Do you even know any teen Moms? If you do, you must not know them well or you'd know NO ONE is praising them for becoming pregnant as a teen. Baby showers are NOT going to change pregnancy rates one way or another. And deciding to have and keep the baby means the Mom is signing up for YEARS of hateful comments and criticism. The odds are stacked against her at every possible turn. No one praises her. NO ONE. Not her family, not her friends and certainly not anyone who attends her baby shower. What a few do, hopefully, is offer emotional support. Saying things like This will be incredibly difficult. Life will never be the same. But let me help you make a plan. Let me help you by offering up a few essentials that will be used up in no time. (Diapers) Let me help you by directing you to some resources. Let me help you by discussing your education and how you can continue that. You'll note that none of those celebrate the Mom and her pregnancy.
I had a baby at 16 and the treatment I got was appalling, at best. Despite the fact that I'd been a very good student, very good kid, never in any trouble at all and just had the misfortune to have been pressured by a boy who didn't care about me but, of course, I thought he did. I got raked over the coals and back again.
Then when he passed away as an infant, after many surgeries to try to treat a heart defect, I got raked over the coals again and again and again. That's what I got, they said. For being a teen Mom. It's for the best. Really?
Our society is so backwards. Nothing but SHAME to young girls regarding sex. Absolutely no birth control! Nope! That's not ok! That's SHAMEFUL. But then they get pregnant and everyone's up in arms. And then, God forbid, they keep and try to raise the child. (Because their feelings regarding that choice actually, you know, matter.) More shame and no one wants to help the girl. Just give her her scarlett letter and cast her and her child off as worthless human beings not deserving of any kind of help or support.
Trust me. TRUST ME. No one is praising teen Moms for getting pregnant. And most of them never meant to be pregnant in the first place. But life happens and sometimes it's nice to have a little help dealing with the hard stuff.