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Tween Moms Apparently Not All That Uncommon
Filed under: In The News, Weird But True, Delivery
Please don't let this spark a new MTV reality series. Credit: Getty Images
They are from Romania after all, she tells Time magazine. She may have a point. Anyone who has seen a Dracula or Frankenstein movie knows weird things happen in that country.
Still ... eeewww!
Most of us would rather see Dr. Frankenstein sew a creature together from dead body parts than wrap our brains around a sexually active and pregnant 10-year-old.
Yet, Time offers some startling -- if more than slightly icky -- facts about teenage pregnancy. If you can even call it teenage pregnancy. Some of the babies who are having babies have years to go before they're teens.
The magazine reports a 9-year-old girl in northeast China gave birth to a baby boy earlier this year. In 2008, the magazine recalls, a 9-year-old girl in Idaho got pregnant and carried the baby to term.
The youngest mother on record comes from a Time magazine story in 1939, that reported a Peruvian girl named Lina Medina gave birth at age 6.
According to the World Health Organization, 10 percent of girls in low- and middle-income countries (and no, that does not include Idaho) become mothers by the age of 16. Some 11 percent of all births worldwide are to mothers ages 10 to 19.
That's risky for both the child and the child's child.
Time magazine reports tween and teen mothers account for 23 percent of the diseases related to childbirth worldwide. They are four times more likely to die during child birth and face an increased risk of anemia, postpartum hemorrhage, depression, mental illness and missing the prom.
At least 65 percent of the expectant mothers who develop obstetric fistula -- in which a hole occurs in the perineum or between the vagina and bladder due to difficulties during labor -- do so during adolescence.
The babies themselves also face an increased risk of death because of low birth weight, respiratory problems and so forth.
The moral of the story? If you want to start a family, wait until you graduate from elementary school.
And maybe -- at least -- a good 12 years after that.
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ReaderComments (Page 1 of 1)
11-04-2010 @ 11:22AM
Bonnie Ferguson said...This sentence was great guys - If you want to start a family, wait until you graduate from elementary school. Parents should really be helping their young kids know what's okay and what's not. Whatever happened to the days of playing house and not living the real thing? So much of what the kids are stupidly doing these days is coming from what they're allowed to watch and then imitate. If you're still trying to make sure your kids get DECENT entertainment, there are some great family-friendly games at Http://bit.ly/GamesForFree Having kids at 10 years old isn't going to make for a happy life for mother or baby. Not now and not 15 years from now when mom is finally 25 and trying to raise a teenager pulling her own shenanigans.
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11-05-2010 @ 5:58PM
Jenni-Anne said...Bonnie, I respectfully disagree. What's going on with kids/teens has nothing to do with what they watch. I think it has way more to do with the fact that most parents are too lazy or busy to ever sit down with their children and talk to them about what they watch. TV, especially shows parents hate, can be a great learning experience for children if parents take the time to sit down and watch the show with the child and talk to them about it.
But I don't think parents in general talk enough to their children about important issues. There are things we come across every day that open up millions of opportunities to converse with our children. Issues that can mean the difference between life and death.
I was out with my 11.5 year old daughter recently when a couple young teen girls in the line next to us were talking about trying to get pregnant and not caring who the father was. My daughter just about fell over. She couldn't understand why they'd want to do something so "stupid". She said they weren't much older than her and were still kids. Then she asked where their parents were. It was a great chance to have an important talk with her.
11-06-2010 @ 7:06PM
wendy said...That last line was not "great". It was ignorance at its worst. Do you mean to say that 10 year old girls, having sexual contact,is their fault? And the perpetrators, grown men, use tv programs that children watch, as an excuse to violate children? Grown men, Bonnie, molest young girls. And they will do anything to get them, as they are master manipulators. The girls are threatened with various acts of harm to them and their family if they tell. This has nothing to do with what they are watching. They, the girls, havent been "sullied" by menses yet, and therefore, in the violators mind, no pregnancy. You should be going after the men who impregnate those litttle girls, and be asking why they are getting away with it.
12-15-2010 @ 7:48PM
Rachael said...Wow, you're ignorant. My parents never censored anything for me, in terms of entertainment. I'm nineteen now and not even sexually active, let alone pregnant. Kids aren't as stupid as you seem to think.
11-06-2010 @ 4:12PM
wendy said...Does anyone here realize that this is a common occurance with sexual abuse? From an adult? We are not talking about teen girls that believe a baby will validate their existance ( which is very sad) but little girls! This is crazy that comments about tv shows, and lazy parents are causing 10 year olds being pregnant. Its adult men molesting little girls. How is tv shows doing this? And why is the blame being put on little girls? Where is your rage at the men who are impregnating the children? Unbelievable..
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12-22-2010 @ 4:28PM
MzAttitude said...I agree with everything you're saying. However, the 10 year old who gave birth in Spain who is from Romania that this story started out with was NOT impregnated by a grown man. The father of the child was, if I recall, 11 or 12 when they conceived a child - TOGETHER. While it is NOT our social norm, it doesn't make it right or wrong when both were young consensual partners. I understand we were raised in a country that, for some time now, has seen an adult as an 18 yaer old...but there are still parents willing to marry off their daughters at 16 to 30 year old men HERE IN THE USA (Trust me, a friend of mine dropped out to marry a man who was 32, with parental consent after they moved to Kentucky).
While we do have the means to live longer, not every country does. Therefore, in order to keep their communities thriving, they need to marry and reproduce at younger ages than we do. And, not too long ago, in our own country, we married our daughters off shortly after their menarche...to second cousins no less.
Please understand that just because we see things one way, it does not mean EVERYONE in this world has to see it that way.
11-08-2010 @ 12:50AM
Sun said...This mom of new 10 years old mom to newborn are nuts! Just ten years old child already had a baby and barely in probably fourth or fifth grade! That's very sad. Now she have to grow up very quickly and never to have her childhood back and teenager years back. SAD
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11-09-2010 @ 5:15PM
originlcin said...Mandatory abortion.
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11-09-2010 @ 5:56PM
Heather said...I had my first child one week before my 14th bday. I believe in most cases it comes from the family situation. I lived with my great grandmother and was very lonely and looking for love in the wrong place. Of course there was a ready and willing 17 yr old who was more than willing to "love" me, untill I became pregnant that is. In the case of 9 and 10 yr olds, that is definitely abuse.
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11-12-2010 @ 10:06AM
Mel said...It has been reported that the father of the 10 year old Romanian girl's baby is a minor as well, not an adult man. It is very sad to me that girls are getting pregnant at younger and younger ages. I do think that to young impressionable girls shows like 16 and Pregnant and Teen Mom do glorify teen pregnancy, and it drives me nuts! I made a few mistakes when I was sixteen and I got pregnant, but it was related to my home life and I am married to the father of my son today. It is difficult being a wife and mother in high school (or elementary school) and I just don't think kids realize what a challenge it is because TV and movies make it look so easy.
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11-13-2010 @ 8:13PM
Amanda said...Just so you know the 9 year old in Idaho was raped repeatedly by her mother's boyfriend. Her mother KNEW she was pregnant, and did nothing and went to jail for it. The man was convicted, and will be deported after he completes his sentence. She had to go into foster care. While I do not agree that young children should be sexually active, I wish people would get their facts straight. A pregnancy resulting from child molestation is not the same as a pregnancy resulting from being sexually active. She told people at school that she was pregnant, they all though she was lying, after all, she was so young. This was a sad sad case of a child being abused and ignored, and not at all the same as consensual seual activity.
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2-28-2011 @ 2:32PM
Ann said...This is a topic that needs more care and thoughtful consideration than the author gave to it. To include such flippant comments such as missing the prom at the end of a very serious statement about possible death to a child mother was both appalling and in very poor taste. The writer may want to consider another line of writing, perhaps a gossip column.
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3-16-2011 @ 8:49AM
LESLI said...You completely missed the mark here and I am sorry that I even read this article. While it should have been an interesting and serious piece, you chose to treat it like a joke. "Missing the prom", really? Like that's the most important thing in a kid's life when most kids in those countries mentioned don't have a prom. How absolutely insulting and ignorant of the conditions these kids are in. How about looking at angles like historically, women have given birth young and can the case be made that we are trying to "swim up stream" biologically and have babies later in life. Or how having children at a more mature age is a luxury of more developed, better educated countries. Or how about the economic and social factors involved in these cases. Or even if you had presented the medical issues facing a young mother been written better, it might have salvaged your article. Next time, figure out your tone and what works best before you begin writing and stick to it.
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