Hi, I’m a teenage mother.

At the age of 14, I learned I, was 4 months pregnant. My first thought was that it couldn’t be true. But of course, the doctor wasn’t listening. At the time, that was the most devastating thing I had ever heard. My mama was with me when I, found out and her expression was over a million words. And of course, her most famous expression was disappointment. My baby’s father wasn’t anywhere around. He had left town and I was all alone. When he came back, I was six months pregnant and he didn’t believe me. He argued with me and tried to fight me and said my baby wasn’t his. I cried almost every night of my pregnancy and was all alone. My mom wasn’t there for me. She put me down a lot during my pregnancy and talked about me. I guessed it was just her way of dealing with it.

During the whole 9 months of my pregnancy, life was horrible. I had no support group. It was just me and my unborn child. To make a long story shorter, on June 11 at 3:49 p.m. After 12 hours and 49 minutes of labor, I gave birth to my beautiful daughter Kaliya. After I had her, life didn’t get better because after you have a child, there’s a reality check to come along and a lot of life learned lesson. But now things are going good for me. I’m working. Kaliya is in childcare and I am in my senior year of high school. Her father is still a pain in the butt and still isn’t any help. But hey, I made it this far without him so I know the sky is the limit.

To all the other teenage mothers out there, I’m 17 years old and doing it on my own. If I can do it, I know you can to. All it takes is faith, strength, and courage.