a worrying teenage trend
Posted: Tue Feb 12, 2002 8:45 pm
Dear All,
A current trend that I have noticed in some of boroughs of London I grew up in, is that of teenage girls talking about guys in terms of 'i'm gonna have his baby' instead of ' I really like him'
and 'I don't care what anyone says I want my own baby' ...
you may say so what ... but these girls are 14 years old and below. The youngest I've talked to was twelve, (menarche at 9) common factors I've picked up on :-
early menses
early involvement in alcohol/drugs
aggressive/dysfunctional relations to mother
mother also had early/teenage pregnancies
low self-esteem coupled with peer pressure to sexualize
going out with boys over 16 (how much coercion is involved god knows, also factors in male pedophiliac question)
the causation as far as talking to them leads me to believe it's :
extreme neediness (inner child just wants to be nutured)
need to show mum where she went wrong
I understand this is a very common trend in urban situations now where the mothers of these kids instead of enjoying freedom from the childrearing treadmill are put through it all over again with grandchildren. Now these ladies are usually in early thirties not the grey dears of yesteryear.
UK has the highest teenage pregnancy rate in Europe ... I do not think it's because
of lack of moral fibre but just some really marginalised kids trying to be adult before their time ...purely because they think menses=adult and they have nothing to lose when in reality the sad thing is they haven't lifted their sights high enough to notice how much they have to lose...
How can we as homepaths help reverse this trend ?
peace and hope
Jas
A current trend that I have noticed in some of boroughs of London I grew up in, is that of teenage girls talking about guys in terms of 'i'm gonna have his baby' instead of ' I really like him'
and 'I don't care what anyone says I want my own baby' ...
you may say so what ... but these girls are 14 years old and below. The youngest I've talked to was twelve, (menarche at 9) common factors I've picked up on :-
early menses
early involvement in alcohol/drugs
aggressive/dysfunctional relations to mother
mother also had early/teenage pregnancies
low self-esteem coupled with peer pressure to sexualize
going out with boys over 16 (how much coercion is involved god knows, also factors in male pedophiliac question)
the causation as far as talking to them leads me to believe it's :
extreme neediness (inner child just wants to be nutured)
need to show mum where she went wrong
I understand this is a very common trend in urban situations now where the mothers of these kids instead of enjoying freedom from the childrearing treadmill are put through it all over again with grandchildren. Now these ladies are usually in early thirties not the grey dears of yesteryear.
UK has the highest teenage pregnancy rate in Europe ... I do not think it's because
of lack of moral fibre but just some really marginalised kids trying to be adult before their time ...purely because they think menses=adult and they have nothing to lose when in reality the sad thing is they haven't lifted their sights high enough to notice how much they have to lose...
How can we as homepaths help reverse this trend ?
peace and hope
Jas