From our notebook: ‘I wouldn’t trust anyone, unless they could feel my pain

Posted Aug. 21, 2018 by Melanie Wilson

I’ve been thinking lately about why conservatives and liberals argue so much. One answer is that it’s easy to disagree when real-life situations — those requiring some kind of public policy and investment — remain abstract. In the realm of abstraction, policy debates become an academic, tit-for-tat exercise, my set of data against your set of data, this study’s findings against that study’s findings.

An example is teen pregnancy. On one level, it’s abstract. Since we know that early pregnancy and childbearing has negative consequences for teen parents, their children and society at large, we want to stop it, or at least reduce it as much as possible. But how? This is where the fighting starts. What teens really need is more sex education. What they really need is less sex education and more old-fashioned morality. What they really need is more rules. Our expectations are too low. Or they’re too high. They’re unrealistic or overly permissive or untethered to reality. All this has been been said over and over, for decades, and is being said right now in Washington, DC., where the argument, so long a flashpoint for culture warriors of all stripes, is raging again.

Here’s an experiment, though. For a moment, let’s try to take this abstract issue (teenagers get pregnant or cause pregnancies) and make it a specific one — one that happens to actual people living in particular circumstances. When a problem is rooted in real life and made of flesh and bone, it’s harder to turn it into a talking point and easier to see it as the complicated and very human thing it is.

Two summers ago, as part of a grant-funded research project on the sexual health needs of vulnerable adolescents, we sat down with two teenage girls connected with a program for pregnant and parenting teens. We wanted to talk to them about sex and relationships, and any additional help or knowledge they wish they’d had growing up. We had no agenda or assumptions — we just wanted to understand their lives better.

We’ll call the girls Theresa and Angie. Angie was 16, with an 18-month-old baby, and Theresa was 19 and seven months pregnant. Both had spent time in foster care. We recorded the conversation, and every once in a while I re-read transcript. I do it to remind myself how honest and open many teenagers are willing to be, and also how entirely capable they are of speaking for themselves. In fact, I’ve come to think of Angie and Theresa as my true north on this subject; anything we do to prevent teen pregnancy that doesn’t work for them won’t work for much of anybody. They’re precisely who our social programs target, after all.

So let’s dive in for a communal listening experience.

On romance

Angie: I’ve had so many boyfriends it’s not even funny. I was in a serious relationship, I was 14, with my baby-daddy.

Theresa: When I was 14, kids would meet at the library. Or the granite quarries. Relationships would last for like a month, tops. The end goal for both parties in a relationship was sex. Sex was the first thing that happened.

Angie: Well, around 14 I actually lost my virginity. It was an all-new thing. We had one hang-out place in our town, it was in the woods, it was a party place, in a lean-to. Everybody went there and did their thing as a couple. But as a couple, you had sex and you were in love apparently. Love was sex. If you had sex you were in love.

Theresa: If you’re in love, you guys had to tell each other everything. It had to be real. For us, we all wanted to grow up faster than we were. We wanted to be adults at age 14, we wanted to drink, we wanted to smoke, we wanted to have sex. Cause that’s what every adult was doing in our eyes. They were going out, they were having fun, they didn’t care about the law or anything, and that’s how we were raised to love. Not to care about anything. I didn’t fit in. I was a romantic. I wanted my virginity taken somewhere else and I got picked on, and my boyfriend ended up leaving me. He had a different goal than I did. Everybody around me had the goal that sex was where it ended. I didn’t.

Angie: I met one of my boyfriends on Facebook. We were together a year and a half. I got pregnant, had his kid. Then I cheated on him so it ended. Maybe I was drunk, but I’ve always had open relationships.

Love was sex. If you had sex you were in love.

Theresa: Not me! Being with someone else was cheating. But I did cheat and then played the victim card. I went back, I cheated on the guy with his best friend, and it didn’t go well. I thought he was gonna understand for some reason, but he didn’t. He was really hurt. I think I used the victim card to be honest, because his best friend was older and about to graduate high school, and I was just going into high school, and he was popular and everybody wanted him, and I was with his friend. It was messed up. Back then we were so immature.

On ideal relationships

Angie: At 14, [in an ideal relationship], I’d be able to see him every day, my mom would let him come over and spend the night. With my boyfriend at that time, my mom would be like, ‘He can’t go to your bedroom,’ but then he did, and she said, ‘Whatever, next time he has to stay all night on the couch,’ and then I would sleep with him there. She never really said no. She just laughed about it. She’d say, ‘Just try next time.’ I wanted my parents to accept him, and if they didn’t, it didn’t matter because I would rebel. In my mind, I wanted to see him regardless who told me. I wanted to do what I wanted to do. I wanted to feel that I was loved no matter what. Obviously it didn’t turn out that way.

Theresa: We would go down to the river or go out to the hangout spot, we’d smoke pot, it was an ideal thing. It was a priority to just do everything together. Every little thing. If I went to the bathroom, he came with me.

On what attracts them in a relationship

Angie: Physical – I have a very high standard for physical attraction, big shoulders, big arms, I don’t care about the sixpack. Intelligence. I can’t have someone stupid. You can tell by the way they talk if they’re stupid. And if they can’t spell it drives me crazy.

I wanted to feel loved no matter what. Obviously, it didn’t work out that way.

Theresa: Me, I have very low standards for guys’ appearance. He needs to have a big body part down there. But I mostly care about how they’re going to go about feelings. I’m a feeling type. But there are some guys with the best personality, and I won’t date them. It’s probably abusiveness that attracts me [joke].

On crazy things they did for love

Angie: I ran away with my boyfriend. I ran away to [another state], we had $700, and we ran away. Then my mom caught us. I don’t know how. She literally pulled up to the hotel we were staying in. I was 13.

Theresa: I was kind of psychotic just in general, but there was one guy I’d still do anything for. I’d kill someone for him. We’re best friends now, but back then we dated, and I would literally do anything. I’d steal. He asked me to steal pot, he asked me to do all these things. I’d be very disrespectful to a cop, or go punch a girl, just because he told me to. Eventually he grew into a mature person, but I’d still do anything for him. I never outgrew it for some reason. Most girls outgrow it, I never did.

I’m 14 and dating a 35-year-old. My mom called the cops on me and not the dude.

Angie: All my relationships from age 13 to age 16 and a half, I hid, because all of my boyfriends were older, in the 25-35 age [range]. I’m 14 and dating a 35-year-old. My mom called the cops on me and not the dude. All of them were older, all of them. I wouldn’t look for younger. I wanted that age for a specific reason, I don’t know why. I think it’s the attention they gave me. Perverts, really.

Theresa: As a policy, I don’t use protection. I got chlamydia once. I never used condoms, I don’t like the way they feel. I’ve never used a condom and never will. For a long time I tried to rip out the patch. You can see the scar where I did. I got pregnant by accident. Even when I was a kid I got pregnant and had a miscarriage. I’ve been on birth control (pills) since I was 12. Then I took antibiotics for a yeast infection, or something to do with my vagina, I’m not sure. I got badly pregnant. They took the test and they didn’t tell me I was pregnant. So I remained on the pills for a while.

On how they learned about sex

Angie: I found out about sex by doing it.

Theresa: I figured out things on my own, after they happened. But I still don’t know what an orgasm is. I hear if you’ve had one you would know it. Me and our mutual friend, we’ve talked about it a lot, but some people, they don’t experience it because they’re not with the right person. Really, in my whole thing, I wouldn’t trust anyone at that age [to give me information or guidance], unless they could put themselves in my shoes and feel my pain. If you didn’t, I wouldn’t allow myself to receive your help.

I never even thought being pregnant was so much work. I just thought about the attention and the love.

On the need for love

Theresa: Everybody gets pregnant for a different reason. Half of them don’t even get pregnant on purpose. I don’t think as a kid half of them really realize how hard and emotionally draining it is – some girls can’t handle it and harm themselves with a baby on their hands. It’s sad, but it’s the honest truth. They thought it was this, and then it was a bunch more stuff. I wanted it, too, so I can easily speak in their shoes.

I never even thought being pregnant was so much work. I just thought about the attention and the love. My 16-year-old friend, she’s in foster care, she called me up the other day and was like, ‘I’m going to get pregnant.’ I said, ‘Listen, I know you want the love and attention you’re not getting, but that’s not what you want.’ She heard me. She’s not pregnant. She actually went on birth control. She did it late. She told them, my friend said this, and she understands it, and I do want love and I do want more attention.

*****

So there you have it. I don’t have any summarizing insights. Instead, let’s just sit with this.