For my senior project I chose to do it on something I had personal experience in, such as teen pregnancy, which in this paper I have to have 7 different sources, and many facts. As for many teens having sexually intercourse is a scary thing, but ever scarier than that is finding out that you might be pregnant. This has never been an uncommon thing, but as I found out on “womenshealthchannel.com/teenpregnancy” there has been a decrease in it from the year 1991 through the year 2005. Studies showed that in 1991 60 out of 1000 teenagers became pregnant, and in the year 2005 40.5 out of 1000 became pregnant.They also showed that approximately 1/3 become pregnant in their teen age years, but it also states that more than 80% of those pregnancies are unintended and unintentional. Using different races for example Hispanic women had the highest birth rates in 2006, which showed 83 out of 100 became pregnant, but African Americans had the most dramatic reduction in that year only 23% became pregnant. A different study showed that 25% of teen girls who give birth become pregnant and have another child within two years.
As I found on “pregnantteenhelp.org” there are different options for these pregnant, when they find out that they are in fact pregnant. The first option would be to keep the baby and raise it themselves, which is the option I myself chose. Another option for the teens would be to carry the baby full term, and give it up for adoption. Even then the teen has the choice of having an open adoption which mean that they would receive pictures and letters knowing how the child is, and what they look like. or the have the choice of having a normal closed adoption which means they would have no contact what so ever with the child, or with its adoptive parents. The other option is to have have an abortion, which means to fully terminate the pregnancy. A recent study on abortion showed that more than 25% of women when they find out they are pregnant have and abortion, but that is just for the percentage of the world, as for when it comes to the United States nearly 40% of women have abortions. More than 52% of abortions are obtained by women who are under the age of 25. Another study showed that teenagers are more apt to have a late abortion. Although in my own opinion I believe that abortion is wrong, and that it should be all together banned, because there are too many people in this world who can’t have children, and would love to have one, even if it would mean that they would have to adopt someone elses.
According to the “Washington Post” the teen birth rate nationally feel 30% from the year 1991 all the way to 2002. They stated that if it had not dropped during that decade, 1.2 million more children would have been born to teenage mothers in the United States. Another good reason that it dropped would be that 460,000 would have been living in poverty due to being born to a teenage mother, and 700,000 would have been born into a single parent home, most likely only have a mother and no father. Adolescents who become pregnant at an early age, if they decide to keep the baby, are more likely to drop out of school, which in return leads to lower paying jobs for the parent, which in most cases drives them into trying to find other ways to provide for their children, even if it would mean doing it illegally. Also young mothers are less likely to marry which would mean that their children would be raised in a home with only one income, and probably no support from the other parent. Even if the to teens decide not to stay together, the mother is offered the right to collect what is called “child support” from the father, but in order to do that they have to have proof the child does in fact belong to them. Which in most cases a court will order a DNA Test to ensure that it is true.
During my research I found in “People Magazine” that almost 750,000 girls ages ranging from 15-19 years old get pregnant each year. Although most people look down upon teen parents most don’t really understand about all the pressures that we face today. Even though most schools say they want a “sex free zone” for their students it never really happens, because no one ever actually enforces the policy. As in my case I can remember walking down the hallways in school, and on a regular basis I could see people kissing and groping each other like its nothing, and some teachers just stand by like its nothing. Even after a historic 14 year decline in teen pregnancy in the year 2006 the birth rate increased by 3%, which is not good at all. More than half pregnant teens today choose to take the responsibility, and keep their babies. Roughly only 1/3 decide to terminate their pregnancy, 2% choose adoption, and about 14% miscarry. Studies have also shown that only 1/3 of teen mothers finish high school, and get their diploma. As for myself I’m going to graduate, and then take college courses online, so that I can be with my son.
“Family Corner” stated that teen pregnancy rates are much higher in the United States than in many other developed countries. The Unites States are twice as high as in England and Wales or Canada, and are nine times as high as in the Netherlands or Japan. Which is really saying something, due to the fact that they are all fairly large countries, and are very high populated countries. They also said that 8% of 14 year olds, 18% of 15-17 year olds, and 22% of 18-19 year olds become pregnant each year. I myself am in the 18% of girls, considering that i’m 17 years old, and I’m nearly 5 months pregnant. 20% of those who have sexual intercourse become pregnant, although there are ways to prevent it, they don’t always work, for example a comdom can bust, or may even have a pin hole, and you would never know that it was there. Most girls get put on birth control, but even then they still aren’t fully safe from getting pregnant, even though they may think that there in a .1% chance of them getting pregnant it could still happen, that is why they should still use a condom, and make sure they don’t skip any doses of their birth control, also they should use a spermicide that night and the next day as well.
Many people think that pregnancy is wonderful, but ther are so many bad symptoms and complaints such as the following: preeclampsia, spotting, sleep problems, varicose veins, vaginal pain, vaginal discharge, yeast infections, urinary frequency, umbilical hernia, acne, chloasma, stretch marks, shortness of breath, sciatica, hip pain, pounding heart, pelvic pain, carpel tunnel syndrome, nose bleeds, bleeding gums, morning sickness, leg cramps,hemorrhoids, heart burn, indigestion, headaches, dizziness, gestational diabetes, fatigue, exhaustion, constipation, breast pain, breast leakage, braxton hicks contractions, blurry vision, back pain, diastasis, and anemia. These are all things that I found thanks to “Parents” which is a magazine for parents, and expectant parents. Although I’m sure I will feel these symptoms and complaints sometime during my pregnancy so far I have only had the following: morning sickness, dizziness, braxton hick contractions, leg cramps, back pain, and breast pain. I must say that I haven’t really enjoyed being pregnant, its not because of the baby, its just that constantly feeling sick or dizzy just isn’t fun at all. One thing that I have definitely enjoyed about being pregnant is feeling the baby move for the first time, it is such a weird, but wonderful feeling all at the same time.
I found my last facts from “Baby Center” which gives you all sorts of different fact on pregnancy and babies. Some people believe that having a baby is easy, well it may have been 50 years ago, but now there are so many things they need, and so much you have to do before they get here. Here are just a few of the things you do while pregnant: go to a O.B. doctor to make sure everything is good with the baby during your pregnancy, have ultrasounds to to let you see how your baby is developing during your pregnancy, pick out names, have a baby shower, make the baby a room of its own that has only the things for the baby, pick a theme for its room, choose a hospital to go to when you go into labor, pack you and the baby a bag for when you go to the hospital, and wash everything you get for the baby so that nothing will break it out or irritate its sensitive skin. When you go into labor, there are some complications that all women should be aware of such as these: breech birth, cesarean section, inducing labor, labor augumentation, macrosomia, preterm labor and birth, uterine rupture, and vaginal birth after cesarean. So these are all the facts that i found on teen pregnancy.