Hi!!
I'm doing my grad dip in maternity, and as part of my assessment we have to present a seminar at the hosptials on a topic of interest.
I've always been interested in young mums, esp. teenage pregnancies, and the support/lack of support they recieve. which is slim to none, and I feel you might need more support than older parents.
So I'm thinking of doing mine on that, I'm still not 100% but would like to hear from young parents, their experiences, anythings specifically I can focus on, if people think it is an issue etc...
thanks guys!!!!
I was 17 when I fell pg with DD1, 20 with DD2. Had them at 18 & 21.
IME there is no real support, too much descrimination. Its not easy. Being young is hard enough, add peoples assumptions to it, & the lack of people to talk to & support.
I was 19 when I fell pregnant with DS.
I've also had severe PND and that was even more of a struggle through the awful systems.
Let me know if you want any info. xo
If anyone could share their stories that would be great, on here or feel free to pm or email me. I need as much information as possible and really want to know what people went through.
Lulu - yea I only know of one though where i am (midwife led) and one doula ran one. I'm in the ACT and I think that is all we have.
In regards to support what type of things would people want/find useful. Like do you think that going to highschools and talking to classmates and teachers about teenage pg would be useful?
also where would young people most likely find information, I know the internet is a big one...but this sort of thing it's only if you are looking for it. I'm sure alot of young mums wouldn't know if there any let alone what support is out there.
I fell pregnant with #1 when i was 14 and gave birth at 15. Now expecting #2 and currently 17 and bub will be born when im 18. People are shocked to learn how young i am as i dont look my age i have always looked older. I didnt get too much grief during my 1st pregnancy, The hospital was great and the midwives asked me what i wanted to do and listened to me. Everything went great, I had no problems everything was text book. My mum wasnt supportive untill i was almost due to give birth, But my Dad shocked me and he supported me since i told him. Being so young was a bit of a challenge and yes it was hard but we got through it. People ask me "are you still with the father" like they are expecting me to say no, Actually yes i am and plan to be for a long time. I had more problems with my friends then with anyone else, Once you have a baby all your friends are "too busy" for you or you just dont hear from them ever again. It deffinately shows you who your true friends are.
Having been there and done that (well doing it again lol) i wish all young parents good luck. Its not easy but its deffinately worth it.
I was 16 when I fell PG with DD1 (unplanned), 17 when she was born. I was about 6 mths PG when I graduated high school.
I was 19 when I fell PG with DS1 (planned) and 20 when he was born.
TBH I was very lucky, I didn't feel a lot of judgement from family, school or health workers, Drs etc.
I never expected to be judged or treated differently, and so I probably wasn't as sensitive to any prejudice IYKWIM - if I got it, I never noticed
A lot of this is owing to the support I got from mum, I cannot fault her in the slightest, the help & support she gave me, and from the school. They never treated me any differently. I had teachers congratulate me on my pregnancy & one of them gave me pregnancy book. Mothers of my friends gave me bags of clothing, etc etc.
My local MCHN was great, she was so warm & again, she never made me feel like I was anything less than any other mother.
I guess if I look at my experience as being a really easy adjustment for me, I can see that it would not have been, had it not been for that support.
So I think if there's anything young mums really need it's initial support - someone or somewhere to go to know that it can & will be ok, and that there's help, and that not everyone will judge them.
It might sound strange but I really do think that if I received any judgement I was oblivious to it & that helped enormously.
The only thing I would really have liked that I didn't get was more support to continue my education. Not the school's fault, there was another girl in yr 1o when she had her baby, the school made allowances for her to be able to continue & she graduated - but because I was at the end of high school it was too easy to let my university hopes slip away. The principle tried to talk me into continuing but he was the only one & at that stage to me it all seemed too hard.
At one stage I was considering starting a group for young mums where I used to live - the MCHN was backing me on that, but it didn't happen. I still think it might be a good thing though especially in areas where there are a lot of young mums.
I ended up going to playgroup with one of my old teachers - she wanted me to talk at the high school about the reality of being a young mum - I never ended up doing it for a few reasons, one of which was she wanted me to tell everyone how awful it was & I didn't want to be so negative about it.
What would that do to a girl who listened to me & then found herself PG? What a way to make her feel confident that her life's not in the toilet
Young mums
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