Adoption Effects, Chapter 1

When I was 16, I knew everything. I knew that I was never going to be as stupid as my mom was and get pregnant in high school. I knew that the rhythm method worked. HAH! I was WAY too smart to speak to my mom about birth control. Then again, maybe I was just too scared . . . I knew she thought I should wait until marriage to have sex, or at least until I was older. The way she didn’t. The way she got pregnant with me at 17. Those things I was too smart to repeat, right?

Now that I’m older (and maybe a little wiser), I know that a lot of things my mom told me when I was a teenager were true. I wish she had talked to me about birth control then, instead of just telling me not to have sex, though. I had actually intended to “save” myself for marriage. But hormones, my boyfriend, and parents got the best of me. Both my mom and his parents seemed pretty sure we were already “doing it.” I finally let him wear me down, since if I was being accused of IT, I might as well find out what all the fuss was about.

Prom Night, May 4, 1980, was The Night. Then I discovered it was kinda fun. We used condoms. Mostly. Until June when I said, “Oh, it should be okay. I just ended my period.”
Yeah, well. By the time I missed my first period, we were pretty much broken up. By the time I missed my SECOND period, I was dating someone else. I called E and we agreed not to tell anyone until I made an appointment with Planned Parenthood and found out for sure. Then he told his mom, who told MY mom, who said to me that evening, “I know.” I said, “You know WHAT?” She said, “I know you’re pregnant.” I said, “How can you know that when I don’t even know for sure?” I admit, it DID negate my having to open that conversation with my mom. And of course, I was pregnant.
The conversation with E then went like this. He said, “Would you think about an abortion?” I said, “Sure. Okay, thought about it. NOPE!” I had hoped for a better response from him. He and I had talked about the “what if” stuff, and I thought I made my position on abortion pretty clear at the time. Unfortunately, how you think or hope you’ll react to a given situation isn’t always how you do react when it comes right down to it. End of his involvement for the most part.
Because of my mom’s experience (more about that later), I was pretty much all about adoption. Lots of people told me how “unselfish” I was being about the whole thing. Yeah, that was my primary motivation. I grew up poor. I wanted better for my baby. But there was some part in there that was me being 16, then 17 and not wanting to be a mom.