"I've something to tell you Haldita. Please close the door." Gina whispered. "I'm pregnant!"
The sudden news of Gina's pregnancy came as a shock.
"Whattttt?" Was my immediate response. "Are you sure darling?"
What a question to ask! No, she is just kiddin'. So to tell you a little about Gina; she is another one of my many twenty-something-year-old friends who is bright, holds a good job, has a good family and is well-travelled.
Of the more sensible questions, I asked: "Does George know? How is he by the way?"
"Oh! We broke up the week before." Gina said with an expression of open eyes, slightly biting her lower lip on one side, bending her head to the other and pulling her shoulders up as in 'what to do'.
I looked at Albert across the room, who in turn shook his head in confirmation.
"Were you feeling sick at all?" I felt the need to ask the appropriate questions.
"Just a little," Gina replied.
"Have you talked to George since? Are you gonna tell him?" Couldn't stop the questions following.
Gina replied: "No. We broke up and no, I shan't tell him. Not now anyway. Perhaps in years to come if we decided to stay friends."
"You know," I continued. "I always wondered how I'd react, had I got pregnant from someone I didn't want to spend the rest of my life with. What's the right thing to do? What rights has the 'father' towards the decision of keeping the child?"
"Yes, I know what you mean," were Gina's words. "Had we been together, I'd felt obliged to tell him. But since we have broken up, there's no point. I'm not ready for a child."
Albert who had been there discussing the matter with Gina before I arrived, had a say: "If you wanted to keep the child, I'd say go ahead and have it. But since you don't, abortion is the only way."
Gina turned to me and asked: "Haldita, what's your opinion on abortion? Do you think it's wrong?"
"No way Darling. It's like taking out a tooth." I said.
"But... there's a lot of emotion involved," we said simultaneously.
"Yes, but it's a hard one." Gina was in deep thought.
"It's as hard as you make it out to be. As in everything else in life." That was my input.
I continued: "The times I was growing up, this was a major issue. Most girls would have to hide any news of pregnancy and some got up to dangerous ways of getting rid of their offspring. In some countries, the fact of losing one's virginity was a major family disgrace, let alone being pregnant with a bastard!"
"Nowadays, with women having stronger roles and say in society, they also have a choice. And why would one bring a child into this world with a doubt in their mind? The world's hard enough as it is. I personally have no problem with abortion. Even if only one of the parents isn't ready." I rested my case knowing that I still have no idea how I would have reacted, had the situation arisen.
Albert then said: "We were watching a program on teenage pregnancy before you arrived, Haldita. It was sadly hysterical. These young girls 13, 14, and 15 years of age were pregnant and they showed the fathers who were present. One 22-year-old couch potato in one instance, who laid around, jobless and clueless!"
"And this was just one of them," Gina picked up. "The girls were from middle-class families, who went to college and had plans for their future, only too young for motherhood. But the guys were a disaster! They were clearly not ready for what was to come."
My last words on this... Don't keep an unwanted child. The wanted ones have enough issues growing up. And this is just my opinion. You are absolutely entitled to yours and would love to hear them if anyone cared to comment here!
My mother would say:
"What's abortion for if you've issues about bringing them onto this troubled world?"
As she believes: "What's divorce for if two people don't get on! Should they destroy each other for a mistake they made earlier in life?"
And: "What's marriage for, except for a damn signature to help make two people miserable in the belief of possessing one another?!"
I Guess Mum gets her points across well but I like being a romantic and believing in the reverie of love and romance; even if as a childlike fantasy. I'd be lying if I said otherwise.
I did however, tell my kids in later years, perhaps around 10 years old, not to believe in the stories of Cinderella and Snow White etc and 'The Prince Charming' riding on a horse... as they were only 'fiction'. The fact that marriage is a 'happily ever after' thing... Is just a story, it doesn't quite happen that way in real life! But for the 'very' few. Be prepared for reality!
As for the controversy against gay couples adopting babies, I had to give the matter some thought when it made the headlines.
To think in 'real' terms, it came to my attention that through observation of gay couple friends, they have been kind, over-friendly, live well, look after themselves, and most of them quite articulate. And they absolutely get attached to their pets. All this puts them in a 'caring' category of parenthood as to some straight parents. I did say some. And if it is the sexual worry of gay men with younger boys... It seems this could happen in the church and I am only being truthful from what I keep hearing through distasteful jokes etc over the years. It also happens within families, where the uncle or the stepfather etc disturbingly continues years of sexual abuse and hidden encounters with the young children in the family. These situations sadly happen everywhere but they are tabooed... Not many, still at this age, care to bring them up.
Last but not least, why do parents behave so irrationally at times? As do children?
What effect do the mother and father's constant quarrels have on children growing up?
Why do we put ourselves and our youngsters through torment? What makes 'rappers' so angry as to want to shout in aggression about family abuse, beating of the mother, and constant rows with words of hatred from parent and child alike? And what... But what can be done to help?
I shall get back to the subject of parenthood and children. How we could work on those relationships.
Here are further major subjects which I feel are neglected and tabooed by society and especially governments all over, which I would love to bring to your attention.
Shall we discuss Sex,
Drugs,
And Rock & Roll?
Mental illness,
Pharmaceuticals
How have governments messed up our planet so hopelessly?
Menopause.
The subjects are endless.
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