Reports of a boy in Britain being a father at 13 shocked the world last week. In the exclusive report from The Sun, we learned the story of young parents Alfie Patten and Chantelle Steadman, 15, who decided to keep their child and vowed to care for their own daughter Maisie.
A few days later, before the initial shock even wore off, Alfie and Chantelle made headlines anew, this time when two other teenage boys claimed to have fathered Maisie, saying they also shared a bed with Chantelle around the time she conceived, as reported by the News of the World. The drama continues to unfold, and now Alfie has even agreed to undergo a DNA test just to prove his paternity.
In a society that openly talks about sex—premarital or otherwise—news of teenage sex and, consequently, pregnancy are of course still alarming, saddening, and utterly appalling. Yes, we’ve all seen the movie Juno, and read all about Britney’s baby sister Jamie Lynn Spears getting pregnant at 16 and became equally appalled by it. But nothing prepares us for more news of such young parents.
We wonder how children this young could be engaging in unprotected sex and dealing not just with teenage pregnancy but apparently also uncertain paternity at such young age! How could this have happened?
We are of course curious to know what you, our dear FemaleNetwork readers, think. How do you feel about this news? Are you as alarmed as we are? Parents, how do you think you can protect your own children from such woeful circumstances? Please tell us when you comment.
3 Comments
Add Commentconfusedjoanna
i have friends who got pregnant at a very young age.. and i do not condemn them., in the first place that is how they run their lives, second im proud of them because they accept the consequence of their mistakes and third.. for those people who gt pregnant at early age, yes there will always be a big changes after 9 month but then life must go on., its not a mistake.. its a blessing and a preciouse gift..
February 19, 2009 at 9:11 pmsweetpot
yeah but they should also be thinking before they do something... there are you know, ways on how to avoid that.. parenting is a huge responsibility... especially to an unprepared person... you wouldn't want your child to grow up being judged and having a lot of emotional stresses... people nowadays just don't think of the consequences.. they just think of themselves and coming out "clean" and with a so called "morally right" thing to do
February 20, 2009 at 11:02 ambratineller
Well, it reminds me of the stories that I used to hear from my grandparents, our ancestors also practiced teenage marriage, and they too started out from the age of 13-14. It's not really new, but then, with how the things go around the world today, you'd be expecting that these phenomenon shouldn't be existing anymore. We live in a modern world, everything shouldn't be new to us anymore. Maybe we can blame the parents, or we can blame the church, but one thing is absolute, these things are bound to happen. Even adults make mistakes when in the first place they should be thinking of what they're doing, but these are, I believe and from the looks ot it, aren't even guided properly by their parents.
February 21, 2009 at 2:35 pm