The middle classes can learn a lot from teenage parents :-)

I was training to be a social worker at the time, and living in a rather prim, pretty Leicestershire village in conservative England. It was part of my remit to teach people living on council estates how to be good parents.

Read on...........

The middle classes can learn a lot from teenage parents

Sunday 14 February 2010

So now we're being told that instead of being a disaster parenthood can improve young women's lives. I couldn't agree more

When I was 22 I found out, to my delight, that I was pregnant. I'd never thought about having children. I'd never even held a baby. I'd never noticed even an iota of maternal instinct. Yet the day I discovered I was pregnant made me feel more real and useful than any other day in my life. I knew immediately that this was what I was on the Earth to do: to be a mother.

When you fall in love you project on to your new partner all the qualities you have ever desired to find in another person. Being pregnant for the first time feels much the same, except, miraculously, the aspirations are not just for your unborn child but for yourself, for the sort of person you want to become. My love for my unborn child was almost like a religious yearning that was going to be met at his birth. I remember singing songs that I never realised I knew. Feeling him move within my body felt like some ­glorious secret.

I was training to be a social worker at the time, and living in a rather prim, pretty Leicestershire village in conservative England. It was part of my remit to teach people living on council estates how to be good parents. I was supposed to be persuading them to breast-feed ("my boyfriend doesn't want leaky boobs") and to give up smoking ("the great thing about smoking is you get small babies and they don't hurt you when they come out"), but there was something enviably instinctive about the mothering skills of those I met.

Their kids meant everything to them: at six months they were having their ears pierced, by one they had their own TV. There was no angst about, "Am I doing this right?". No textbook consulted, and on the whole, apart from what their mums advised them, no authority revered. A new pregnancy, however many children already lived in the house and whether there was a man around or not, was almost always a cause for celebration. And in the end, these mothers ended up teaching me. Like how to share your bedroom with five kids and not get wound up. Like how to rely on no one but yourself. No bloke was ever worth trusting, I was told; they were just useful for one thing, sex. These young women had an important job to do. They were bringing up the next generation. They were mums.

I'm pleased to hear that a book has finally been written which does them credit. ­Teenage Parenthood: What's the Problem? is an academic study which shows that parenthood is not necessarily a disaster for teenagers, and can sometimes improve their lives.

I couldn't agree more. Motherhood engendered responsibility. When we talk about teenage mothers not having aspirations, what are we talking about? Working in a chip shop? A cleaning job? Are we saying those are more noble, more "aspirational" pursuits than motherhood?

When I was pregnant I decided to give a dinner for all the pregnant girls of Corby who were under 16. It was fun. We compared our bumps, ridiculed our partners, told each other anecdotes about bad sex. All had got pregnant "accidentally on purpose", and not because they had no aspirations but because they had: being a mother, living in their own flat, and being paid pocket money by the state to do so. None felt that real life was passing them by: they had each other for company. It would be a laugh. They'd have pushchair races. They'd take sandwiches and eat them in the park together. They all loved kids. Kids were the best company of all, they said. I was impressed. These teenagers were so cool, so life-affirming, and so much more refreshing than the "good" middle-class ­parents I was to mix with when my first son was born.

My memories of those early years as a mother are not happy ones. What is it about having children that turns "good" parents into rivals? They've read all the literature, know the milestones off by heart, know exactly and in what way their own child is "advanced". And the trouble is, that despite my best intentions, and despite all the great lessons those single mothers of Corby taught me, I found myself being caught up in the Big Competition. My child could recognise and say every single letter in the alphabet at 18 months, and could read before his third birthday. I saw what I was doing to him and I hated myself. The poor thing loved my applause and obliged me by doing exactly what I wanted him to. But happiness, spontaneity, eluded him.

I went on to have more children. This time, I became a different kind of mother, not for lack of will but for lack of energy. I would lie, catatonic, with baby number two snuggled up in my arms. When 17 months later, my third son came along I was both physically and emotionally spent. I dragged myself along to toddler groups in our local church hall – this terrible, tired place where strung-out middle-class mothers were obliged to join in. We had to do the hokey cokey together. We had to put our left foot out and our right foot in, and I remember thinking I would sooner be dead.

I had three children in nappies for about a year. If I had been in control with my first child, I now had none. My first son got a proper bedtime and a story. Sons two and three had a sleeping mother lying next to them who had completely lost the plot.

We didn't have a garden and I made it a rule to take them to the park every day. Forget the books that tell you children know instinctively to stay close to their mother. They don't. All three would walk off in different directions, and there were main roads on all sides. I wanted to lie down on the grass and shout out for someone to help me.

So where were my friends during this splendid time? They were abroad. They were being artists or training for the professions. They were in restaurants with potential lovers. Did they want to know me with my three children? Not on your life.

My husband travelled. I was, to all intents and purposes, a single mother, and, unlike the teenagers on council estates, alone. It was a bleak time. The local nursery school closed down because Health and Safety declared there wasn't the "optimum playing space per child". I wanted to burn Health and Safety down and shout out: "But what about me? Don't I need an optimum playing space, too?"

A few years later, I became, for a brief while, a truant officer. I was persuaded by every single family I interviewed that school was a waste of time. The mum would argue, 'My lad's just not happy at school. He's bullied. He finds lessons boring. He doesn't concentrate and then the teacher shouts at him. I just don't see the point of school, when you can be at home."

And I would say: "But don't you have aspirations for your child? Don't you want him to grow up and be a brain surgeon?"

And the mum would say: "What I want is for my child to be happy. And being happy with a little is better than being unhappy, isn't it? And my son's already got himself a job at the market on Wednesdays. I don't want him to have a stressed sort of life. I just want him to be himself. And we're just not cut out for more, you know. It would take him away from the family if he got too big for his boots, and that makes for problems, I can tell you."

Was she right? Was she wise? When I think of the taut, proud, anxious middle-class ­parents that I know, I think she might just have a point.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/feb/14/olivia-fane-teenage-mothers

IMO its an excellent article, everyone has aspirations, theyre just not the same aspirations; and who is to say who is wrong.

a few year ago i had a child. she was not easy. she was demanding. a short while later i misjudged her medication and killed her. funny thing is, now she is dead i really love her. she makes me millions of pounds. i cant understand how i got away with it. i mean, my only defence is that i am her father. ha ha . dont people realise that 84% of abuse/abduction cases are perpetrated by the parents. apparently not because people ignore the very real intelligence of dogs and dna matches. crocodile tears are so much more impressive. gotta dash, i have a private plane to catch. cheers maddie x

henty wrote:a few year ago i had a child. she was not easy. she was demanding. a short while later i misjudged her medication and killed her. funny thing is, now she is dead i really love her. she makes me millions of pounds. i cant understand how i got away with it. i mean, my only defence is that i am her father. ha ha . dont people realise that 84% of abuse/abduction cases are perpetrated by the parents. apparently not because people ignore the very real intelligence of dogs and dna matches. crocodile tears are so much more impressive. gotta dash, i have a private plane to catch. cheers maddie x

Good post.