How should the teenagers continue their education?
Who would help with childcare?
How could the young parents support their baby?
What kind of relationship would they have with each other?
And how could adults protect the children from the enormous pressure surrounding them?
These questions had no easy answers.
Becoming a parent is difficult at any age.
Doing it while you’re still a child creates challenges that most adults never have to face.
Financial independence may not exist.
Education is unfinished.
Emotional maturity is still developing.
And the practical skills needed to raise a child often have to be learned while simultaneously trying to cope with adolescence.
It doesn’t mean they cannot become responsible adults.
And it certainly doesn’t mean their lives are automatically ruined.
But it does mean they need support.
A great deal of support.
For the young mother, the physical and emotional experience of pregnancy and childbirth would have been enormous.
