Teen Pregnancy and Entitlement
65Why Is Our Society Making This an Easier Choice?
Almost 15 years ago when I started my career in social services, I had an occasion to visit a Chicago Public High School. I was there to visit a minor on my caseload. While I was waiting in the guidance office, I noticed a hand lettered poster. The title was "What to do if You are or Think You are Pregnant." The list included the following:
1. Find out how to get free daycare while you finish high school.
2. Find out how to get WIC coupons. (Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) Provides food, nutrition counseling, and access to health services to low-income women, infants, and children. www.fns.usda.gov/wic)
3. Find out how to get Pubic Aid, medical cards and cash assistance for you and your baby.
4. Find out how to get free housing.
No where on that poster was the following included:
1. Go to a doctor and find out if you are actually pregnant.
2. If you are pregnant, talk to a professional counselor about your options and choices.
3. If you are not pregnant, speak to a doctor about birth control methods and STD prevention.
I was 26 years old and single at that time. I was also living with my parents to pay off my student loans (from earning my Master's Degree) and save for a house. I remember thinking that the poster in that office was a blueprint for a teen aged girl to get out of her parents' home and into her own apartment. Have a baby and profit! Have a baby and get all your bills paid! It almost sounded good to me but as an educated adult, I could really imagine and comprehend the enormous amount of responsibility a baby is. I had married friends with children. Married friends who also worked out of the home in addition to caring for their children. Married friends who had children on their own dime and not the taxpayers'!
Fast forward to age 35. I met and married my husband by age 35. We decided to have one child but we waited until we were married almost 3 years before trying. My husband was finishing his Engineering degree and we just bought our first home together. We wanted to have two incomes before starting a family. We also decided on one child so we could send him to college and still be able to retire a decent age in order to enjoy our "golden years" together. So far, we have managed to have him and raise him without all the "freebies" mentioned in that poster I read all those years before. Our son is now 2 and a half years old.
Then about a year ago, we found out that my husband's 16 year old niece was pregnant. This was a planned pregnancy. (If her mother had only read her Facebook pages once in a while, she would have found this out and maybe not have let her daughter spend so much unsupervised time with boyfriend but that's a topic for another time.)
Of course his niece knew all about WIC and signed up for Public Aid. Instead of encouraging adoption and speaking with her about her alternatives, some of the family threw her a baby shower. She also enrolled in an alternative school especially for teen mothers. The school even held a Prom. Her pregnancy and subsequent teen motherhood was "normalized" and also subsidized by the taxpayers.
You have to wonder how many teen aged girls would choose to get pregnant if they had to sign loan repayment agreements with the hospital, doctors and anesthesiologist prior to giving birth? What if there was no WIC unless one did "sweat equity" or some sort of community service in order to receive it. What if there were no longer any entitlement programs? What if these girls were held accountable for their adult decisions? Somehow I think there would be a lot less unprotected sex and fewer overseas adoptions.
Artica Burr 2 years ago
Being a social worker you have to be on the thump of a lot of todays social trends. Indeed the balloon with responsibility written on it is leaking but that has been going on for generations. There are only shades of grey and no solid answers in the cookbook called life. How to take responsibility for your own actions should be a class taught in high school because life indeed has its consequences.
The best anti-up story I ever heard came from an antigue dealer who's daughter got a fine dose of old fashioned values. As the story unfolded, if I recall the details correctly, for it has been 12 years, her 17 year old daughter was in the NYS PINS program, which meant she was unable to accept supervision from her parents and the court was overseeing her as to curfews etc. The program helps when youth are drinking, coming home on drugs, being abusive etc and are minors. The daughter became pregnant and the court ordered her to be placed in a home for unwed mothers rather than allow the daughter to live at home with her parents and have her child. The parents were outraged especially when they were given limited visitation with her and she was sent to the Carolinas.
As it turned out it changed everything in the family's case for the better. The teen-mother spent her time expecting and a full six months after she gave birth, getting her GED, learning about child care, parenting, and job training so she would be prepared to make the biggest decision of her life. Her parents had limited visits and input. When the baby reached six months old, the teen decided to utilize the gift of adoption, or retain her child and face the real world as a young, single mother. This particular teen chose to keep her baby and returned back to New York State.
There were further restrictions placed on the family. Their teen daughter had to live independantly,not with her family, get a job, and prove she could make it on her own for the next six months or back to the reconsider adoption circle. The teen was well prepared. She had bonded well with her baby in the educational environment away from family where she easily could have shirked full committment. The baby, and the program brought out the best in the teen-mother. My friend was amazed and grateful to the court for its wisdom. Her teenage daughter was full of self pride,healthy independance, and love for her baby.
If taxpaper money is used as a stepping stone instead of a maintenance routine wonders can happen. Quite a few of the girls chose adoption rather than effort but one can not say they made less than an educated choice and likely a wise one.
Apparently sensible social workers such as yourself were employed to help the life changing decision making along. A lot of teenagers think life is a soap opera. Nothing is as real as bringing a child into the world.