Christian Teen Mom Tells her Story

" Cary" became a teen mom in London in the late 1980's. Today, her faith in God helps her deal with the challenges of being a single mom.

If I had my life to live all over again; if I woke up one morning and God said,

"Right, Cary . Me and Jesus think that you've had a really raw deal, and we feel sorry for you, so we're going to let you rewind time. Just what would you do differently?"

Well, I'd have to go back to when I was 16. I was idiotic enough to think that it would never happen to me.

I actually believed I'd be exempt from the rules; that it didn't matter that I was 16, he was 16 and we were having it off, bonking, shagging, doing the nookie, having sexual intercourse, and didn't feel the need for some birth control - it was never going to happen to me. I was sensible! I had better things to do than be a teen mom.

So, I'm 16, and something within me just knows.without needing any tests, without missing a period, that I'm up the creek without a paddle. A bun is rising, slowly but surely is in the oven. I went for the tests anyway, and they conformed what I'd known for weeks. I was pregnant. The teen father, on hearing that I was pregnant, said it was my problem.

Terror is too tame a word to describe what I felt when I found out I was pregnant. For starters, I was supposed, yes "supposed" to be a Christian, which meant that I wasn't meant to be having sex at all, at least not until I was married, and I definitely wasn't married.

Terror also came from the thought of having to tell my mother I was pregnant - a deeply religious Christian woman, given to fits of extreme rage. I felt that when I told my mother that I was a pregnant, that I would be battered within an inch of my life: there would be no need for a delivery room: she would beat the baby out of me instead.

So I went home, trying to drum up the courage to face my mother with the news of the century, and prayed. Perhaps if I had done more praying on a regular basis, I wouldn't have ending up as a pregnant church-going teen.

I was sitting in the kitchen, trying desperately to stop gaping like a goldfish every time I opened my mouth to speak, when my mum finally asked what was wrong. After several more unintentional impersonations of a goldfish, I gave up and burst into tears. Great big waling sobs; looking now more like an anguished cod than anything else.

"What's the matter?" my mum asked again, putting down whatever it was she was holding and focusing her whole attention on me now.

"Mum, I'm pregna-a-a-a-a-nnnntttttt" I wailed some more, then put my head down, hunched my shoulders, and waited for the blows with my eyes screwed tightly shut.

So, there I am, all scrunched up waiting for my beating, subsequent miscarriage, followed by my still bleeding body being chucked unceremoniously into the street.

It seemed to last forever.

Then I felt it. The hug. She hugged me tightly, and I was so surprised I stopped crying, but was too rigid to settle into the hug, still suspicious in case it was a prelude to disaster taking an exceptionally cruel emotional twist en route.

But no, it continued, and along with it came the words, "This baby will be loved and accepted."

***

If God gave me the chance to live my life over again, I wouldn't take Him up on the offer, in spite of the troubles I experienced being a teen mom.

You see, in spite of what others may think, being a teen mom was the greatest thing that could ever have happened to me; the best gift I could ever have been given. It taught me about unconditional love (from my mom), and gave me a crash course in responsibility. Even when I look back on the hardships my daughter and I went through, the mistakes I would drag her through as I made them, the rebellion I would later encounter as she exerted her own personality, being a teen mom taught me to rely on my heavenly Father.

Want to reach out to teen moms like Cary? Check out LINK LIFE AFTER BIRTH