Troubled teens
Dr. S. YAMUNA
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Learn to show affection and love in non-sexual expressions...
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Eighteen-year-old Sumega, a first year engineering student, was suffering from abdominal pain and vomiting for two days. The medical officer who examined her suspected food poisoning and prescribed medicines.
A fortnight later, Sumega visited the medical officer with symptoms of headache, vomiting and abdominal pain. The same medical officer examined her. He went into the details of her menstrual history and frequency of the menstrual cycles. Sumega said that her cycles have always been irregular. The doctor requested Sumega to be frank. He asked, "Have you been going steady with anybody? Have you slept with anyone?" Sumega denied any such association or encounter. But in view of the recurrent abdominal pain and vomiting, the medical officer asked for an ultrasound examination. The result showed a 12-week-old foetus in Sumega's uterus.
Teenage pregnancy outside wedlock is a reality. We are living in a world where it is still believed that boys can be sexually aggressive and it is the duty of the girls to resist sexual advances.
Experimentation
For many youth who are in a committed relationship, sexual intimacy is seen as the ultimate expression of love. Many feel that sexual intercourse is not an impulsive act in response to pheromones, passion or experimentation. They sincerely acknowledge the act as a genuine expression of caring and intimacy.
Few others are chronically depressed due to many factors like scholastic pressure, environmental chaos, parents are unhappily married and so on. Their poor self esteem makes them believe that sexual closeness would provide them with the love and encouragement they are eagerly looking for.
In situations where parents make critical appraisal of their sons and daughters and do not allow teenagers to evolve and emancipate, some boys and girls feel that having an intimate relationship with a person of the opposite sex would look after their need for unconditional love.
Some teens, who are brought up in households with rigid disciplining, where even talking to a person of the opposite sex is considered a gross deviation of behaviour, rebel by getting involved in sexual proximity and promiscuity.
There are some youngsters who feel that they are entitled to experience everything under the sun, irrespective of the high risk involved. These are individuals who experiment with drugs, alcohol and tobacco and also with multiple partners.
Then there is another group of young adults who believe that everyone else around them are sexually active but are not becoming pregnant or not suffering from AIDS. "Why should I alone deprive myself?" But in reality, they are in the midst of friends who are in a fantasy world.
As far as teenagers are concerned, their main sources of information on sexuality are friends, books and pornographic films. Parents are not their informants. Many parents give guidance only on prohibition without explaining the actual processes involved. Many a time, parents hush their adolescents to silence when they talk about a single friend of the opposite sex. Rather parents should encourage conversation and should also feel free to invite their teenager's friends and have a healthy get together at home.'
High risk behaviour
Abstinence is the most effective contraceptive. Teenagers should learn to show affection and love in many of the non-sexual expressions and not involve in sexual activity. Pressurising or forcing anyone into sexual intercourse is not acceptable. It does not show love or respect. It only shows how selfish, exploitative and disrespectful the person is. Teenagers should avoid high-risk situations like being alone in someone else's house or car. Youngsters should learn to say, "There is no doubt that I love you. But I am not ready for the kind of intimacy you are expecting. If you really love me, respect my feelings." A true friend would definitely respect their feelings.
If Sumega had been properly informed, she could have prevented the eventuality. Though sexuality emerges during adolescence, sexual intercourse should be postponed until after marriage. Pregnancy outside wedlock either ends in abortion or orphans. Youngsters of today are responsible and should not contribute to the destruction of lives or the production of many more orphans.
Dr. Yamuna is a Chennai based Consultant Paediatrician and Adolescent Physician.
E-mail: dryamunapaed@yahoo.com
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