Goddess: celebrity moms

• Babies Having Babies

  posted by brenda - Thu Jun 19 2008, 11:41 AM PDT

  celebs: Casey Aldridge | Jamie Lynn Spears
  topics: Couples | Kids

  Jamie Lynn Spears and Casey Aldridge plan to raise Maddie Briann in Lousiana. INFDaily.com Everyone was shocked when 17-year-old Jamie Lynn Spears announced that she was pregnant back in December. While the "Zoey 101" star was admittedly scared, she and her 19-year-old boyfriend Casey Aldridge got engaged and decided to bravely face their future together, along with the support of their families.
  
  This morning, Jamie Lynn gave birth to a healthy baby girl named Maddie Briann. Now the real fun begins. Being a new mom is a lot of work for anyone, but I imagine it's particularly challenging when you're a teenager. Fortunately, Jamie Lynn has plenty of family to help out with her new daughter, and has the means to pay others to lend her a hand if necessary, but many teen mothers aren't as lucky. This is why the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy is on a mission to reduce the number of teen pregnancies in the United States. According to the organization, Jamie Lynn is just one of more than 400,000 teen girls who will give birth this year.
  
  Here are some additional statistics to ponder:
  
  -- Despite a one-third decline since the early 1990s, the United States still has the highest rate of teen pregnancy and birth among comparable (meaning fully industrialized) countries.
  
  -- Three out of ten American girls get pregnant before age 20 that's 750,000 teen pregnancies each year.
  
  -- Among Latina girls, 53% get pregnant at least once before age 20. Among African American girls it's 51%. That means more than half of all girls in these communities are getting pregnant as teenagers.
  
  -- Almost half of all teens have never considered how a pregnancy would affect their lives.
  
  -- Less than half of teen mothers ever graduate from high school and fewer than 2% earn a college degree by age 30.
  
  -- Parenthood is the leading reason girls cite for dropping out of school.
  
  -- Pregnant teens are far less likely to receive timely and consistent prenatal care than women who become pregnant at a later age.
  
  -- Children of teen mothers do worse in school than those born to older parents. They are 50% more likely to repeat a grade, are less likely to complete high school than the children of older mothers, and also have lower performance on standardized tests.
  
  -- Children of teen mothers are more likely to be born prematurely and at low birthweight, and are twice as likely to suffer abuse and neglect than children born to older mothers.
  
  -- Two-thirds of families begun by a young unmarried mother are poor.
  
  -- More than half of all mothers on welfare had their first child as a teenager.
  
  -- Teen mothers are likely to have a second birth relatively soon about one-fourth of teen moms have a second child within 24 months of the first which can further impede their ability to finish school, keep a job, or escape poverty.
  
  -- Eight out of ten fathers don't marry the teen mother of their child.
  
  -- Daughters of teen mothers are more likely to become teen mothers themselves than daughters born to older women.
  
  -- Sons of teen mothers are more than twice as likely to end up in prison than sons born to older women.
  
  -- Children born to teen parents are more likely than those born to older parents to end up in foster care.
  
  
  

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