermath which of course I would if necessary.

I'm an LP so does that mean i get to do the menacing stare and cleaning my shotgun when they bring the first one home? Does it even work with son's bringing home girls? maybe they'll bring home boys just to let me play out the script