Strollerderby : young mothers

What They're Babbling About: Birthdays, Babyproofing and Twilight

JeanneSager — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 16:31:00 GMT

A Babble take on what's going on around the blogosphere for you:

Ever been tempted to just bag the birthday bash and take the kids for ice cream? Find out what the experts have to say about this form of "bad" parenting. - ParentDish

Rewarding good behavior? Well, that's just not done. Snort. Would you give this kid a cookie? - CafeMom

Twilight got you atwitter? Check out the wolf pack - and weigh in on how that makes your alpha mom growl. - MamaPop

Remember the Sex and the City episode when Carrie's Manolos were stolen because the party hostess said no shoes where the baby crawls? Parents are wondering - how do you babyproof the houseguests? - AlphaMom

Are young mothers getting the stink-eye for being young? - Momversation

Is Madlyn Primoff just an example of frustrated parents everywhere . . . just a bit over the edge? - The Juggle

Homeschooling is certainly not a new thing, but if you're a homeschooling parent getting criticism, how about hauling out these names of successful former homeschool students. Showed them, huh? - Mental Floss

Image: EssentialBaby

Get Ready, Get Set, Read With Celebrities!

Evangelical Teens' Very Active Sex Lives

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 21:00:00 GMT

In this week's issue of The New Yorker, there's a cartoon that made me laugh so hard I spit out my tea. Although it's not technically Bristol Palin's unborn child speaking, it easily could be. Two kids are sitting on a stoop and one says to the other, "I was an abstinence-only baby."

An article by Margarot Talbot in this same New Yorker tackles the issue of evangelical teen pregnancy in a more serious vein. Even for someone who is already convinced that abstinence-only sex education doesn’t work, these statistics are shocking.

Although 74 percent of white evangelical teenagers are opposed to premarital sex, more evangelical teens are sexually active than almost any other major religious group, including mainline Protestants, Jews, and Mormons. The average age for an evangelical to lose her virginity is 16. And half of these kids are not using protection. Compare that with 69 percent of non-evangelical teens who report using contraception every time they have sex.

The reason for this high percentage of unsafe sex among evangelical teens likely stems from shame at being sexually active—if you carry around condoms or suggest using one, you could give the impression that you are looking for sex. Furthermore, abstinence-only sex ed. teaches that condoms are not effective protection against STDs and pregnancy.

As we’ve seen in the widespread conservative support for Bristol Palin’s plans to get married and have a baby at age 17, for many evangelical parents, a teen daughter becoming pregnant is not a problem—so long as she keeps the baby and marries the father. This is a perfectly valid attitude based on a personal moral belief. The problem is that this retroactive problem solving often does not lead to happy families.

The states with the highest divorce rates and the highest teen pregnancy rates are all red (where people are, obviously, more likely to be evangelical conservatives than social liberals). The states with the lowest divorce and teen-pregnancy rates are all blue.

Many are arguing, even within the evangelical community, that if Christians want to preserve a commitment to abstinence until marriage, they must do more to encourage happier, younger marriages, since delaying sex until age 25 or 30 is just not realistic.

A large part of encouraging young Christians to have happier relationships is offering them more realistic attitudes toward sex. If hormonal teenagers are taught, for instance, that masturbation is sinful, they are more likely to have less engagement with and control over their bodies. Similarly, teen girls who are taught that they can always become "born-again virgins" if they "accidentally" have sex before marriage are not likely to embark on a responsible sex life. And such guilt-addled, unrealistic attitudes toward sex are likely to cause problems for couples well into marriage.

Photo: Mary Ellen Mark/The New Yorker

Could Sex on TV Lead to Teen Pregnancy?

Tyra Banks Talks to Wanna-be Teen Moms

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 20:30:00 GMT

Guests on last night’s Tyra Banks Show included a pregnant 13-year-old who used to want to be a lawyer, but who now says, without a tone of regret, that she doesn’t think she’ll make it to college. A 14-year-old who is actively trying to get pregnant said that she believes that her boyfriend would “probably marry” her if she got pregnant—unless he decides he doesn’t want to be with her anymore “for some reason.” Perhaps that reason could be going to college instead of continuing to mow lawns to support his family? This teenager also said that she wants a baby because she thinks baby showers are just so “fun and adorable!” Tyra wisely reminded her that a baby shower lasts for two hours.

I’d like to pass the topic of this show off as one of those sensational trends that gets a lot of media coverage but doesn’t necessarily reflect real life. But the fact is, one in three teenage girls will become pregnant before she turns 20—that’s the highest rate of teen pregnancy in the industrialized world. And teen pregnancy rates in the U.S. are on the rise for the first time in 15 years.

It’s clear from listening to these girls talk that they are lacking something fundamental—a sense of control over their lives or the experience of unconditional love, to put it broadly. Adolescence is such a difficult time of life and the thought that one could have a tiny, adorable being to devote one’s self to—rather than having to work to forge a life for one’s self—could be appealing to some youth. But, naturally, this fantasy is nothing like the reality of being a teen mom.

Young men and women need not only comprehensive sex education, but parenting and marriage education that explains that these are not states into which one enters lightly. And almost all of the media hubbub over teen pregnancy has focused on girls. What about the boys who are getting these girls pregnant? They need to understand the consequences of their actions just as much as girls do, including the risk that having sex at such a young age will make their partners long for, and perhaps seek, more commitment than they can handle.

Thanks to Jezebel, you can watch a clip of the last night’s show here.

Photo: informedvoters.wordpress.com

Are Shotgun Weddings the Best Answer to Teen Pregnancy?

Czech Law Forces Pregnant Teens Out of School

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 22:34:00 GMT

The legal system is no friend to pregnant teens in the Czech Republic, according to the Prague Daily Monitor. Because Czech law only permits gifted or handicapped students to follow individualized study plans, pregnant teens must either take a full high school course load throughout their pregnancies or discontinue their studies until they are able to do so—which, with a newborn at home, may not happen for a long time, if at all.

Czech police also aggressively investigate cases of underage intercourse, whether or not it’s consensual. The case of one 13-year-old girl will be under investigation as soon as she gives birth, with her 17-year-old partner facing up to four years of prison.

Considering the unfortunate situations these young parents-to-be find themselves in, Czech sexologists recommended increasing sex ed. in schools and in families, saying that better informed girls are more likely to use birth control and to have fewer sexual partners.

Looking on the bright side, the Prague Daily Monitor reminds its readers that teen pregnancy rates in the Czech Republic remain very low—unlike in "other countries like the United States."

Photo: supernannyrules.com

10-Year-Old Gives Birth in Idaho

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Sun, 11 May 2008 03:13:00 GMT

This is a story with so many tragic layers that there’s really nothing to report but the sad facts: An Idaho girl, just a child herself at 10-years-old, delivered a six-pound baby by C-section. The alleged father, 37-year-old Guadalupe Gutierrez-Juarez, has been charged with rape and is being held in county jail. The girl, who was 9-years-old when she became pregnant, may have had a medical condition that caused her to have an unusually early onset of puberty. Police only became aware of the situation after the girl went to a doctor's office for treatment the day before she gave birth. Very little information is being released about the young mother, who is in state custody along with her baby.

Reading a story like this, I have to remind myself of the almost miraculous resiliency of the human spirit. Both the 10-year-old and her baby are in good health, and it is not naive to hope that they will one day lead healthy, happy lives.

In another sad twist to the story, Gutierrez-Juarez is a suspected illegal immigrant, so that some Web commentators have seized on this tragedy to call for tougher immigration laws. Whatever one’s beliefs on legislating immigration, let’s hope that reason prevails in this case, and one horrific event is not used to make blanket characterizations about the millions of immigrants living peacefully in the U.S.

Photo: localnews8.com

Butt Cream for Your Face

Madeline Holler — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 20:03:00 GMT

Want face cheeks as soft as a baby's butt cheek? Of course you do (only without the diaper rash). Women in the U.K. have been applying an all-natural baby butt cream to all cheeks concerned and makers of the product can't keep it in stock.

Women there have been stampeding the stores in search of a $4 pot of Waitrose's Baby Bottom Butter, after comments about the stuff's alternative uses -- on mom's face, not just baby's behind -- began appearing on parenting websites.

Here's what they've been saying:

"I have been using it constantly for 2 weeks now and my skin now has the smoothest texture, which I don't think it's had since prepubescence.

"And it makes my foundation look super dewy and youthful too. It is SO much better than all the expensive face creams I have tried - including Creme de la Mer."

Ingredients include olive oil, camomile and lavender.

A cosmetic surgery expert is skeptical, reminding women that this isn't the first cream touted as a miracle (apparently Prep H gets smeared on faces for a younger look). He also says women who have babies are younger, therefore there skin is too. Ha! If only ...

Photo: Daily Mail

Pregcellent: Looking Beyond Jamie-Lynn To Talk Teen Pregnancy

Jessica Ashley (Sassafrass) — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:57:00 GMT

I've delighted in talking Jamie-Lynn, Juno and even a little For Keeps in a Holly-goss sort of way like any other savvy, (ahem) oh-so-hip parent these last few weeks. But now, the conversation about teenagers having babies needs to open up a bit. And I think it needs to expand beyond the finger-wagging abstainance talks, the head-shaking birth control questions and the so-sad, so-sad what-can-I-possibly-do discussions that go no further.

Like many, many other parents, I never intended to be a single mother. And yet, here I am on the verge of it. But no matter how freaked out about finances or finding love again or being the only one around when the inevitable vomit tsunami hits some strangely quiet 2 a.m., I am so grateful to have the support and resources and experience in life that I have. And beyond my own self and circumstances, I am so grateful that there are great organizations that offer all of those things and so much more to the many young women facing motherhood alone, homeless or in need of support they've not yet found. The more challenges I face, the more I appreciate those organizations, like New Moms Inc. in my own corner of the world, and what they give over and over to change the course of the lives of teenage mothers and their children.

When my church women's group chose to work with New Moms Inc. here in Chicago, there were skeptics among us. Not every woman wanted to be involved with a group that they feared "encouraged" being young, single and a mother. It was tough for me and tough for them as these women confronted their own fears and judgments. Interestingly, most of that skepticism turned once we were introduced to the young women this organization served. As we heard their stories of where they came from -- heartbreaking stories of being gang raped or fired from their after-school job and kicked out of their home once bosses and parents found out they were pregnant, caught up in circumstance or the system or one simple poor choice -- and where they are -- in a group home with strict schedules and vocational training and book groups and nutritional cooking classes and their plans -- to go back to school or into self-supporting careers or mentoring other young mothers, there was an overwhelming sense of responsiblity, accountability and need to connect with this organization and its participants.

During the holidays, even when too much family time is driving me crazy and too many shopping trips has me exhausted, I'm reminded how fortunate I am to have those specific issues. And I am reminded of the many high school aged women who will be starting from scratch this New Year's, either with children or with babies on the way. My wish is that more parents, especially mothers, will include teenaged moms and the services that aide them in their gifts, prayers, warm thoughts and shifting judgments. With programs that support self-sufficiency and cycle-breaking and minds that embrace empowering young mothers rather than shunning them even more, maybe all of our kids will be having a very different conversation about teenage pregnancy years down the line.