Every person in their life is forced to make decisions. Sometimes, it is challenging to find the best option because there is always a fear of making a mistake and regretting what has been done. It is especially puzzling to decide something for an adolescent whose worldview has not yet fully formed. Teenage pregnancy is an awkward issue when a girl faces burdensome alternatives that can drastically alter her life. Therefore, before making a decision, she must carefully weigh everything and consider each option’s positive and negative consequences.
Teen Pregnancy: The Different Options to Address the Problem
The Alternative Ways Out of Crisis Situation
The problem of teen pregnancy can be solved in different ways. Kristi Kanel (2018) claims that every crisis can include both danger and opportunity. Thus, there are such options:
- The girl may decide to keep the child and prepare to become a mother. According to data, 11% of all births occur during the teenage age worldwide (Ghose & John, 2017).
- She can decide to give birth to a baby and leave him in the hospital.
- Teenagers can have an abortion or terminate a pregnancy at home using herbs, medicines, or folk methods and try to live as if nothing happened.
- The girl can give birth to a kid and let his grandparents raise him if they do not mind.
Thus, there are at least four alternative ways to address this problem.
The Consequences of Each Option
Each alternative that a girl can choose has both positive and negative sides. The first option is the birth of a new person and the opportunity for the young mother to love and raise him. However, the adolescent will probably give up her school and face the risk of failure in her future career. The advantages of the second alternative include a chance for the girl to continue studying and the removal of the risk of further infertility. On the other side, she will always know that her child considers another woman his mom, or worse, that he lives in the children’s home. The termination of pregnancy allows continuing education and building the life of dream, but it will be a heavy burden on the teenager’s soul and may lead to infertility. Although the fourth option offers the opportunity to study and be close to the child, the girl will still move away from him and will not become a full-fledged mother. Thus, any choice carries positive and negative consequences with which the girl then has to live.
The Values Influencing Decision and the Best Option
Speaking about the values that can influence this decision, it is worth mentioning religious and cultural ones. In general, any religion prohibits abortion; any culture is against murder. My inner convictions also rank the third alternative as the most inappropriate. According to my values, education and career are significant parts of life, but a child is not a toy that can be taken, left, or even broken. A frightened teenage girl may try to terminate the pregnancy without informing other people because of a period of “risk-taking behaviors and social-affective sensitivity” (Van Hoorn et al., 2019, p. 129). However, her decision will also affect the child’s father, who has a right to know about the baby, and the girl’s parents. The main thing in making a decision is still the girl’s values because she will have to take responsibility for her choice. As for me, I have concluded that the best way out of this situation is the first option. Although it is essential to get an education and build a career, the life and happiness of the baby are more important.
After completing this process, I can say that it was hard enough to consider all situations from different angles and make the only right decision for oneself. However, creating a list of each alternative’s positive and negative points can significantly help people in various crisis situations. While looking for all the pros and cons, a person already subconsciously understands which solution is closer to them.
References
Ghose, S., & John, L. B. (2017). Adolescent pregnancy: An overview. International Journal of Reproduction, Contraception, Obstetrics and Gynecology, 6(10), 4197-4203.
Kanel, K. (2018). A guide to crisis intervention (6th ed.). Cengage Learning.
Van Hoorn, J., Shablack, H., Lindquist, K. A., & Telzer, E. H. (2019). Incorporating the social context into neurocognitive models of adolescent decision-making: A neuroimaging meta-analysis. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 101, 129–142.