Yesterday I was working in our Queens office and had 3 girls walk in. The first was 17, the second was 15, and the third was 14. They all thought they could be pregnant. It was totally beyond me how girls so young could be sexually active at such a young age. I don’t know what they were getting out of these relationships that they weren’t getting other places, like home or school, but I knew I had to talk to these girls about abstinence. When I brought it up for the first time they all raised their eyebrows and said, “What’s that?” I explained abstinence to them and how, unlike other types of birth control, it didn’t have any negative side effects and was guaranteed that they couldn’t get pregnant or contract STD’s. Fortunately, while talking to the girls, it turned out that all three of them wanted to keep their babies if it turned out that they were pregnant. As happy as this made me, I had to ask them: What would you do with a baby? They said things like snuggle it, love it, feed it so I had to rain on their parade and explain the amount of time, money, and energy it takes to take care of a baby. I told the girls that having a baby is a 24 hour job each and every single day and that no allowance they get from their parents is going to pay for clothes, food, diapers and other necessities they baby needs. I also explained that at the end of the day after school they wouldn’t be able to hang out with their friends all day because they would have to go pick up the baby from day care, bring her home and feed her, play with her, give her a bath and put her to bed. After that they still need to do homework so they can maintain good grades so they can go to college and get a job. I told them that it wasn’t impossible to do, just that it was a lot harder, and that I’ve seen a lot of other girls do it. The youngest girls left after that. Hearing about the responsibilities of a child and the fact that they might not be able to go to their senior prom or high school football games made them realize having a baby meant giving up a lot. They left and I was comfortable with the way everything had ended.
The oldest girl that came in was concerned about some abnormal developments that had presented themselves some time after becoming sexually active with her boyfriend. She said that he was the only guy she had been intimate with but that he had been with other girls before her. I broke my heart to have to tell her but she needed to know that she could have possibly contracted an STD from her boyfriend and should go get checked out by a doctor as soon as possible. She was a little shocked but didn’t want to believe that it would happen to her. She left our office in denial of the fact that her boyfriend could have given her a STD. Talking with these girls really made me appreciate the freedom that living an abstinent life provides. If I was sexually active I would have to worry about getting pregnant and wonder about whether or not I could have an STD where being abstinent allows me to enjoy my relationship with my boyfriend in a safe, clean, and moral way.
1 comment:
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I have volunteered at a crisis pregnancy center for three years now and have similar experiences to what you have described here. I find it extremely sad that our society gives young women a raw deal in that it tells them to go out and be sexually active and yet abandons them when it comes to support in life decisions such as abstinence and raising a child. These are choices also.
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