Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
This year, there's a lot of kids, like getting pregnant and like, it's just like, it's crazy.
It's a lot of pressure. And so like, some kids drop out and some kids try to stay in
school, but like, either way it's gonna be hard.
My girls were coming home, they were in middle school, they were telling me about the other
kids in school who were having sex. For me and my family, I'm very much about the abstinence
approach, I think most parents are. But the reality is that they said, it's not happening.
When folks parent too early, then that impacts their ability to finish high school, go on
to college, it even limits, you know, the job choices that they have.
Pregnancy, and teen parenting is a difficult issue. A lot of the teens we work with also
come from young parents. What we do at Healthy Futures of Texas, is
promote and provide the solutions, the strategies that work to help prevent teen pregnancy and
unplanned pregnancy in San Antonio and Texas. I think people in the community have been
historically um, found it difficult to talk about. We have had a silence that has not
helped young people to be able to know what to do. And in that silence from parents, from
the community, what do young people hear and see? They see what's on the internet, what's
on TV. There's a lot of *** messages out there and most of them are not healthy.
I've been in the field of social services for almost fifteen years. Hands down, I will
tell you that the work we are doing here is the most important that we could do is to
focus on prevention. I've worked with child abuse, I've worked in all different areas
in society and I know that prevention is key. Year after year after year, of seeing just,
terrible suffering I realized that the foundation of a healthy society is planning your family.
I work with the parenting program of Healthy Futures. So I run empowerment sessions to
help parents to feel comfortable in talking with their children about sex.
What I came away with is a very strong understanding that uh, I have a lot of learning to do myself.
Because I was brought up, this topic is full of shame and that shouldn't be my children's
fault, that's my fault. The parents walk in oftentimes not knowing
what to expect. And I see their eyes light up, I see them actually have those ah-ha moments
where they realize just how important they are, and how much influence they have in their
children' lives. The instructors were real, they were really
friendly too. And they talked about what they really needed to be talked about. There's
no one had to be like, afraid that they would be judged there, they could just say whatever.
A lot of times, they're kind of embarrassed, or don't want to ask their family. And just
with the information they received, they know there are services out there that they can
go to. It just made a difference of how we thought
about everything and what the possibilities were. Cuz if they're not or if they do get
pregnant or like they do, They won't have as much opportunities as they would not getting
pregnant I've always been honest with my girls on how
that is empowering them. Giving them that information would empower them to make those
life choices. This sort of sensitive and difficult piece
about how to talk about sex and healthy relationships, and *** decision making, how to talk about
abstinence, and for those who are already sexually active, how to protect yourself from
disease and unwanted pregnancy. Those are difficult things to be able to talk about.
We have so much good work going on in the community. Healthy Futures can come in and
help fill that piece of the puzzle for the folks that different agencies work with, schools,
churches, um and really help be a part of the fabric.
Right away, I started thinking, I've got to do something to support them. Because I feel
this is a very important message. To our donors and to potential donors to Healthy
Futures of Texas, I just say thank you. You are making a huge impact on the trajectory
and on the success of San Antonio as a city. Thank you for providing the funds so my children
could attend the program. It did make me, personally, think about like,
my goals and how I could reach them or how. Like waiting, is a good thing.
It's not just a message about uh sex. And what options there are and what STD's are,
it's an, it's a message of how you need to look inside yourself and have self-esteem.
Love yourself. I mean, so it's a much, much bigger, bigger message and I think, that's
what ties it all together in a beautiful way.