the best advice i could give you is wait.
im 19 and have a baby, and there is so much responsibility and beyond that goes into raising a child. its alot of hard work and then some.
at 18 i got pregnant unplanned, my boyfriend is still with me and supportive, but i would have liked to do things differently.
your so young and have so much more to learn and experience, a child takes away all your freedom, even if you dont go out that much, you will miss the times you ususlly go out.
i rarely have time to do anything for myself now, and forget about bonding and cuddling up with your boyfriend, you have to care for that child now.
i think you should give it alot more thought. 17 is a young age to willingly have a child. maybe you should talk to your mom about this, and see what her opinion is, and if she freaks out, double that by 10 because if you tell her shes pregnant alot of family will be quite disappointed or mad.
my mom knew before i told her that i was pregnant, and it took a while for her to adjust. she loves my son now, but it was hard at first.
you and your boyfriend should enjoy the time you have together, find a place to live together, where you pay rent, insurance, health insurance, bills etc. and then see if 17 is the time to have a child. it takes alot of money to raise a child, about $40,000 .
and my boyfriend and i struggly sometimes, well everyday is a struggle.
i rarely get slep anymore, some of my friends have stopped talking to me so it jsut shows that they arent friends, i rarely get to see my best friend, and hardly have time to relax and have time to myself.
it will be so much more rewarding when your older to have a child, your still so young, whats the rush?
enjoy your youth while your still young.
because once its gone, its gone for good.
and a child erases that youth even faster.

i realize all that you have just told me, i have thought about every word you said before, and yes in cases it does bother some people that they cant go out and party get drunk and w.e. but life isn't about that its about building yourself and your life all your actions now will make your future. i agree with you that we should move in together and i think that would be the BEST first step. and i can't talk to my mom, with my mom i CAN'T talk about ANYTHING and i mean that i'm not over exaggerating in any way.

but after im done with everything in the national guard and we live together for awhile I'm more than confident that then i will be ready.

you should wait. Go to college find a good job have a stable income and a nice place for all of you to live and enough money to support the baby. Think about how much your going to need to move out with all of your bills plus a baby is expensive. You will have no free time what so ever and your life will be put on hold for a little while. Your entire life will now be all about your baby everything you chose to do will somehow effect him or her and you will have to re evaluate your entire way of living. You end up loosing your friends because your too busy to talk and hang out, you and your boyfriend will not be able to send time together just to cuddle because the baby will constantly need something. it is so much work to have a baby i got pregnant at 17 (unplanned) had the baby when i turned 18 and if my mom wouldnt be helping me i wouldnt be able to do it. im a single mom and all i do is stay in and take care of my 7 week old baby i lost most of my friends and the ones i stil talk to text me mayb once or twice a week i feel so alone plus the father is 19 has a crappy job and isnt going to get my daughter anywhere in life. Im trying to complete college but i have no time i had to stop going so i can stay home all day and take to care for her. You seriously need to think about all of this what is the rush you have your whole life ahead of you . I love my baby girl to death but i wish i wouldve waited . . plus the stretch marks arent that great i gained 30 pounds lost it all after the baby and got left with horrible stretch marks all over my body . .

going out and having a good time does not mean getting drunk.
i dont go out with my boyfriend to get wasted and call that a good time.
i dont drink, and neither does my boyfriend, we have a drink only on special occasions[weddings, baptisms, birthdays, etc.] but we do not freely drink.
having a good time can be seeing a movie, hanging out with friends, going to a party and still not drinking.
i dont go out all the time, and when i do it has nothing to do with drinking.
i have only had one drink since my son was born, and that was with my boyfriend and cousins at a club because it was one of their birthdays. and that was the last time ive been in a club or hd a drink.
and even if a good time to some people means having a few drinks, it does not make them a bad person, they are having a fun night, still knowing who they are, but enjoying themselves.
your still so young, what is thr rush?
really, you need to weigh out everything, the what ifs and all. it takes alot of hard work to raise a child while still young. and it takes alot out of you. my baby drains me of all energy each day, and i cant just take a break, somedays i can barely get even a piece of toast in me because my son wants attention, wants food, wants me to hold him, wants anything and everything so my health and well-being is put aside till later.
if you cant talk to your mom about this, what do you think she would say if she finds out her daughter is pregnant? talk to a different family member or someone you trust. you need to hear the reality of having a child from someone in your life, because you have no idea what your wanting to get yourself into.
it is rewarding, and i would not trade my son for anything, but there is so much responsibility than you could ever imagine.
what were you wanting to get into for the national guard? why not stick with that for a couple years then when everything financially is stable enough for you and your boyfriend plan to have a baby.
seriously, think long and hard about this, some relationships are ended when a baby enters the relationship. there is no rush to have a child, women up in their 40's get pregnant. you have so long to plan this out. dont rush.

It's not necessarily about being financially ready, or even emotionally ready. Being in a loving relationship and having a stable income, a mature attitude, family support, and a job doesn't make you ready to have a baby. Why?

Because you will be seventeen. I don't know where you live, but where I live, you become an adult at age eighteen. I am seventeen right now, I will be eighteen in December, and from the time I was thirteen years old until my friend had a baby last March, I had a baby craving like you can't imagine. I bought baby things, I bought baby books, I lost thirty pounds so that I was at a healthy weight to get pregnant, I studied hard in school so I could get scholarships for university, I picked out names and every guy I fell for got mentally evaluated to see if HE was the one who should be the father for my baby. I went so far as to start a separate bank account for baby expenses and researching hospital costs.
What stopped me? I watched my friend go through a pregnancy when she was completely in love with a boy who was completely in love with her back. Christian (the dad) was making enough money to support them, and they lived in separate houses but only a little ways away from each other. Haven (my friend, the mama) had the support of her family, all of whom became closer than ever in the anticipation of the baby. Their family made a good amount of money so that Haven could go to school and focus on her education before the baby came, and when the baby was born she was set up to graduate by correspondence with all of us. All of her friends were accepting of her decision, none of us treated her differently, and she read every single website and book she could get her hands on to make sure she was prepared. They bought everything they needed, not just the fun toys and clothes. Christian and Haven weren't just in hormonal teenage love, but they genuinely respected each other, and still do. They communicate better than most adults I know and their fights are healthy and purposeful. Getting pregnant didn't make them grow up, they were already mature and responsible. When Avaerie-Rose was born on March 8th, 2008, she was the most loved baby on the planet instantly. She was a surprise, but not a mistake.
Ava-Rose was colicky and slept only an hour at a time. Christian moved in with Haven and her family and the two of them alone got up each night to feed the baby and change her. For the first six weeks of Ava's life, Haven had to rock her for hours before she would finally sleep. Christian hardly got any sleep, and then he had to get up and work while also doing his schoolwork. And guess what? They were both completely happy. They were both two of the most unrested parents imaginable because Ava had such a hard time sleeping, and they couldn't imagine anything else.

A nice little fairy tale, right? And then on Ava's six month birthday, Haven turned eighteen. She became an adult.

This was the wake up call. Haven and I have only been friends for a few years, but we always talked about our eighteenth birthdays. We would get all dressed up and invite everyone we knew, go out to the clubs and dance all night and drink cocktails and finally get that experience that we were free, our childhood was over and our life was beginning. And the thing that never once crossed Haven's mind when she was pregnant with Ava-Rose was that her coming-of-age experience would not come with her emergence into adulthood, with a college education ahead of her, no stops, the ability to travel all over the world and meet new people and party til the crack of dawn. Her coming-of-age came when she became a mother of a child, when she was technically only a child herself.

What you need to realize is what you're giving up, and that's the moral of the anecdote. Haven is completely happy and a functioning young woman, but something she forgot to take into account was how much she would inevitably change when Avaerie was born. She never got that night out when she got to be wild and crazy and free for the very first time. She will never get that night, and do you know why? Because she will never be free. There is never freedom when you have a baby. There is love, love that neither you nor I can imagine. There's happiness. You may be able to deal with the lack of sleep, or the diapers, or the ever-churning emotion, or the fear that maybe someday your boyfriend will realize that he will never get to be an uninhibited nineteen year old again. You might be able to come to terms with the fact that money will be tighter, and you will have to put back that cute dress you found at H&M to go buy a new carseat for your little one. You might be the most selfless person on the planet. But the point is that you're probably not. You're a teenager, you're a child. You have things you want! And, more than that, the world has things it wants from you! You have potential, and you have talent, and you have heart. You can live your life and stay in love with this person your with and, in five years, when you've done everything you want to do and you still want that baby, he or she will be waiting for you.
I feel very strongly about this because I know EXACTLY how you feel!!! I've been there, girl, and the only way I got through it was reminding myself about that moment of freedom, and the knowledge that the world is yours. You're not that far away from having everything you want within reach. And if you respond to this by sayign that everything you want IS a baby, or that you can do everything you want with a baby, you're wrong, plain and simple. Babies are a wonderful gift, but they are a gift that you can open anytime you want, and it doesn't have to be now.
You don't have a to 'be a kid', I'm not going to start preaching that, but be YOU! Be the YOU that you are now, because believe it or not, that person is going to change. Maybe now you want to climb Mount Everest...when you're a mother, you'll second guess that. Because you will never be the priority to yourself again, or shouldn't...that baby will be your world. And no matter how ready you are for that, it doesn't justify losing everything that you'll never be able to get back.

I hope this has helped!

you worded that incredibly!

that helped some what thank you. we'll see what happens in the future, i still have some months before i choose..

toasted, that was fantastic.

toasted you summed up the entire experience of being a young mother perfectly.

Thanks, ladies. I appreciate the vote of confidence because I'm NOT a teen mother, have never been pregnant, and can only recount what I know secondhand. It's good to know that those who have been through what Haven has agree with me.

Haley, feel free to message me if you ever want to chat. I can put you in touch with Haven too if you ever want some firsthand information. =)

- Elizabeth

I am 20 years old now, and I too was pregnant at 17. I graduated from high school nine months pregnant. I WAS with her father all through highschool, and we just broke up about a year ago. I would wait until you marry him to have a baby. You are still young!!! I wish I could have waited until I finished nursing school, and married. I missed out on experiencing the fun, college life! But hey I would NEVER change a thing!! She is my little girl, and I can't go one day without her. Although it was very hard being a single, teenage mother it was worth it!! So what I am trying to say to you is get done with all your millitary stuff then if having a baby is what you want GO FOR IT! Being a mother is the most rewarding experience!! It takes a lot of dedication and responsibility and MONEY! So make sure you can handle it first!!

Good luck with everything!

Notice how she said "I wish I could have waited". There's not need to read past there! It's a rewarding experience, but it's one you can have anytime you want in the next thirty years! =)

I can see how some people would get mixed messages when they read the same poster say:

I wish I had waited.

and

I wouldn't change a thing.