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Two brothers, two babies
Filed under: Teens, Your Pregnancy, Siblings, Day Care & Education
"I'd have liked to have settled down with a nice man first but it didn't happen. I was ready to have a baby anyway." So says Elizabeth Rawling of Bristol, England. The only thing is, she's not a thirty-something professional with a good job and a home of her own, she's a seventeen-year-old girl living on government assistance in a council flat.She is not the only unemployed teenage mother, of course, but her situation is a bit different. Her son Kaylum, who is sixteen-months-old, was fathered by Michael Bayford, who is also seventeen and unemployed. The couple broke up shortly after Kaylum was born and Elizabeth went at it with Michael's nineteen-year-old brother, Alan. That led to five-week-old Harvey.
While Michael accepts that Kaylum is his son, brother Alan is not sure Harvey is his. "It was a drunken moment," he says. "I don't want anything to do with her." Miss Rawling is now dating a twenty-two year old and hopes to become a nurse. Unfortunately, with two kids, I'm not sure she'll have the time to do any kind of nursing that doesn't involve boobs and babies.
According to the article, Miss Rawling lost her virginity when she was but fourteen years old. Call me a prude, but that seems pretty young. I don't know the full details of her family life, but I do wonder where her parents were and how she managed to become sexually active so young. I also hope, for those young boys' sake, that the fathers step up and take responsibility for their offspring.
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ReaderComments (Page 1 of 3)
1-24-2008 @ 1:31PM
Michelle said..."Unfortunately, with two kids, I'm not sure she'll have the time to do any kind of nursing that doesn't involve boobs and babies."
Wow. What a great comment - yes, she made some bad decisions, but to assume that she'll never be able to do anything with her life? Nice.
Reply
1-25-2008 @ 1:47PM
roger.sinasohn said...I don't know about you, but over the last five years, I've had help from my mother-in-law, my sister-in-law, friends, and the close-knit community of parents from Jared's preschool, and I've barely had time to sleep, let alone go to college. I managed to take one English class a few summers ago, but that was before the kids were old enough for their own Saturday morning classes.
Now, certainly, it's possible for a young, single parent to go to college; I have a friend who is a college professor and is working on her doctorate and who also had a child as a teenager. Is it likely for a 17-year-old living on the dole with two kids under two? I don't think so. But hopefully, she'll prove me wrong.
1-24-2008 @ 1:43PM
Karen said...Sounds to me like a better option is to remove these children from this immature, irresponsible little girl that is prone to drunken outings.
Place these INNOCENT babies with someone who both wants them and is capable of providing them with a decent life.
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1-24-2008 @ 1:40PM
Mel said...Oh gosh, Michelle. Context, my dear. This is not a man v. woman issue; this is not about feminism; this is not about human rights or women's right. This is about time, priority, and reality. It is well accepted that when a person (male or female) has children, other things fall by the wayside until the kids are older or grown up. This is just the way it is. I'm sure you agree, actually. You just don't like that these sentiments came from a male.
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1-24-2008 @ 6:04PM
Michelle said...Just curious, but where in my comment did I state that I had an issue with it coming from a man?
1-24-2008 @ 2:38PM
Erika said...Here we go again...judging other parents. You've never been a 14-year-old girl! :o)
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1-24-2008 @ 2:47PM
Nicola said...Surely this story isn't unique? Teenagers have babies. Teenagers have more than one baby if they don't learn the old birth control lesson after the first. If you have access to one brother, you probably have access to the other. Teenage boys aren't the most discriminating lovers. Teenager are sexually active. That is natural and normal. Most of them simply don't get pregnant in the act of enjoying those hormones!
And, for the record, I was barely 14 myself. And I had a lot of fun (well protected) years before I settled down. I am a research scientist now, I have a graduate education and my summa cum laude distinction on the wall next to my Phi Beta Kappa plaque. Sex is a natural (and pleasurable!) process. Lets not get too high and mighty on the poor kid, eh?
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1-24-2008 @ 2:59PM
mamaloo said...I'm kinda with Michelle here. Roger, I usually adore your writing and consider our viewpoints to be very similar, but I think you make a lot of callous remarks and assumptions about this young girl.
Let's give the young woman the benefit of the doubt before we assume her future life will be a big zero.
How about the fact that she could start nursing school in a few years when her own kids start school and by the time she graduates and gets a position her kids will be older when most of her colleagues will only just be beginning to have children. That's a hidden benefit of having kids young.
I have a cousin who get pregnant as a teen. She wasn't making good choices back then. By the time she was in her mid-twenties she was a social worker. So, I know first hand how young irresponsible people can grow and learn.
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1-24-2008 @ 3:57PM
Monica said...England is having some fairly significant problems with teen pregnancy now, to the point where it seems it's become the fashionable decision to make. There have been several programs created to counteract that, but it will take time to change the minds of girls who romanticize the situation.
I understand what Roger is saying, she's made some decisions that are definitely going to have an impact on her life plans for the next 18 years. It doesn't mean she can't do it, but it's sure going to be a lot harder on her.
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1-24-2008 @ 4:12PM
Caelligh said..."I do wonder where her parents were and how she managed to become sexually active so young."
Her parents were probably living their lives rather than outfitting their daughter with a chastity belt and scrutinizing her every move with a spycam. Because that's what it would take to guarantee that she didn't have sex until whatever that magical age is when it's suddenly no problem.
Reply
1-25-2008 @ 1:57PM
roger.sinasohn said...I understand that kids do things their parents don't know about... I wasn't always going to "computer club meetings". (Although, I'd sure like to know where all you sexually-active-at-14'ers were when I was in high school!)
But... fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. After she got pregnant the first time, perhaps it would have been time for the parents to sit down and have a little chat about how babies are made and how you can prevent that?
She was 15 when she got pregnant the first time, by my calculations, so it's not like it could be argued that she was an adult. I don't know. I do know that if Sara came home pregnant at 15, we'd sit down and have a long talk about sex and babies and parties and boys and so on... but actually, we'll (hopefully) do that before she gets pregnant so that she doesn't until she's really ready.
1-24-2008 @ 4:54PM
Anji said...Holy shit, Roger. I lost my virginity at 15. Was I a silly little teenage slut too, like you seem to be implying about this young woman?
I also fell pregnant a few weeks shy of my nineteenth birthday. I now rent a house (paid for by me only), work, have a satisfying social life, hobbies and great prospects.
Pigeon-holing people says more about you than it does about them.
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1-31-2008 @ 5:24PM
isis said...Stats are hard to ignore....while I had very active social life at 15 sex was not even an issue---there was a matter of a gold band, I know some are small but they should still mean something. Temptation was there...and so was teen love(married HS sweetie @18) we both had future goals that didn't include Pampers and Pacifiers until much later.
1-24-2008 @ 5:00PM
Mel said...Fell pregnant? Hmmm. Perhaps it's a regional/dialect thing, but that phrase is suspicious; it implies that pregnancy happens spontaeously, without contribution from she who is pregnant.
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1-24-2008 @ 5:09PM
Anji said...I think it's just a term we use here because "got pregnant" is not grammatically correct. "Became pregnant" is probably a better term, though more cumbersome.
1-24-2008 @ 5:03PM
Mel said...Well, thank goodness her parents were "living their lives"!
We wouldn't want parents to actually raise their children, now would we?
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1-24-2008 @ 5:12PM
Caelligh said...Oh, honestly. You know what I meant. I meant simply that this could happen to the child of any parent/s who share at least some minimum of trust - as in, the teen is allowed to have friends, leave the house for social outings, etc - without the parents hovering over them like parole officers.
This young woman has her own life, her own mind, her own sexual agency. Maybe what those young men (don't forget, it takes two to tango) and she did was short-sighted, and maybe it will make life harder for a while, but she's not doomed to a life on government assistance and she doesn't deserve to be shamed. Nor do her parents!
1-31-2008 @ 4:52PM
isisaquaria said...well said-I have a very full and fulfilling life but my children are at my side. There is no 100% in this world--but where was baby 1 whilst baby 2 was concieved? Sleeping one hopes-and not being neglected for mommies benefit(not making generalizations-not all mothers would do this teen or otherwise.)
1-24-2008 @ 5:11PM
Anji said...Also, there's a very good article about how screwed-up America's view of teenage sexuality is here: http://feministing.com/archives/008467.html
Reply
1-24-2008 @ 5:13PM
Caelligh said...Awesome! I thought I was the only one who read both of these blogs...