Teen pregnancies in Q-C region: Times reporter passes test with pride
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By Kay Luna | Sunday, December 02, 2007 |
I was used to taking tests. Not this kind. We sat together, my two friends and I, crowded into an upstairs bathroom on a Friday night.
And we waited.
We chatted about what movie we wanted to see later.
We fluffed up our hair.
And then we looked.
“Oh, man, that’s two lines,” I remember saying.
They were two very dark lines.
I scrambled to look at the instructions again, but I didn’t need to.
In my heart, I knew it was true.
I was pregnant.
And I was only 16, a junior at Rock Island High School.
It’s so cliché, but — let’s say it all in unison — I never thought it would happen to me. Like most young people, I thought I was invincible, made of Teflon.
I was your typical “preppy” girl who got good grades, smiled a lot and never skipped — and I mean not even a single day — of school. But there I was.
That period of my life is like one big blur: All of those weeks coming to terms with the situation in my own head, trying to break the news to my parents and other family members. We cried a lot.
This may sound strange, but I was so very lucky to have people who tried to discourage me. I vividly remember a social worker telling my mom, “Everyone would just be better off if she lost this baby.”
What a horrible thing to say. I still get angry when I think about it. But I say, “Thank you for the challenge.”
I worked incredibly hard to show those people they were wrong.
My little boy was born in September of my senior year, and I had enough credits to graduate early, in December. I walked with my class during the graduation ceremony in June.
And that fall I went straight to college.
I worked as the editor of the school newspaper at Black Hawk in Moline, and when I graduated I held my 2-year-old boy on my lap during the ceremony.
We went away to college together, too — twice. I graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Northern Illinois University in DeKalb and earned a master’s degree from the University of Illinois-Springfield, all by the time my son started kindergarten.
I’m biased, but he has been an absolute treasure. I firmly believe that boy is supposed to be here.
No question about it, he has brought more love and pride into my life than I ever imagined possible.
On the other hand, motherhood also has brought me face to face with some of the most heart-wrenching emotional struggles of my life. Dang those teen years — his and mine!
My boy is now a strapping 16-year-old — the same age I was when I found out I was having him. Circle of life, I guess.
Tall and lean, with striking blue-green eyes, he’s smart and funny and has a smile that’s infectious. He loves computers, skiing, sailing and going to the movies. He has a talent for writing. He excels in math.
He isn’t always a ray of sunshine. Neither am I.
But even though I drive him crazy, and our lives aren’t perfect, he still loves his mama. And oh how I love him.
When my son was very small, I hung this poem by Ralph Waldo Emerson on his bedroom wall:
“To laugh often and much; To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; To appreciate beauty, to find the best in others; To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.”
Together, I think we passed the test.
Kay Luna can be contacted at (563) 383-2323 or kluna@qctimes.com.
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