The other day I was at the pool and I saw a young woman that I have not seen in quite some time. I was wondering why I had not seen her, and when I finally did, I realized why. She had gotten pregnant with her boyfriend and disappeared from school. I could not go up to the girl I once knew and speak to her because I had not seen her in so long-- it would have been awkward.

Although the situation left me awe-struck, I could not get over how the father was acting toward his partner. At the pool, one would expect a boyfriend to be nice and courteous to his pregnant girl friend. Instead, he was splashing water her and trying to force her into the pool! What has this world come to? I was shocked by the actions of the male and I cannot get over it. This just goes to show that most teens are not ready to be mature enough to be parents.

You know how when you walk throw the halls, you say hi to people you talk to. But there are so many that I pass in the hallway. I tend to forget about some people unless I see them on a daily basis. Well there was this girl that was in my horticulture class in ninth grade. I though she was a nice girl. Well I used to talk to her everyday. Once the semester changed we did not see each other anymore. We grew apart just like everyone does.

So walking throw the hallway last week, I thought of how I never see her anymore. I began to wonder were she was. Was it just because our paths never crossed? Had she moved away? It was all I could think about the rest of the day. The first thing I did when i got home that afternoon was sign into Facebook and see how she was doing. I saw that people were telling her congratulations but I could not figure out why... I scrolled down... and.... I saw were she had pasted pictures of her and her brand new baby. I was in utter disbelief. No! not her I thought. She was a nice girl with a bright future. I was going to post something to her wall but I could not think of what to say. I was not going to tell her "congratulations." Teenage pregnancy is not something to be congratulated for. Then I thought okay I will just send her a message and then everyone will not see what I put. I clicked the compose new button and the screen popped up. I sat there starring at it for about five minutes. I could not think of anything to say to her.

We no longer have the relationship to where I could talk to her-- tell her she should stay in school, contact someone for help, or anything along those lines. The only thing I could think of that would have been appropriate to say would have been something along the lines of congrats. But I was not about to congratulate her.... So I left well enough alone and went on my marry way.

This is a prime example of how adults think when it comes to dealing with young people and sexual health. They want to turn their head and pretend it is not happening. They don't want to talk to kids about this very natural part of life and how to handle their sexual feelings because this would be "awkward." Okay, I will give some adults some credit.... some do give their child "the talk," but is A TALK all that is needed. NO! In math class when the teacher teaches a new type of math problem, they do not just show one example and expect the students to know how to do it! It takes practice. Just like talking to young people. It takes time for a young person to build up the self esteem needed to go to their parent with a question about sex. If the parent and child have not opening made it comfortable, then the child is going to think it is not right for them to ask.

Parents: Talk to your children!
Young people: Listen to what they have to say and ask questions!

For a lot of teens the first time they go to talk to their parents is to tell them they are pregnant or have gotten someone pregnant. Don't be another number that can be counted in the statistics for teen pregnancy!!!

For one of my advanced placement classes, I had to write an example essay-- essay conveying your point through the use of examples (fyi). The teacher said it could be on anything "we were passionate about." As soon as these words came flying out of his mouth, I automatically knew what I was going to write my paper about!

In a nutshell, I told the story of a person, I named Susan, who lives in my county who became pregnant at 13 and gave birth at the mere age of 14! Susan had parents who neglected her so DFCS took her away from her them. She turned to sex for love and attention. After she became pregnant, she was admitted into a local second chance home where the agencies were able to defy all odds and keep her in school! She graduated high school but soon afterward, she had to go and live in the world again where she was neglected and did not have agencies making sure she was doing the right thing for her child and herself. She soon turned to drugs and lost her son to DFCS. After loosing the one person who she truely cared about, Susan realized she had to turn her life around! She went back to college and eventually got her masters degree in Social Work and she was able to get her son back!

Little bit of side information: our teacher picks papers to read out loud so that the whole class can "learn" from the writers mistakes or greatness. Well he picked my paper!!!! I did not care that he was grammatically correcting my paper in front of the whole class--- because I am horrible with grammar!!! I was just happy that he was sharing my paper for the class to hear!!! This was yesterday and it actually made my day! I did not even had to get up and talk to the class yet they still got to hear me advocate through my writing!!!

Although much progress has been made in my counties, there is still a huge amount of ground to be covered. We are finally re-grouping and getting back on track! This deisire was fulfilled with the addition of a new adult partner who is genuinely passionate about helpling us-- unlike our previous adults who showed up at our meetings just to tell people they were helping us, and a new cooridinator. I know our line of advocacy is frustrating and exhausting but when you think about the benefits, they gravely outway the frustrations. I am so happy that I will be able to look back in the future when everyone in ou society is actually getting an effective, correct education and say that I was apart of the change that made it become a success!!!!

Okay. So I live in Georgia, and snow in our area is very rare. Today we got of school 3 1/2 hours early.... and everyone seems to think we will be out tomorrow. All of this over 1/2 inch of snow!!!! I am out raged.

It covers the news, the weather report interrupts afternoon broadcasts, and people go crazy on Facebook! I do not see why people do not got their panties in a wad over my county have FIVE, yes 5, teenage pregnancies on average a week!!! It appears to me that people in my area have their priorities alittle out of line. Why can't they open their eyes and see what is happening to the young people around them?!?!? Not to mention that the STD's and STI's are ramped. A local pharmacist informed me that he gives out more medication to treat genital herpies than anything else!! Unbelievable.

So why isn't the school system doing something about it? Well.... this is Georgia and apparently parents here believe that their little angel(s) is not going to get involved in this sinful and risky behavior. People around here do not want to live up to the fact that children are dropping out of school because they either are going to have a child or they have to work to support the child. Rather they concern themselves with the fact that they must cancell school because of a measly amount of cold water! Arrg.

With the Health care reform in the center of the media spot light, sexual education has taken a step to the side of the stage. The 2010 Appropriations Bill for the Department of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Realted Agencies is a 146-page bill that does not necessarily hit funding for sexuality education on the head. But it does do better than the money spent during the Bush administration- $1.8 million dollars for abstinence-only education. This is what Obama has proposed:
 

$100,000,000 shall be for making contracts and competitive grants to public and private entities to fund medically accurate and age-appropriate programs that reduce teen pregnancy; and for the federal costs associated with administering and evaluating such contracts and grants, of which not less than $75,000,000 shall be for replicating programs that have been proven through rigorous evaluation to delay sexual activity, increase contraceptive use (without increasing sexual activity), reduce the transmission of sexuallytransmitted infections or reduce teenage pregnancy; and of which not less than $25,000,000 shall be available for research and demonstration grants to develop, replicate, refine, and test additional models and innovative strategies for preventing teen pregnancy or sexually transmitted infections.

What does this say? Well it does not say specifically that it will provide funding for comprehensive sexual education programs. It says that it will provide funding for any program that can provide that it is effective. You either teach youth people about contraceptives or not at all. And the striking fact is that abstinence or contraceptives is the only way of protecting against an unplanned pregnancy AND contracting an STD/STI. The other thing it says is that there will be no further funding for research for programs that have already been deemed uneffective. This too is a step up.

But still, I wish that Mr.Obama would just come out specify that the country needs scientifically accurate, proven-to-work, better COMPREHENSIVE EDUCATION!!!!!!!
 

I find myself talking about teen pregnancy and its impacts on everyday life, everyday!!!! It is unbelievable how much I have grown as a person over the last few years. Today I had such a great opputunity to education some of my fellow classmates. I have a friend that is openly lesbian, but she is so quiet and shy that few people know she is actually lesbian. She is very shy about talking to people about why she feels the way she feels, and not to help the situation, she has not been out that long. I over heard some people asking her questions, and I could tell she was uncomfortable so I went to assist. I all of the sudden had the whole class listening to me and how I was talking about my issues. It was enchanting just to know that so many people were listening to me talk. I had to idea that I had that kind of effect. This is what happens you have a passion for something. Please have this kind of apssion for yur issues in life, and with enough momentum and people supporting, maybe you can get them changed!!! :)

I finally realize what we (Advocates for Youth wrolking with G-CAPP) are trying to do might get somewhere! I was in my last class of the day yesterday and we had to give a persuasive speech. One of the girls in my class decided that she was going to give a speech about how abstinece only programs do NOT work. I had no idea that this was her topic and she had no idea that I was working toward this goal!!!! Completely out of shock because she had the courage to get in front of the class to make this speech, I went over to her and told her that i worked with Advocates for Youth toward this goal. I asked her if she wanted to get on the train with us and help us make this goal a reality. She said yes and is now joining our local group!!! :)

So today I was doing one of my assignments for AP Psychology and so I see this article title "Teens and Sex" and so I click on it. I started reading it and it said:

While the media bombards us with alarming statistics about the number of teenagers having sex, few reports shed light on what might encourage teens to become sexually active in the first place. Three studies offer some insight into sexually active teens: environment, age of partner and perceived family support may affect young people's decisions to have sex.

In a study presented at a meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA), researchers at the University of Kentucky followed 950 teenagers at 17 high schools in Kentucky and Ohio from 9th to 11th grades. They found evidence that teens who have intercourse tend to think their friends are too, even if they're not. "You're 2.5 times more likely to have sex by the 9th grade if you think your friends are having sex -- whether or not they really are," says Katharine Atwood, assistant professor at the Kentucky School of Public Health. Plus, teens tended to overestimate how many of their friends were sexually active. Only 33 percent of kids in the study had had sex by the 9th grade, but 31 percent said that most or all of their friends had had sex. "If you can persuade them that fewer are having sex than they think," she says, "that can have a significant impact on their behavior."

Among young girls, a partner's age is a risk factor for sexual activity. "The younger the girl is at the age of first intercourse, the more likely she is to have a much older partner," says Harold Leitenberg, Ph.D., a professor of psychology at the University of Vermont. His study, published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, found that of 4,201 girls in 8th through 12th grades, those who lost their virginity between ages 11 and 12 tended to have partners five or more years older. For girls who had sex later in adolescence, the partner's age disparity was much smaller. Early sexual initiation was also associated with a number of behavioral problems. "Ignoring the age of the partners, the earlier a girl was when she first had intercourse, the greater her risk of suicide attempts, alcohol use, drug abuse, truancy and pregnancy," Leitenberg says.

The good news is that while teen sex may not be wholly preventable, the health risks it involves can be reduced through communication within the family. More research presented at the APHA meeting showed that frequent parent-child discussions about sex and its dangers may prevent teenagers from engaging in risky sexual behavior. Researchers at Emory University questioned 522 sexually active African-American adolescents about the openness and support that their families provided. Adolescents who felt that their families were more supportive were less likely to have unprotected sex, and thus were at a lesser risk for pregnancy and disease.
http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/pto-2139.html

I am really glad that I found this and that people are  finally starting to do research on these kinds of issues. I like the fact that major big wigs (universities) are starting to open their eyes and see what all is going on with the youth!!
 

A few days ago we had our very first press release since returnign from Washington D.C. It went really well actually. Everyone was impressed about our performance. We were even in the forum! Peoples reactions were not all that bad. Surprisingly we are having more support than expected! Our team is not wasting any time on gettig together and becoming active. :)