Stopping the stigma: A look at the lives of young parents

New Zealanders are broad-minded and accepting of differences in society – but their attitudes to teenage mothers can be insulting.

Two teenage mothers who had their first child decades apart from one another both agree on one thing – society still looks askance at teenagers who have babies.

Tertiary student Jessica Holland has been a victim of the stigma still surrounding teenage pregnancy.

“I got called a slut a lot.”

Jessica was 16 when she conceived her son Xavier in 2014, but was subjected to a stigma that has been around for centuries.

Registered nurse Michelle Ranstead conceived her first child at 17 in 1994, and is not surprised by Jessica’s treatment.

While there may be two decades between the women’s pregnancies, both confirmed they were subject to strangers hurling verbal abuse at them in public.

“They didn’t know anything about me. What if it was a rape baby? I used to go to the toilets and cry,”  Ranstead said.

The abuse is surprising as, according to The Te Ara Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, this country  has the second highest rate of teenage births in high-income countries, with 28.4 births in a 1000 for women aged 15-19.

However, Ranstead believes it is because of the high number of teenage mothers that the government has become involved.

“I think the government’s decided ‘this is a problem. We need to actually do something’”.

While both Jessica and Michelle believe there are more government-based support networks for young parents neither felt the stigma within society itself was gone.

“I think there will always be that [stigma], especially with people like me who look really young as well,” says Michelle.

Michelle is working towards her masters degree, whose eldest child turned 22 this year.

Jessica Holland is a tertiary student currently studying early childhood education in Hamilton, with her son’s second birthday next month, and believes age does not matter in parenting.

“It’s not any different to anyone else having a kid. I may be younger and I’ve still got things to do in my life, but having kids isn’t going to stop me.”