Planned to fall pregnant age 15

[Karrotten]

I'm 25 now so this was a decade ago it's something I've never admitted to anyone not even my own mother. Only my husband knows that our first child was not an "accident" and was actually planned even though we were only 15.

Don't get me wrong I have no regrets with how how my life is and I love my child but I look back and think I must of been really disturbed to intentionally do that.
Every one else I know who had a child so young fell pregnant accidentally. Closest I've heard of it being planned is internet theories of young girls getting pregnant just for a council house. I did not even know what a council house or a mortgage was at 15 though.

Not sure what the point in this post is, just musing over something I can obviously never admit to in real life

I don’t think it’s that unusual op
I think most common reason for that is a want for love

I agree that there must have been something amiss for an adolescent of that age to want a baby more than anything else at that stage in her life. Most girls who feel this way and end up being pregnant with not very genuine 'accidents' usually have unhappy childhoods, neglectful or abusive parents or a physically or emotionally absent parent. Or they've come from the care system and they feel they have no control and no agency over anything in their lives. A baby represents something that they can make a decision about for themselves and absolutely no-one an stop them. There is also often a point to prove, that they will love better, be better, to their own child where their own parents may have failed.

Their family may live in very disadvantaged circumstances where there is overcrowding at home, no space or privacy, possibly an unhappy or abusive environment. That trope of getting pregnant for a council house seems like the only way out of a poverty trap for many young girls. Especially if they don't achieve much at school and are only ever going to scrape by in a minimum wage job. Having a baby offers the passage to adulthood and independence that other young women might gain through education, going to uni, moving to a new town to start a new career or travelling abroad for a couple of years. All of that feels completely unachievable for some girls, so having a baby offers an instant way out of the poverty trap, or so they think. The irony is that it actually keeps them in a poverty trap and a doom loop of low attainment for them and their children.

Edited to say: If none of the above applies to some girls who get PG in their teens about unhappy or abusive upbringings, often it's just about lack of ambition to do or be anything more than they see around them. If their own mother had them very young then it's difficult to argue that they shouldn't be able to do the same. If their own family has always got by relying on benefits and social housing to get them afloat and everyone else in your circle lives the same way then it takes a particular sort of person to say 'no, that's not for me, I want more.' Most people are happy to repeat the only patterns they know and see around them.

This has made me remember a girl I was at shool with who when I look back with adult eyes more than likely had a difficult life. She was sexually active before most of us, at about age 13 I think and then became pregnant at about 15 or so. She disappeared and then returned to school when we were about to start our A levels. She had given birth and the baby had been adopted and we were not in any way sympathetic. I feel horrible when I look back as she must have been traumatised, she used to lie down on our common room floor and reneact childbirth, crying and yelling . It gave me a phobia about birth as she said it was like being tortured and then of course she would have had her baby taken away to be adopted, there would have been no counselling, no option to keep the baby. This was the 70's, thank goodness we have moved on

I’m just surprised your boyfriend was in on it OP, it’s not unusual for 15 year old girls to be broody but it’s quite unusual I would say for a boy to feel the same.

That could have easily have been me at 15, I was so broody even as a child. I desperately romanticised it all and remember running through scenarios in my head involving boyfriends and babies. No childhood trauma and parents would have been worried but supportive had it happened. Luckily I didn’t meet anyone at that time because generally it is too young. It’s probably hormonal as well.

Sorry to hear you were widowed so young.

But interesting you should mention this. Quite a few people I know of who had kids young, then died young - or youngish. I don’t believe in fate, but interesting how they had an urge to procreate - and then it turns out if they’d had kids at an average age, they’d have died childless or their kids would’ve been very young when they died.

I didn't even know what a council house was when I was 15 or a mortgage. I only mentioned it because internet theories of 15 year olds getting pregnant just for a council house is the closest thing I've seen to anyone ever saying it could be anything other than a tragic accident to fall pregnant at that age

No I don’t think you were at all disturb. I had a friend who at the 15, decided to get pregnant by her boyfriend so, she wouldn’t have to go to school !!! Yeh no sh’t !! Although I do feel for her child as he was then brought up by the man she married and I do believe this gave him anger issues as and adolescent. It’s good you and your husband stayed together, as it gives your child/ children a sense of who they are .
As for me, at the age of 15 I hadn’t kissed a boy and the thought of sex and intimacy scared the shite out of me . I do believe you are one of many . Don’t sweat it .

I’m so amazed at these stories. Thank you for your candour and insights. My dd is 16, almost 17. She doesn’t have a boyfriend, not ready for one atm. But she gave me a card saying thanks for everything I do, one step closer to grandma hood. It is making me wonder now if she’s thinking about stuff. 🫣

And immaturity.
How did you support yourself?
Did you have a lot of family support?
Makes a huge difference
15 is far too young to have a child, you were still a child yourself

Maybe a lot of that is from the past when there wasn’t really reliable contraception or access to abortion. I remember my Nan (who had got married before the pill had been available) saying to me she didn’t really understand how so many women (of any age group) had unplanned pregnancies considering all the options available.

I dont think it means you were disturbed in some way, just that you didnt think it all through which is a common problem for teens. I don't think their brain is fully developed until later. Glad it has worked out for you anyway.

Did you hate school and wish you could leave? My sister was like this. At 15 she was desperately broody, she never did get PG as a teen but if she had she definitely would have kept it. She was definitely trying to fill an emotional void. We had an absent father and tricky childhood with a self absorbed and emotionally immature mother.

She ended up getting married at 20 and having her first baby at 21. She never wanted anything more than she wanted to be a mum. I wanted to be a mum too, but wasn't in such a desperate hurry. I managed to get to the grand old age of 27! But that's because I'd met my husband and it felt right. If I hadn't, then it would not have worried me to wait a few more years. For me the relationship had to be exactly right, whereas my sis would have had a baby come what may, because the urge was all consuming.

I was 17 when I had eldest and he wasnt planned at all.

When he was about 6 months I saw a friend of my sisters on the bus, 15 at the time (would be late 40's now) and she said she was trying to get PG. I did everything I could to talk her out of it.

After she had twins I saw her quite often at baby clinic and she said that she wished she had listened to me. Obviously she loved them but she hadnt fully appreciated how hard life would be, especially as she ended up with twins. She thought it would be wonderful and cute..... ex had buggered off within a couple of weeks of their birth.

So while you think that the others were all accidents, they think that about you so you dont know. I am not sure that there arent far more of these deliberate accidents than people realise as no one is talking about it.

Perhaps we should.

Well done, can't have been easy to achieve.

A girl in my year at school got pregnant at 17, in the first year of her A levels. She dropped out, married the dad and had the baby, worked in a local bakery for years. She picked up her studies again, got divorced and got her PhD and went on to be a uni lecturer. It's amazing what people can achieve when they are determined.

Well yes, I think she knows that. Thats rather the point of her post.

I know exactly how you feel. When I was a teenager a little bit older than you I went through a period of being desperate for a child, really desperate, knitted baby clothes and all sorts. Luckily I didn't have a boyfriend. After about 18 it wore off but I did finally get pregnant at 21.
Good luck to you.

Girl who had kids at 15 & 17 in my school had them removed by age 3

P.S I am in my 60s now and don't regret a thing. DS is my life.

It makes it a lot more challenging.

I went to school with quite a few teenage girls who planned their pregnancies. They chose to study GCSE child development as they knew that was their future. This was in the 2000s.

I also planned my baby at 15… I turned 16 just before she was born and now she’s 18 in a couple of weeks! I was always very maternal from a very young age and so desperately wanted a baby, unlike my eldest daughter who is quite the opposite and I’m happy with that!!
I married 13 years ago, work and had another 3 children, youngest is 3.
Worked out ok for me as I had very supportive family but when I look back now I can see how crazy it was!

Well it sounds like she does to me. I don't know what you think you are reading! And what makes you think her husband doesn't know, or even if he doesn't that it's any of his business?

I think it's far more common than any of us care to admit. We are programmed to think it's the choice of girls with low standards, low attainment levels, low self esteem, and no ambition or capabilitity to do or be anything 'better'. Of course this means that the girls who choose teen motherhood and secretly wish for it, feel compelled to pretend it was an accident and swear they didn't intend it to happen. To admit they hoped for it and planned it seems such a taboo thing to do, when we all know it gives your child the least favourable outcomes.

@TwoSwannitsno I liked school and did A levels and uni. It was just very very intense at that time 14-16. The desire then died back a little to a sensible level. Like someone earlier said, in my case I think it felt like everyone was maturing quicker than me and it felt like a fast track to being an adult and taken more seriously. Probably would have done the opposite tbh but that’s the teen brain for you!