i will never forget the day i found out i was pregnant. i sat in the bathroom hyperventilating as i looked at the blue line that indicated i was pregnant. “i’m only 19,” i kept thinking.

i met the father of my baby in february last year and spent time getting to know him. he seemed perfect. in june we were dating and i was sure this was one relationship that was built to last.
 
weeks earlier, my boyfriend had had been teasing me about gaining weight and asked me if I was pregnant. having been told by my gynaecologist that i had an ovarian syndrome and would have difficulty concieving, i told myself it was impossible and there must be some sort of mistake.

when i saw that proud blue line telling me i was pregnant, i wanted to cry but just didn’t have the tears. i started feeling faint, and scared. how could this have happened and when did it happen?
i couldn’t concentrate on anything except the positive test the next day. that night, i told my best friend i was pregnant. his reaction was not what i expected.  he promised to be there for me no matter what i decided to do.
the next day i told my boyfriend. the first thing he said to me was “you’re going to get an abortion, right?” i felt the tears forming n my eyes and i said yes. that night, i cried myself to sleep.
that weekend when i went over to his place, he talked me into getting drunk as “i was going to have the abortion so it wouldn’t matter if i had that beer.” i thought i might feel better, but when i sobered up, i felt so guilty. i cried myself to sleep again that night as i kept thinking what a horrible person i was.  that was when i decided i needed to go to a doctor to confirm the pregnancy.
 
the doctor told me there was no doubt at all that i was pregnant. i was 8 weeks already! i didn’t hear anything else he said as i sat in the chair staring out the window.

telling my parents wasn’t easy. i had always been the rebel of the family and knew this was going to be the last straw. in my mind i tired to prepare myself for what was to come. what happend though surprised me. both my parents took the news very calmly, although they could not hide the diappointment on their faces.

the next step was telling my boyfriend that i was going to keep the baby. that didn’t come easy either. for the next couple of days, he didn’t talk to me. intstead, he would go out and get drunk everyday. he would call me at 3 am, still drunk and ask me why i was keeping the baby. telling me that he still loved me but he just wasn’t ready to be a father. i hadn’t been for any ultrasounds, but i already knew that i loved my baby. when i would tell him that i am not changing my mind, he would start crying.
what came after that was the biggest surprise. my boyfriend proposed to me. he said he realised that being a father was a blessing and not the end of the world for him. i sat in awe, and when i eventually found the words to speak again, i said yes i would marry him. somewhere, i suspected that my best friend had something to do with this sudden change of heart towards having a baby.

for about two weeks it was fanatstic. he would call me every night and talk to me until i fell asleep on the phone.he would tell me how he couldn’t wait to go to the first appointment with me so he could see our baby. the day of my first ultrasound came, and my boyfriend wasn’t there. my heart sank as i thought of how i had called him that morning to remind him of the appointment and he promised he would be there.

seeing my little baby and hearing his heart beating made me realise just how much i loved my baby already, and for the first time, i felt excited about being a mother.

things started to turn sour and my boyfriend and i started fighting a lot more. that’s also when i saw him for who he really was. i was really unhappy and hated being around him (and no, it wasn’t only the hormones!).
i broke up with him, explaining to him that i can’t be with him because he made me so unhappy.  talking to him would leave me either angry or on the verge of tears. all he ever did was put me down, insult me or make me feel guilty about being pregnant.
thank God for my best friend, who was with me, just as he had promised he would be. as i told more and more of my friends and felt their excitment as we all realised “we are going to have a baby”, that’s when i realised that parenting is a choice. no matter what i did or said to the father of my baby, i could not force him to be a father. that is a decision he would have to make for himself.

and that is when i realised that i had infact been in love with him! he always seems to prove to me that parentng is indeed a choice that one makes, and he has chosen to be a father to brooklyn. i realise that i can’t replace brooklyn’s biological father with someone else, but what i can give my son is someone who is willing to be a father. someone who is willing to make him smile, help change his diapers, help feed him, comfort him when he cries, and most importantly, someone who will love him as much as i love him.

brooklyn was born on the 17th of march. now every day i look at him and hold him in my arms i don’t regret my decision to keep him at all. i truely feel love have finally found my happiness.