Mya Elmelem was 15 when she became pregnant with Jake and has been surviving on benefits ever since. Now 19, she lives with her three-year-old son in Kentish Town.
Mya recently gave evidence to the Government's Social Exclusion Unit, which has just published its report into teenage pregnancy. Here she describes what being a teenage mother was like for her.
“I went out with Jake's dad for a long time. We were childhood sweethearts. Sex education never covers anything about the emotional side of relationships - the fact that you're dealing with young people in love."
Mya, who lives in Grafton Road, was already pregnant when somebody from the Brook Advisory Service came into school.
She said: "They shouldn't have one-off lessons. Sex education should happen over the whole school learning period. But I can't say that I didn't have any knowledge. When I was 12, me and my mum were really close and she was very liberal. I could always talk to her about sex."
Mya complained that information supplied with the Pill seemed complicated.
"They should print little cards with step-by-step information for young people instead of big leaflets that you have to hunt through. Some kind of plastic card with basic steps, one to 10, would work. Then if you did miss a pill and were panicking, you'd know exactly what to do."
She believes for the most part that contraception is still a woman's issue.
"It's nerve-racking for a young girl to stop in the middle of sex and say to a boy, 'can you put on a condom, please?' I've got older friends who still don't like doing it because they say it 'ruins the moment'. They don't even think about what can happen after- wards."
When Mya suspected she was pregnant, she encountered "this really horrible doctor" who refused to see her without her mother.
"It's hard because you associate your family doctor with your parents and you're scared to tell them anything. I remember my mum taking me to the doctor with her years before. People should know, through a flyer or something, that what you tell the doctor is confidential.
"I said to the doctor, 'Look, I'm nearly 16 anyway, so I can do this on my own', and she said, 'oh, I don't think you should. Have you thought about an abortion?'
"She went on,'look at you, you're getting annoyed with me now. How do you think you'll handle being a mum?' This was my first appointment to find out if I was really pregnant and I got all that. She had a really negative attitude, yet it was none of her business.
"From the beginning I wanted to keep my child. I had been taking the Pill, but I didn't take it properly and fell pregnant. I considered a termination and I had the appointment booked, but I didn't go because I knew I'd regret it. My teachers were really good. They fought to find me a home tutor and helped me take some of my exams while Jake was a new-born baby.
"People look at you and think, 'young mum, boyfriend in prison'. It's just stereotyping. At first, when I'd walk down the street with Jake, I found people would say to me, 'Oh, what did your mum say?' That annoyed me. People were thinking, 'Oh, she only did it to get a council flat'. I actually had to wait ages for my flat. I cried when I saw it because it was so disgusting and dismal. It was utterly horrible. I felt like I was fighting the whole world when Jake was first born, but now it's the real life issues which make it hard to be a young mum.
"I don't have as much of a life in terms of going out, because I don't see my friends every day like I used to. The money I get to live on isn't enough. It literally puts the food in my mouth and it pays my electricity bill.
"Teenage fathers should definitely make a financial contribution because they helped make that child. Jake's dad has only recently come out of prison, but I'd rather have the money off him than the Government. It's the principle really.
"I've always wanted to go back to work. I used to try to go to college but I couldn't find a nursery place; I went to my MP, who wrote a letter to my local nursery to get a place for me. I wasn't accepted. I've always done a lot more than most young mums to get work, but it's still out of reach.
"Sometimes I wish I'd waited to have Jake, but I can still have everything in life. I just have to try a little bit harder."
About the team
This article was produced by editors Rachel Bulford, 18, Daniel Blackwood and Darrell Philip, 17, Oliver Robertson and Karen Loughrey, 16, Anna Chandwani, Steven Boyle, Lindsay Marchant and Amy Wood, 15, Ruth Sewell, 14, and reporter Kierra Box, 13. It was published in the Hampstead and Highgate Express.
