Impact of Teen Pregnancy on Mother and Child: an Explainer

Teen Pregnancy. You hear about it but, never really think that it could be you until that is you, your life is about to flip completely upside down. Your life changes but so does the child’s who isn't even born yet, most teen mothers are not ready to graduate high school much less raise a child. Think about it, the child is coming into a world of complete chaos possibly not having a father, the mother is not ready, and maybe even not getting to meet the person that carried you for 9 months and going straight into the adoption system. Maybe the child will be loved more than it could’ve with the birth mother maybe it doesn't get loved. The mother and child will both live their lives knowing that there is someone out there they have never met. On the other side, there are also teen moms who are living their best lives with their baby and a happy family.

For example, this is Emily, she was 17 years old and just starting her senior year of high school when she got pregnant. She and her boyfriend had been together for about a year. She was very involved with her school she played the flute and was the captain of her school’s dance team. She was also very involved in taking dance classes and even Hannah 2 taught her own classes at her studio outside of school. When Emily found out she was pregnant, fear was the biggest thing she felt, but she also felt a strange calmness about being a teen mom. Telling her parents was also one of her biggest fears and is what made her scared the most. Of course, she was nervous about how she would be able to care for a child and how her life would change from what she had planned. On the other side, her boyfriend had big plans to go to college with Emily and someday marry her but this was about to change everything. Did she consider not keeping the child? No, she never considered that due to her being adopted herself she didn’t want to do that to her child. Emily knew from the beginning she would raise the child. She went through her senior year and a week before she had her baby turned one Emily and her boyfriend ended up getting married. At the time they both were full-time college students, working and trying to raise a baby girl. A little over a year Emily and her boyfriend ended getting divorced. She ended up getting remarried when her daughter was about three years old and had another child shortly after. Now when she isn’t running children around she works on her own photography business.

Through all of this she is still doing well in life and has a happy marriage with four children when asked if she has any advice teen moms could apply to their lives, she said: “don’t get lost in Hannah 3 the negative but choose the find the positive.”

Effects of Graduation rates and Statistics

Thirty percent of all teen girls drop out of high school due to teen pregnancy. Less than 2% of teen mothers finish college by age 30. Teen mothers who have the child while attending a community college are sixty-five percent less likely to complete their degree. With that being said most teen moms have a hard time getting jobs and starting a career due to them not having a college degree or even a high school diploma, and also needing someone to watch their baby, then you would have to pay to have someone to watch your child while still having money issues. “About 77 percent of teen pregnancies are not planned, 61 percent end in actually giving birth to the child, 15 percent end in a miscarriage, and 25 percent end with the mother having an abortion”. “The birthrate for teenagers also declined by 2% between 1999 and 2000 (from 48.8 to 47.7 births per 1,000 women aged 15–19). The 2000 rate was 5% lower than the 1986 rate and 23% lower than the peak rate of 61.8 births per 1,000 women reached in 1991. Teenagers’ abortion rate in 2000 was 24.0 per 1,000 women aged 15–19 — some 3% lower than the 1999 rate of 24.7 per 1,000. From Hannah 4 1986 to 2000, the abortion rate dropped by 43%; during the same period, the proportion of teenage pregnancies ending in abortion fell from 46% to 33% — a decline of more than one-quarter (27%)”.

Divorce

Eight out of ten teen fathers don’t marry the mother of their child. Most people that get married under the age of 18 are more likely to get divorced within the first 10 years of marriage, also getting married as a teen parent makes the divorce rate even higher with the stress of having a child, still trying to grow up and not being mature, also trying to be financially stable to support you and your now family you will be working so much that you won't get to spend the time needed to have a successful marriage, according to the teenage pregnancy and divorce rates, men and women that marry as teens are more likely to get divorced than couples that are over the age of 25, only 24 percent of marriages end in divorce after getting married after the age of 25. Over the past 25 years, the teen pregnancy rate has gone down from 117.6 percent of pregnancies to 43.3 percent due to teens making the decision to wait until getting married to have sexual intercourse and also the number of effective contraceptives used by teens. Hannah 5 This is because many schools take an abstinence-only approach when teaching on sexual education, but a major part of prevention is having an active parent. “A sexually active teen who doesn’t use contraceptives has a 90% chance of becoming pregnant within a year”.

Effects on the Child and Family of the Teen Mother

Many people just think about the mother’s life being affected but, have you thought about the child? “At the family level, adolescents with mothers who gave birth as teens and/or whose mothers have only a high school degree are more likely to have a baby before age 20 than teen whose mothers were older at their birth or who attended at least some college. Having lived with both biological parents at age 14 is associated with a lower risk of a teen birth”. The child of a teen mother is also more likely to have more health problems and face unemployment as an adult due to the child possibly having lower school achievements causing the drop out rate to increase. “According to the teen pregnancy and divorce statistics from the CDC, It is more likely to have teen pregnancy occur in families where the parents are divorced. Unfortunately, teen moms who get married young and possibly divorce are also more likely to have their own children become pregnant as teens as well”. When a teenager becomes pregnant and has a child, it is reasonable to expect that this affects the family of the teenager too, mostly because the new baby requires a lot of love and attention, families won’t have the time due to working and trying to provide for the family. With nearly 80 percent of teenagers wanting to live with their parents 1 year after they have the child the parents will most likely care for the child too, while still trying to live their lives.

With all of the being said having a teen pregnancy doesn’t just affect you while being a teen you will have this child for 18 years or even more, it will also affect your future if you planned to go to college, you might not now due to you wanting to stay home with your child or having to work full time, your about to graduate high school if you stayed in school and your parents are thinking you will move out and off to college but maybe you stay home then they too are having to do the baby thing all over again: baby proofing everything, helping find a daycare, possibly even helping financially or even in some cases taking in the child. When getting into a relationship you should probably think about the many other people you will impact and effect if you get pregnant as a teen.