Young Mom

I guess being a "Young Mom" has a bad wrap that comes with the name. "We can't support our child", "We don't know what's best for our baby", "We are too young to have sex", etc. I guess to some extent they're right but we know what's true and we know what's false.

I'm 17 years old and I'm having my first child, a baby girl. I'm 32 weeks along and am more happy than I've ever been. I have such a great support system and my daughter's dad is my fiance. I've gone through up's and down's with this pregnancy from my parents, my fiance, my fiance's parents, and plenty of on-lookers. I thought by writing a blog I could help answer other young mom's questions and hopefully make a strong community of determined teens.

FINDING OUT I WAS PREGNANT:
When I found out I was pregnant I had a ton of emotions running through me. My fiance, at the time was my boyfriend of a year. And to be honest, we were going through some hard times. So having to tell him I was having his first child was really difficult. But luckily, he embraced me with hugs and told me that it wasn't a bad thing. Little did I know that in just a few weeks it was going to finally hit him and again, we had a rough patch. I truly felt alone and like I had nobody. That was when I made the choice to do it all on my own. I let my ego get the best of me. I wasn't going to tell me parents and I was going to make my boyfriend leave me. When it finally got too difficult emotionally, I gave in and told my parents. My boyfriend seemed to see how hard it was for me and he's been by my side since. He's supported every decision I've made and given me more love that I thought a person could give. As for my parents, they were very shocked and at first didn't know what to say. It took a while, but soon enough I had their full support.

KEEPING THE BABY OR NOT:
This was not a hard decision for me. I'm completely against abortion. And even though I knew I had adoption as an option, I could never find it in me to allow another family to raise my child. I knew that my boyfriend had a say in our plan for this baby as well. And after looking at our options we decided to keep the baby. Yes, we acknowledged how difficult it was going to be. At the time, my boyfriend wasn't working very much and I (still) didn't have a job. But we did have support and love from both sides of our family.

HOW PREGNANCY AFFECTED ME:
I've been on the A-B Honor Roll every year. When I found out I was pregnant I knew that I would be the new talk of the school, something that I was not looking forward to. I talked to my school counselor and my parents and decided that dropping out of school was NOT for me. School has always been a breeze for me so being in the 11th grade and then dropping out was pointless. I didn't want people to know about my pregnancy, so I decided to enroll on online school and finish it out that way. It's been a great choice, for me. My boyfriend, at the time, was a senior at a different school. He made the conscious decision of studying hard and taking his GED. We looked into this a lot and found out that if you scored high enough, you wouldn't receive a GED but a high school diploma instead. I helped him study and he ended up taking the test and receiving his high school diploma early. Now he was able to work more. Since he took this test in March, he's had more time to focus on working hard. He went from working 10-12 hours a week to now receiving two promotions and working almost 40 hours a week. Even though this was the best choice for our family, it may not be for the others of you reading this.

PREGNANCY SYMPTOMS:
The beginning of pregnancy was not enjoyable at all. I was constantly throwing up and not sleeping. Morning sickness hit me like a semi truck. My doctors told me that it would go away eventually and that this pregnancy would be enjoyable. Up until my 17th week I couldn't keep anything down. I was losing weight instead of gaining it and my doctors became very worried about me. I looked into ways of curing this and tried Chinese acupuncture. I can gladly say that I've not gotten sick since. :) At my 19th week I felt my baby kick. Me and my boyfriend were on vacation and on our way to go on a horse back riding trip. On our way there I felt the kick! It was so exciting! At 21 weeks my family and boyfriend were able to feel the baby.


FINDING OUT THE SEX:
Me and my boyfriend knew we couldn't wait. We wanted to find out what our little baby was. For some reason, I just knew that we were having a baby boy! I was even calling my little bump a 'him'. At my 22nd week appointment we went in for my second ultrasound. The OB asked if we wanted to find out and I said yes. When out OB put the picture up on the monitor our baby's legs were wide open and then we heard the words, "You're having a little girl!" My boyfriend and I looked at each other and were so surprised. I just knew I was pregnant and I just knew we were having a baby boy. Goes to show you how much I knew! :P

GOING FROM BOYFRIEND TO FIANCE:
My, now, fiance has been my best friend for awhile now. We started dating back in January '09. And if you're all wondering YES! we've had our up's and down's. And YES! we were having sex right away. We didn't wait long enough and we both regret that to this day. It would have been more special if we waited longer. My parents loved him right away and his parents accepted me like another daughter. We've been so lucky to have such a good support system. On June 22nd, 2010 we sat down and I asked him to promise himself to me and I would promise myself to him. We did and now wear rings. He calls me his fiancee and he's my fiance. I can't picture my life without him and I'm so glad that we're going through this together.

MORE ABOUT BABY:
We decided to name our daughter Gabrielle Joan-Louise. Her middle name is my fiance's grandmother and my grandmother's name combined. We're leaving it a surprise! :) Gabby is a jumping bean! She move's so much and keeps me up at night. She gets hiccups all the time now and recognizes her daddy's voice. My fiance also plays the guitar, so he'll put the guitar near my tummy and she'll move a lot. I haven't gained much weight, only putting on 14 lbs. extra. But little Gabby is gaining enough and is just fine!


Well this was my first blog and I'm planning on updating everyone every couple days! Please contact me with any questions!

-Mommy To Be :)